At least one Gartner analyst has noted that service-oriented architecture (SOA) is an inevitability*. It's going to happen, whether you like it or not. Says Gartner research VP Paolo Malinverno: “Even if you really don't want to know about SOA, and think it's no good for your company, you won't be able to avoid it unless you retire in the next year.”
This, he says, is because business application functionality is increasingly being broken up into services. “The use of SOA is increasing as organisations, including your competitors, try to attain the agility SOA promises. Web services standards are maturing (albeit slowly) and SOA-enabling technology (Web services support) is pervasively available in virtually every software product in the market.”
Vendors need to get their solutions to a level where they can plug into an SOA environment.
Deon Eachells, solutions manager, Softworx
Every vendor and his dog have hopped on the bandwagon too. For them, SOA is necessitating a relook at programme design and architecture. Oracle or SAP, for example, flog unwieldy, monolithic ERP systems. The promise of SOA is that a customer can buy financials from SAP, HR from Oracle, manufacturing from Sonic and so on. In order to do that, these programmes need to be componentised.
Says Softworx solutions manager Deon Eachells: “ERP promised it could do everything, including making tea. We know now that is not true. [The burning issue now is] how to get old ERP versions SOA compliant. ERP must be able to live in an SOA environment. The promise of SOA is that it will break ERP into smaller applications that plug into an SOA platform and integrate using XML. This means when you need to upgrade, you only upgrade a piece, unlike in the past when you had to disrupt the entire business and upgrade the whole platform. Vendors need to get their solutions to a level where they can plug into an SOA environment.”
SAP, via Netweaver, is on the road to providing new applications in componentised fashion, Eachells says. “Oracle has Fusion, which also provides integration and a platform to plug into, but this has been written for Oracle and its products. Microsoft has its application platform, Info4 has an OEM [agreement with] Progress Software's Sonic ESB. Again, the challenge is how to get customers using version one to version four so they're SOA complaint?” he asks.
It's a journey
A fair number of organisations have started heading down the SOA road. Many of them, not surprisingly, are facing challenges.
Says IBM South Africa business development manager for open computing and SOA, Joe Ruthven: “Many organisations have started with SOA, but failed prior to realising significant benefits. The major reasons for this are a lack of SOA governance, limited or no business sponsorship and support, no clearly defined business problem, and trying to do too much.
“As long as customers and vendors think of SOA as a thing or product, and not as a style or architecture, we'll have inconsistency. Customers and other users of SOA (consumers of services) must continuously place pressure on vendors to conform to standards that allow for interoperability. As users of SOA become more informed, consistency will follow as vendors will no longer get away with inaccurate messages.”
Says Softline Enterprise MD Ashley Ellington: “From an ERP vendor's perspective, we've recognised that SOA is part of the next generation of deployments of business software. In most organisations, there are many disparate areas running different applications. SOA is the component bringing all those together in one framework. What we're seeing now, especially in larger telcos employing larger applications that require integration between applications, is that the integration and delivery of that integration is done via an SOA framework. It's easier to manage and maintain as well as adding value to the overall solution.
“Where before we've seen disparate applications being integrated on a point-to-point basis, SOA lets you develop a more secure integration framework, which lets you pass information from one application to another more easily and more securely.”
Says Softworx's Eachells: “The race will be to see which of the major vendors can produce their new applications in this way first. Most customers will start using SOA at an integration level over the next 18 months, but the development and release of software in a true-service format is dependent on how quickly the vendors can bring their solutions to market in this format.”
Services first
Services are a modern way of looking at application functionality, says Progress Software SA MD Rick Parry. “When one views application functionality as a service, you realise that's what application functionality does - it's there to deliver service. The biggest inhibiting factor [to SOA] is getting people to recognise and understand the concept of service.”
SOA is part of the next generation of deployments of business software.
Ashley Ellington, MD, Softline Enterprise
Parry uses a simple analogy of the Internet and Internet service providers (ISPs). “The service ISPs deliver is access to the Internet, e-mail, etcetera, which users subscribe to over a network. This service doesn't typically reside on your technology or your infrastructure; it's an external service you can call [when you need it]. Internet banking is another good example.”
Clive Brindley, solution architect at HP SA, says: “When we meet customers, there's a lot of concern around what's existing in their infrastructures as far as services and Web services are concerned; SOA is not just Web services. Customers want to get a perspective on what is out there. They want us to help them discover these services and make sense of them. They know they have to do it, but they need to know where to start. They need a unified strategy, rather than just creating services in silos.”
A further challenge, says Softline's Ellington, is the technology and frameworks in which SOA is deployed. “You need the right resources in terms of technical knowledge. On the one side, you find SOA and the technologies around it allow you to deploy it in a building block type solution. You don't need to get involved in all of the technologies from day one; just use the components relevant to getting the solution in place. It's essential to get the platform in place and then, using SOA, grow and develop the applications in that environment.”
Take up?
IBM's Ruthven says the company has over 6 000 customer experiences with SOA worldwide. HP claims a mere four customers in Europe, a couple in the US, and one in South Africa are taking the plunge. Softline's Ellington says his company has about half-a-dozen customers using it one way or another, and Progress Software's Parry says his company is deploying to between five and 10 customers in SA.
Not huge numbers, but if the analysts are right, we can expect this to change in the next year or two. If the vendors can fulfil the promise of SOA the way it's intended, and not in the typical, 'Oh well, yes, it does integrate, but only if you use our preferred X, Y or Z', then it may take off even faster. Certainly, the local SOA space is one that bears careful watching.
* 'Let's Face It, SOA Is Inevitable', Paolo Malinverno, 31 July 2008. Report courtesy of Gartner.
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