Toward a Hybrid Solution for the Web of Services Eric Newcomer IONA Technologies W3C Workshop on Web of Services for Enterprise Computing February

Web of Documents is a Success! Human to computer interactions well on the way to solution Everyone knows about and uses the Web

Web of Services is Not Industry and business requirements are not met How to make this succeed? CICS IMS C, C++, COBOL, PL/I, Java, C#

The answer is standardization Underlying Platform Application Service Network Standard Network Interconnect Protocol Standard Application Programming Interface But the industry has been trying unsuccessfully for years From “The Keys to the Highway” by Conklin and Newcomer, third chapter of The Future Of Software, MIT Press,1995 Figure 1, Interchangeable applications and open network access

CICS IMS Is service abstraction the right approach? Service enable existing IT systems Use WSDL plus extensions Multi protocol Multi data format (not just XML) Preserve & bridge existing QoS

Enterprise Software Productivity The biggest missing link is program- program standards These are resisted by vendors –Fight for developers remains key issue Solution through Web services would provide significant benefit But Is the W3C really the place for this?

Does a single set of standards make sense? FIREWALL Integrator Routing Transport Translation Process flow IMS SAP MQ Series OS 390 ftp Tandem BAAN Orbix Tuxedo CICS MRP PeopleSoft Supplier A Supplier Supplier A Supplier Internet Intranet Middleware solution based on SOAP/WSDL http/XML standards Exostar TPF http External Repository/ UDDI Internal Repository/ UDDI

Or is a hybrid set better? FIREWALL Integrator Routing Transport Translation Process flow IMS SAP MQ Series OS 390 ftp Tandem BAAN Orbix Tuxedo CICS MRP PeopleSoft Supplier A Supplier Supplier A Supplier Internet Intranet Middleware solution based on SOAP/WSDL Multi- protocol/XML Exostar Middleware solution based on REST http/XML TPF http External Repository/ UDDI Internal Repository/ UDDI

What Can Be Done? Clearly separate Web and services architectures –EPRs make sense in the enterprise (for example) –Define how to join the two Help users develop best practices –Avoid innovator’s dilemma Define multi protocol and multi data format binding –Layer on existing enterprise IT infrastructures –Bridge using WS-Context for sessions –“SOAP server” alongside Web server –(SOAP was originally HTTP extension)

SOAP server alongside Web server Web Server SOAP Server http message http proxy HTML XML MSG JMS IIOP WCF MQ CORBA Object EJB.NET MQ WS-Context

Summary Existing systems are not going away –Too expensive to throw them out Need standards for productivity gain Abstractions are not just technical –Software exists for humans to interact with Avoid innovator’s dilemma –Design new systems using REST principles Do we need a way to map HTTP uniform interfaces to existing custom interfaces?