Someone down in the thread wrote:
> 2) An agent which, acting on behalf of its owner, uses a service.
If we hypothetically agree on the concept that an agent uses service, is
an agent always acting on behalf of its owner? I would assert that it is
acting on behalf of whomever invoked (directed, requested, whatever term
we believe is most appropriate) it.
The more concrete point being: A service owner and a service "invoker"
are, oftentimes, not one and the same.
Joe
Joseph Chiusano
Booz Allen Hamilton
Visit us online@ http://www.boozallen.com
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Don Flinn [mailto:]
> Sent: Thursday, April 07, 2005 12:22 PM
> To: Gregory A. Kohring
> Cc: Matthew MacKenzie; Thomas Erl;
> Subject: Re: [soa-rm] Definition of "Service Consumer"
>
> Greg
>
> Following the concept in the "Web Services Architecture"
> specification we should should separate the owner (human),
> from the agent that is defined in that spec as software.
> This is implied in your definition 2.
> The spec further divides the owner and agent into a requester
> and provider.
>
> Putting those pieces together:
>
> An Agent is a software program acting on behalf of an owner.
> (Note that there can be indirection in the control by the
> owner. For example, the owner might control the agent by
> means of policy, directly invoke the agent, put control
> directly into the agent code, etc.)
>
> A Service Consumer is an agent that wishes to interact with a
> service.
>
> I would lean more to the former spec's use of Requester Agent
> rather than Service Consumer since the request might not be
> successful and thus not consumed.
>
> Symmetry seem to demand similar constructs on the service side.
>
> Don
>
> On Thu, 2005-04-07 at 16:23 +0200, Gregory A. Kohring wrote:
> > Matthew,
> >
> > OK, here a fewer other choices which might be deemed more
> > "respectful"...
> >
> > Service Consumer:
> >
> > 1) End-user of a service.
> >
> > 2) An agent which, acting on behalf of its owner, uses a service.
> >
> > 3) An entity which utilizes a service
> >
> > 4) An entity which consumes the product or information produced by a
> > service.
> >
> >
> > Note all of these definitions depend upon the definition of
> the term
> > "service". Have we agreed on this already? Perhaps we should start
> > there first...
> >
> >
> > -- Greg
> >
> >
> >
> > Matthew MacKenzie wrote:
> > > I think services deserve respect, lets try not to exploit them :-)
> > >
> > > Gregory A. Kohring wrote:
> > >
> > >> Thomas,
> > >>
> > >> Perhaps one should use a somewhat broader definition
> which captures
> > >> the human user as well:
> > >>
> > >> Service Consumer: An entity which exploits a service.
> > >>
> > >>
> > >> -- Greg
> > >>
> > >>
> > >> Thomas Erl wrote:
> > >>
> > >>> Now that we've decided on the term "service consumer" it may be
> > >>> useful to formally define it. The term "consumer" is
> used by the
> > >>> WS-I Basic Profile wherein it is simply defined as
> "Software that
> > >>> invokes an instance."
> > >>>
> > >>> Thomas
> > >>>
> > >>
> > >>
> > >
> >
> >
> --
> Don Flinn
> President, Flint Security LLC
> Tel: 781-856-7230
> Fax: 781-631-7693
> e-mail:
> http://flintsecurity.com
>
>
