I have an initial submission for this TC if anyone is interested. I
have kind of stopped working on it due to time constraints but would
welcome anyone else who wants to work on it. I have not yet contributed
it to the TC but will if there is consensus.
D
*******************************
Adobe Systems, Inc. - http://www.adobe.com
Vice Chair - UN/CEFACT http://www.uncefact.org/
Chair - OASIS SOA Reference Model Technical Committee
Personal Blog - http://technoracle.blogspot.com/
*******************************
-----Original Message-----
From: Francis McCabe [mailto:]
Sent: Thursday, December 08, 2005 9:28 AM
To: Duane Nickull
Cc: Metz Rebekah; Bashioum, Christopher D;
Subject: Re: [soa-rm] Proposal: Reorganization of SOA-RM Draft for
Better
Perhaps we need an OASIS spec on concept maps ....
On Dec 7, 2005, at 10:40 PM, Duane Nickull wrote:
> I believe that the problem, with is largely due to the fact there
> is no normative reference for how to interpret concept maps. In
> this case, a service is neither an action nor an object. It is
> imply an abstract concept.
>
>
>
> D
>
>
>
> *******************************
> Adobe Systems, Inc. - http://www.adobe.com
> Vice Chair - UN/CEFACT http://www.uncefact.org/
> Chair - OASIS SOA Reference Model Technical Committee
> Personal Blog - http://technoracle.blogspot.com/
> *******************************
>
>
>
> From: Metz Rebekah [mailto:]
> Sent: Wednesday, December 07, 2005 7:18 PM
> To: Bashioum, Christopher D;
> Subject: RE: [soa-rm] Proposal: Reorganization of SOA-RM Draft for
> Better
>
>
>
> From: Bashioum, Christopher D [mailto:]
> Sent: Wednesday, December 07, 2005 5:06 PM
> To: Metz Rebekah;
> Subject: RE: [soa-rm] Proposal: Reorganization of SOA-RM Draft for
> Better
>
>
>
> Rebekah,
>
>
>
> what about the potential of an act?
>
>
>
> [->] The potential of service is an offer.
>
>
>
> I have a problem with the following
>
>
>
> <Snip>
>
> The actual invocation and performance of the capability is the
> service; i.e. the action.
>
> </Snip>
>
>
>
> if I understand what you are saying here, it would imply that a
> service is not a service until it is actually performing an
> action. During the time that it is "waiting" to perform an action
> it is not a service, nor is it after it has completed the action it
> was created to do.
>
>
>
> [->] yes, you are right. That is exactly what I'm implying. The
> service isn't performing the action, the implementation of the
> action is. The service is the performance.
>
>
>
>
>
> In Duane's diagram, the service exists independent of the
> interaction. However, the interaction is what causes the real-
> world effect.
>
>
>
> I'm not sure I buy the other statement that a service is an act as
> opposed to an object. Isn't it an object (in that it exists) who's
> purpose is to perform an act?
>
> [->] So I'll ask a question in return. Let's assume the statement
> is true. If a service exists as an object that is independent of
> the capability who's purpose it is to perform; what differentiates
> the service from the capability?
>
>
>
> For that matter, is the capability what is actually providing the
> "action" and the service is the means to access that action?
>
> [->] From this perspective, what differentiates the service from
> the service access point?
>
>
>
> [->] My point is that the conceptualization of service as an object
> doesn't provide resolution to these questions. It is for this
> reason that I started examining service as a verb rather than a
> noun. From that perspective, the concepts and the relationships
> between them clarified.
>
>
>
> Rebekah
>
>
>
> From: Metz Rebekah [mailto:]
> Sent: Wednesday, December 07, 2005 4:37 PM
> To:
> Subject: RE: [soa-rm] Proposal: Reorganization of SOA-RM Draft for
> Better
>
> Gosh - if this email came through in some weird format for everyone
> else, I am terribly sorry about the wacky formatting of this email
> thread. Not sure if everyone saw it as I did, but at least my
> outlook client puked =)
>
>
>
> Uh-oh. We seem to be starting to head back to the service as an
> object as opposed to an act. I still do not believe that a service
> is an 'object.' In fact, I believe that assumption has caused
> much of the difficulty in figuring out what a service actually is.
>
>
>
> What is invoked is a capability, consistent with the execution
> context and so to produce real world effects. The actual
> invocation and performance of the capability is the service; i.e.
> the action. Hence I maintain that visibility, interaction and
> effect are the interrelated concepts often (yet confusingly)
> referred to with a shorthand nomenclature of 'service.'
>
>
>
> As far as roles go, the very essence of the word service is the
> recognition that <someone> does <something> for <someone else>. I
> would agree that any other specification of this generalization (uh...
> isn't that an ontology) belongs in something other than the RM.
>
>
>
> Rebekah
>
>
>
> Rebekah Metz
>
> Associate
>
> Booz Allen Hamilton
>
> Voice: (703) 377-1471
>
> Fax: (703) 902-3457
>
>
>
> From: Ken Laskey [mailto:]
> Sent: Wednesday, December 07, 2005 4:19 PM
> To: Metz Rebekah
> Cc: Jones, Steve G; ; ;
> ; ;
> ; ;
> ; ;
>
> Subject: Re: [soa-rm] Proposal: Reorganization of SOA-RM Draft for
> Better
>
>
>
> inline
>
>
>
> On Dec 7, 2005, at 4:00 PM, Metz Rebekah wrote:
>
>
>
> Comments inline...
>
>
>
> From: Ken Laskey [mailto:]
>
> Sent: Wednesday, December 07, 2005 3:43 PM
>
> To: Jones, Steve G
>
> Cc: ; ; ; soa-
> ; ;
> ; ;
> ;
>
> Subject: Re: [soa-rm] Proposal: Reorganization of SOA-RM Draft for
> Better
>
>
>
> If I invoke a service, I am a service consumer. It does not matter
> if I invoke the service on my own initiative or am told to do it
> (through a targeted instruction or as part of a more complex set of
> instructions), I am still the service consumer.
>
>
>
> [->] Agreed.
>
>
>
> I could glibly say that if I "provide" a service, I'm a service
> provider, but I fear things are not that simple. Is the entity that
> created the service its provider, or the one who maintains it, or
> the one who hosts it, or the one who pays for it, or ...?
>
> [->] I see this being a question of 'what are the roles' versus
> 'who plays the roles'. At first pass, it seems right that we
> recognize the roles @ the RM level and leave the details of
> determining the best way to decide how to assign some entity into
> that role to the RA.
>
>
>
> I think it is easy to start naming roles but difficult to stop, and
> the roles will get more use-specific.
>
>
>
> Luckily, from the RM standpoint, we don't care.
>
> [->] or do we just delegate =)
>
>
>
> ... to someone who has no choice but to care ;-)
>
> To be used within the context of SOA, the service must be visible,
> must be able to take part in an interaction
>
> [->] Here it sounds like the service is an active player in an
> interaction. Isn't it that the service consumer and provider
> interact (as specified...?
>
>
>
> Isn't the service an active player? I invoke it to get its real
> world effect, so it certainly sounds like it does something.
>
>
>
> (as specified by the established execution context), and must
> produce a real world effect (which I assume may in some
> circumstances be null). It has been "provided" but we don't care
> how or by whom.
>
>
>
> So, in summary, there's a lot of muddy water but sometimes we can
> avoid playing in it. :-)
>
> [->] Or we can draw a circle around it and leave that to the RA =)
>
>
>
> ... at which point you initially choose RA cases that you can more
> cleanly defined. You eventually get to the tougher ones, but we
> should learn to ride a bicycle before we get a motorcycle (unless
> Duane has a different perspective)
>
>
>
> Ken
>
> [->] Rebekah
>
>
>
> Ken
>
>
>
>
>
> If I make a service available for someone to invoke (and here I
> would say that "make available"
>
> On Dec 7, 2005, at 4:47 AM, Jones, Steve G wrote:
>
>
>
>
>
> To add some mud into the water...
>
>
>
> Many Bus architectures do "enrichment" of messages between consumer
> and producer, including the invocation of other services to perform
> that enrichment (e.g stock quote returns current price, enrichment
> provides the last ten days closing price). They may also do
> calculations that result in the non-connection or "empty" return
> from the service (e.g. if you call for "last five minutes trades"
> after the market has closed... its an empty set). So while I agree
> that the service consumer is key it's sometimes hard to identify
> the true consumer and the true producer of a service within a
> virtualised bus.
>
>
>
> Steve
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
> From: [mailto:McGregor.Wesley@tbs-
> sct.gc.ca]
>
> Sent: 06 December 2005 19:09
>
> To: ; ; ;
> ; ; ;
> ;
>
> Cc:
>
> Subject: RE: [soa-rm] Proposal: Reorganization of SOA-RM Draft for
> Better
>
>
>
> I agree with Ken.
>
>
>
> The service consumer is the key concept that indicates the entity
> that invoked the service in the first place.
>
>
>
> A brokering service or service actor is merely a middle-man.
>
>
>
> Wes
>
> -----Original Message-----
>
> From: Ken Laskey [mailto:]
>
> Sent: December 6, 2005 2:02 PM
>
> To: ; ;
> ; ; ;
> ;
>
> Cc:
>
> Subject: RE: [soa-rm] Proposal: Reorganization of SOA-RM Draft for
> Better
>
>
>
> I could argue that a broker consumes the service on someone else's
> behalf. In reality, service actor seems too nondescriptive because
> either the consumer or the provider can be thought of as an actor.
>
>
>
> Ken
>
>
>
> At 01:45 PM 12/6/2005, wrote:
>
>
>
> I hate to stir things up a bit, but can you change the service
> consumer term to service actor?
>
> Since in the case of brokering the service actor is not consuming
> but brokering a request to another service.
>
> The broker service can be a service actor upon the service but
> might not really consume any part of the service since it is a pass
> through.
>
>
>
> But I guess this is a matter of opinion.
>
>
>
> - Dan
>
> -----Original Message-----
>
> From: Ken Laskey [ mailto:]
>
> Sent: Tuesday, December 06, 2005 10:39 AM
>
> To: Duane Nickull; Goran Zugic; Matt MacKenzie; MATHEWS, Tim; Sally
> St. Amand;
>
> Cc:
>
>
>
> Subject: RE: [soa-rm] Proposal: Reorganization of SOA-RM Draft for
> Better
>
>
>
> I think we need to add some words to the RM to capture this
> discussion. We cover part of this in the beginning of Section
> 3.2.1 but need to be more specific that:
>
>
>
> - a service consumer can be a human or a software agent;
>
>
>
> - a service consumer can invoke any number of services (including a
> single service in isolation) and can chain the output of some
> services to act as the input of others;
>
>
>
> - from the perspective of a given service, the occurrence of such
> chaining would not be visible;
>
>
>
> - the service consumer can be implementing a business process;
>
>
>
> - the specific of a business process do not change the basic SOA
> concepts as described in the RM; however, the specific architecture
> that one designs and implements will reflect the business process
> and make use of specific service instances that corresponds to the
> real world effects that the business process hopes to realize.
>
>
>
> Now that said, and in full appreciation that we agreed earlier that
> mechanisms which combine services (e.g. choreography,
> orchestration) are out of scope, is it sufficient for words, such
> as those suggested above, to be included somewhere within the
> current discussion or do we need to pull it out into a subsection
> on its own? As an example of the former, we tried to deal with
> loose-coupling and coarse-grained with words at the end of Section
> 2.1.
>
>
>
> Ken
>
> At 12:23 PM 12/6/2005, Duane Nickull wrote:
>
>
>
> Goran:
>
>
>
> I slightly disagree with your assertions, probably based on
> semantics. For a service to "participate" in a process, it would
> have to be aware of the process (which many will not be). A better
> way to depict this may be to state "services may be aggregated and
> used by processes" and "processes may be represented/exposed as
> services". There are really no limits to the number of layers that
> can be present. Attached is a UML CVD depicting such.
>
>
>
> A key rationale of why process is not part of SOA is that services
> cannot see process. They are not aware of whether they are being
> called as part of a process vs. as an individual service. If the
> "s" part of SOA cannot see or touch that, it cannot be part of the RM.
>
>
>
> The chicken and egg discussion you bring forward is a requirement
> for those building services to strongly consider the business
> process when designing their service infrastructure. Accordingly,
> it is not really part of the RM for SOA yet I agree that it is a
> very important consideration.
>
>
>
> For your messages to get to the list, you must join as a
> "applicant" rather than an "observer" as per OASIS process.
>
>
>
> Duane
>
>
>
> *******************************
>
> Adobe Systems, Inc. - http://www.adobe.com
>
> Vice Chair - UN/CEFACT http://www.uncefact.org/
>
> Chair - OASIS SOA Reference Model Technical Committee
>
> Personal Blog - http://technoracle.blogspot.com/
>
> *******************************
>
>
>
>
>
> From: Goran Zugic [ mailto:]
>
> Sent: Monday, December 05, 2005 8:47 PM
>
> To: Duane Nickull; Matt MacKenzie; MATHEWS, Tim; Sally St. Amand;
>
>
> Cc:
>
> Subject: Re: [soa-rm] Proposal: Reorganization of SOA-RM Draft for
> Better
>
>
>
> Duane,
>
>
>
> Thanks for the response. Yes I would like to see the PPT. I hope
> you do not mind if I add few more thoughts related to services and
> business processes:
>
>
>
> Services participate in a business process to add some value to it.
> They can be governed and evaluated using business process metrics.
> One service can participate in many business processes and provide
> value to each of them according to the context within that process.
> As far as SOA is concerned it is as important to know what the
> service does, how it can be discovered, contacted, invoked,
> executed, etc. as it is to be able to use it within the process
> context, measure it and assess its value from the business process
> requirements point of view. SOA needs to avoid typical new
> technology chicken and egg syndrome, e.g. companies not producing
> services because there are no service friendly process definitions
> to use them and not having SOA friendly process definitions because
> there are no services to use. Services do not have to know if they
> will be involved in the process upfront, they will be contacted on
> demand according to the process script that is in effect, and they
> will be contacted, checked if available, passed the arguments,
> collected the response and according to their procedure left alone
> to wait for another call. The process execution engine however
> needs to invoke the service according to both service specific
> information and the process specific information.
>
>
>
> Having just the service specific information in a model covers only
> one part of the picture and I think it is fine as long as that
> model is a pure service model. However I find it difficult to
> understand that the SOA RM TC model is a SOA reference model when
> it does not include other concepts of SOA. Unfortunately it seems
> that we cannot get to the point where we could agree on a minimal
> set of supported SOA concepts by a model to be the SOA RM. We do
> not have to and I do not want to argue with you or anybody else in
> SOA RM TC. I am just trying to see how our works can fit together
> in a most efficient way. We obviously need more time to better
> understand each others thoughts and ideas and I strongly believe
> that a constructive respectable discussion is helpful for everybody.
>
>
>
> By the way, do you know what I am supposed to do to get my messages
> to the SOA RM list. In spite of that I am the SOA RM TC observer I
> get a faliure notice whenever I send a note to the SOA RM.
>
>
>
> Goran
>
>
>
> ----- Original Message -----
>
> From: Duane Nickull
>
> To: Matt MacKenzie ; ; MATHEWS, Tim ;
> Sally St. Amand ;
>
> Cc:
>
> Sent: Monday, December 05, 2005 5:02 PM
>
> Subject: RE: [soa-rm] Proposal: Reorganization of SOA-RM Draft for
> Better
>
>
>
> Goran:
>
>
>
> The service layer enables the process layer over top of it, however
> during runtime, services do not know if they are part of a process
> or being called individually (it would generally be a bad idea to
> try to maintain the overall state of a process within each service,
> although it could be done). For maximum repurposing of services,
> it would be better to have the service as a simple slave to the
> processes that may use it.
>
>
>
> Accordingly, we made a decision that BPM, Orchestration,
> choreography is not a core part of the RM for SOA. We generally
> seem to agree that many SOA implementations will include a layer of
> BPM over top. We are only addressing the SOA model, not the model
> for the underlying or overarching layers.
>
>
>
> I have a PPT that explains this in more detail if you are interested.
>
>
>
>
>
> Duane
>
>
>
> *******************************
>
> Adobe Systems, Inc. - http://www.adobe.com
>
> Vice Chair - UN/CEFACT http://www.uncefact.org/
>
> Chair - OASIS SOA Reference Model Technical Committee
>
> Personal Blog - http://technoracle.blogspot.com/
>
> *******************************
>
>
>
> From: Matt MacKenzie [ mailto:]
>
> Sent: Monday, December 05, 2005 12:51 PM
>
> To: ; MATHEWS, Tim; Sally St. Amand;
>
>
> Cc:
>
> Subject: RE: [soa-rm] Proposal: Reorganization of SOA-RM Draft for
> Better
>
>
>
> Process orientation is only one of multiple potential integration
> with service oriented architecture. SOA-RM is laying the
> foundation for durable architecture based on the core concept of
> service orientation. We recognize that process oriented
> architecture is a natural fit with service orientation...but so are
> things like event orientation.
>
>
>
>
>
> -matt
>
>
>
> From: [ mailto:]
>
> Sent: Monday, December 05, 2005 3:36 PM
>
> To: MATHEWS, Tim; Matt MacKenzie; Sally St. Amand;
>
>
> Cc:
>
> Subject: Re: [soa-rm] Proposal: Reorganization of SOA-RM Draft for
> Better
>
>
>
> I think that SOA RM has done good job documenting well-known
> service related concepts and defining some new ones.
>
>
>
> I do not see other details besides service and service-related
> concept definitions in the current SOA RM committee draft right
> now. I look forward to seeing the completion of the model you are
> working on with the bottom-up approach.
>
> Business, business processes and collaboration aspects of business
> are important to address in the model what is not the case with the
> current content of the SOA RM committee draft. By a business
> process I mean a generic business process entity which has common
> components (activities, decisions, etc) and relationships between
> them that can be used to model a business process in any
> environment regardless of what business we support and technology
> we use. I agree with Sally that a link between business processes
> and services should be one of key requirements any SOA reference
> model should try to meet.
>
>
>
> I am not sure what SOA with services brings to business when the
> link between the business processes and services and overall
> business process semantics in the SOA context are not considered to
> be important aspects in a SOA-based reference model.
>
>
>
> Goran
>
> -----Original Message-----
>
> From: MATHEWS, Tim [ mailto:]
>
> Sent: Monday, December 5, 2005 12:34 PM
>
> To: 'Matt MacKenzie', 'Sally St. Amand',
>
> Cc:
>
> Subject: RE: [soa-rm] Proposal: Reorganization of SOA-RM Draft for
> Better "Componentization"
>
> Matt - I am not sure what point you are trying to make by this? I
> agree with your premise of a bottom up effort, as this was one of
> the operating assumptions that was made from the beginning.
>
>
>
> But, I am confident it is the business environment that is
> independent from the reference model.
>
>
>
> TM
>
>
>
> From: Matt MacKenzie [ mailto:]
>
> Sent: Monday, December 05, 2005 11:58 AM
>
> To: Sally St. Amand;
>
> Cc:
>
> Subject: RE: [soa-rm] Proposal: Reorganization of SOA-RM Draft for
> Better "Componentization"
>
> Sally,
>
>
>
> A reference model actually needs to be a bottom up effort. We
> leave the ever so popular ?top-down? approach to folks like ebSOA J
>
>
>
> We?re creating a vocabulary and general understanding of what I
> hope we can call a discipline of computer science in the future.
> This means, we need a durable reference model that is not dependent
> on the current business environment.
>
>
>
> -matt
>
>
>
> From: Sally St. Amand [ mailto:]
>
> Sent: Monday, December 05, 2005 10:19 AM
>
> To:
>
> Cc:
>
> Subject: Re: [soa-rm] Proposal: Reorganization of SOA-RM Draft for
> Better "Componentization"
>
>
>
> Frank
>
>
>
> This is in response to your request on last week?s conference call,
> if anyone has comments speak now. I also think that the recent
> comments on clarifying sections are a reflection of my issues with
> the specification.
>
>
>
> I agree with the majority of points made/described in ver 10. My
> issues are with what is not in this draft. Based on Fig 1 the Refe!
> rence Model is guided by Reference Architectures, Concrete
> Architectures, Profile & Related Models. They in turn account for
> requirements, motivation & goals. This is creating a Reference
> Model from the bottom up. I believe a Reference Model should
> reflect a top down approach.
>
>
>
>
>
> The Reference Model needs to reflect the environment, the strategy
> and the priorities of the business/mission/collaboration. This
> will impact the construction of services. A service is a business
> task or activity that is realized through technology. The draft
> does a good job of describing how that realization happens. But it
> doesn?t provide a sufficient link between processes and services.
> The draft makes the point that the central focus of! SOA is the
> task of business function?getting something done. A business
> process is made up of tasks and activities to achieve a goal
> (getting something done). The concept of creating the service from
> the tasks and activities in a process is important. For example,
> where on the continuum of fine grained to coarse grained should a
> particular service be; this will affect interaction, reusability.
> The relationship between processes and services needs to be in the
> Reference Model.
>
>
>
> While I saw that there is a note saying the glossary is still in
> flux, since one of the objective of the Reference Model is a
> vocabulary, having less in the glossary might be a better option.
> Is semantic integration a guiding principle of SOA?
>
>
>
> With respect to conformance there needs to be business results.
> That is an SOA should provide demonstrable mission accomplishments,
> e.g. ROI, match a competitors distribution channel. SOA is not a
> technology. Conformance should provide operational accomplishments,
> these should be measurable.
>
>
>
> Sally
>
>
>
>
>
> !
>
>
>
>
>
>
