posted 19 years ago
Thank you for the opportunity to participate in the JavaRanch Web Services forum. I've enjoyed taking part in the discussions this past week. My apologies if it took too long for me to respond to some of the questions; this past week at the ranch coincided with a review of a lengthy paper on SOA I was asked to conduct for an upcoming IBM Systems Journal. However, after reading some of your ongoing discussion threads, it was evident to me that many of you (especially Lasse) already have a solid understanding of what SOA is, its growing significance in the IT community, and how the Web Services technology platform is evolving in support of SOA.
I have one last piece of advice that touches on a an issue an earlier JavaRanch contributor raised: the use (and misuse) of �SOA� as a marketing term. Almost every major application server and software development vendor is incorporating this term into the branding of their next product releases. While sometimes the term is used appropriately, sometimes it isn�t. Simply prefixing a product name with �SOA�, or promoting a product as being �SOA compliant� may have very little actual meaning. I would encourage you to approach this next generation of SOA products with a degree of skepticism. If you�re given the responsibility of evaluating or purchasing tools or servers, try to do some research to ensure that advertised SOA support doesn�t just mean it supports Web Services.
Best regards,
Thomas
