The SOA Network: The Nature of Big, Dynamic Enterprise Service Networks

Understanding and managing the impact of dependencies on the SOA network is critical for the health and security of your enterprise service network. If change is made easier, then change will naturally occur at an accelerated pace. More new systems are completed more quickly. The applications of acquired companies are integrated into the IT landscape more rapidly. Connections with customers, suppliers and partners are built and rebuilt with greater speed.

The enterprise SOA network is, by nature, highly dynamic. Enterprise service networks rapidly get big. The number of application components in a service network is much larger than the number of applications in an enterprise where monolithic applications reign. One of the primary reasons the service-oriented approach works is that it breaks monolithic applications into smaller, more focused application modules that are easily understood, modified and linked to form and reform applications as the needs of the business change.

One look at the following diagram will show that enterprise SOA network is also characterized by complex interdependencies. The very notion of an “application” is changed in a service network. In the past, monolithic applications had very clear boundaries. In a service network, “applications” have fluid boundaries – they overlap and they are often assembled by leveraging components and services provided by other organizations within the enterprise, or even across enterprise boundaries.

The Nature of the SOA Network: Enterprise service networks are characterized by complex SOA interdependencies.

Dependencies can be direct, indirect and circular. Application modules often both consume and provide Web services. Applications are assembled by leveraging services provided by modules that themselves may rely on services provided by other modules that themselves ... you get the picture – it's the one in the diagram above.

The Impact of Change in an SOA

What do you get when you combine change, big networks of application components linked together in complex chains and interdependencies that are often unclear? (Other than a migraine.)

You get exploding costs associated with keeping the network running and meeting performance expectations – all while continuing to facilitate change (the reason for embarking on an SOA strategy in the first place).

The Cost of Change

As a service network grows, the marginal cost of change in the network grows at an accelerating pace. Three types of change in an enterprise service network dominate these rising costs.

Read about these changes and their impact on cost:

• Modifying Web Services: Unexpected Change to a Service in the Network
• Web Services Maintenance: How to Plan for Change in a Service in the Network
• Web Services Systems: Planned Simultaneous Change to Many Services in the Network

For More Information

Learn more about how to manage dependencies on the SOA network. Download the free webinar, Runtime Governance