• 'Neutrality' Is New Challenge for Internet Pioneer - New York Times
  Tim Berners-Lee: "I think even if the United States ends up faltering in its quest for Net neutrality, I think the rest of the world will be horrified, and there will be very strong pressure from other countries who will become a world separate from the U
  (tags: netneutrality timbl)
• Todd Biske: Outside the Box
  "Today, we’re at the apex of the pendulum swing on the side of flexibility. The business is demanding it, and SOA is there to save the day. As you build out your services, however, keep in mind that the pendulum will swing back. There will be a time whe
  (tags: biske soa innovators_solution architecture)
• YouTube - Broadcast Yourself.
  service-oriented architecture on YouTube. Go figure!
  (tags: soa youtube)
• Concerto Product Demonstration http://www.soasta.com/infocenter/podcast2.html
  Video Podcast #2 From SOASTA. Rob Holcomb walks through a simple testing scenario: target, message, clip, composition, analysis using SOASTA Concerto. Concerto uses a digital media creation visual metaphor--watch for the composition editor.
  (tags: soasta visualization soa testing)

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The October Issue of Wired Magazine has a good article by Fred Vogelstein on Rebuilding Microsoft.  The article describes the challenges Microsoft faces in competing (surviving?) in a mobile, cloud centric world, rather than the traditional desktop environment, which Microsoft dominates to the tune of $1.5 billion a month.  The article keys on Ray Ozzie (Lotus, Groove), who is succeeding Bill as chief software architect.  Ozzie's vision for Microsoft (and computing) is well known, and best articulated in his services disruption memo. 

The article covers a lot of interesting territory: reducing software complexity, increasing time-to-market, feature bloat versus just enough, seamless platform transitions, xBox profitability, and a return to innovation.

However, the two things that struck me most about the article had nothing to do with technology.  First, was a comment on Ozzie's leadership style:

"...I suppose this is just classic 'walking the halls', but I feel as though without this kind of direct nonhierarchical contact I would lose touch with my organization, and people throughout would know I was disconnected and would lose respect for me."

So true.  You can't be an effective leader (formal or informal) if you aren't in touch with your people.  Sure, it takes a lot of time, but its invaluable. 

Second, was a change to Microsoft's review process for employees:

"In May, Microsoft also changed its review process for rank-and-file employees, who increasingly felt that the system discouraged risk-taking.  It used to be that you were graded on a curve within your group: For every top performer there had to be a subpar one.  That worked fine when the company was smaller.  But as Microsoft grew, the policy encouraged sloth.  Why chance moving to a group of superstar engineers, people reasoned, if it meant you might go from above average status to below average?  Now each employee is graded based on individual goals, regardless of how others do.  These goals are reset as often as every other month to encourage engineers to ship lots of little software modules and revise them online rather than spend an entire year on a huge release".

Here, classic talent management.  The design of employee performance programs must align with corporate goals.  If a company wants innovation, it must create an environment to encourage it.  If a company wants status quo, there shouldn't be surprises when stars bail. 

Note: According to Wired's website, the Rebuilding Microsoft article will be available online on October 6  is now available.  While I could've waited until 10/6 for this post, strong leadership and creating environments for success are soapbox items for me.  Architecture success requires strong leadership -- from architects, and those tasked with leading architects.  On the latter, it helps if you've been the former.

[Post updated on October 11, 2006 at 11:50 for links to Wired article.]

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• ESBCON The online conference for Enterprise Server Bus ­ ESB-CON
  BEA, Sonic, IBM and Sun participating in online ESB Conference - 9/28 12-5 ET. The opening panel might be interesting - questions on Fortune 1000 implementations.
  (tags: esb ibm sonic beas sunw soa)

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• Amazon launches shipping services for selling partners - CNET News.com
  Examples of powerful business model variations and offerings when your underpinnings are service-oriented..."Newly released beta programs offer fulfillment services and branded Web sites to third-party vendors. "
  (tags: amazon soa)

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• Loosely Coupled Thinking : WS-BPEL 2.0 Enters Public Review
  "The WS-BPEL 2.0 Specification entered Public Review on 10 September 2006. Public Review for WS-BPEL 2.0 ends 09 November 2006." John Evdemon's post contains all the relevant spec links.
  (tags: soa bpel)

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• Submissions due Friday 9/15: OOPSLA 2006 Workshop on Event Driven Architecture
  "a forum in which researchers and practitioners from academia and industry can discuss various aspects of event-driven processing and its relationship to other architecture and programming paradigms, particularly with service-oriented architecture"
  (tags: eda soa ooplsa)
• BethGB on SOA methodology
  "Design and development methodologies inculcate best practices and help reduce risk of failure. As SOA matures and implementations become more widespread, methodologies geared toward SOA implementations will become a requirement."
  (tags: soa methodology)

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This morning, webMethods announced it has agreed to acquire privately-held Infravio for approximately $38 million in cash. This acquisition comes on the heels of webM's purchase of semantic metadata management technology company, Cerebra.  Technology from both acquisitions will be incorporated into a future release of webM's Fabric.  The answer to the burning question for current customers - "Will Infravio's products continue to be offered and supported standalone" - is "Yes".

Of course this is just the latest acquisition in the "SOA Governance" space.  [I use quotes because there's more to governance than what comes in a box.]  On August 23, BEA announced its acquisition of SOA repository vendor Flashline.  And on July 25, HP announced its acquisition of Mercury - the new owner of Systinet.  With Systinet, HP got the registry embedded in Oracle's Fusion and BEA's AquaLogic.

This makes LogicLibrary, a design time metadata repository and registry for SOA (and more), as the last independent standing.  Looking at the names above, the natural assumption is LogicLibrary is next, perhaps by IBM.  However, IBM embarked on a build plan for WebSphere Registry and Repository, and appears to be readying for an October launch. 

This recent flurry of activity centers on design time metadata management, with hooks to runtime.  The next frontier will be integration with IT operations (CMDB, ITIL, SML).  Or as Todd says, the repistry.  On that front, IBM picked up asset management software vendor MRO Software in August.

Speaking of enterprise level metadata management, I find myself intrigued with IBM's Viper (DB2 v9), the hybrid XML/relational database.  What role will Viper play in IBM's plans? 

Anyway, I digress.  It looks like enterprises now have 3 choices in respect to design time "SOA Governance":

1.  Adopt the registry/repository of your primary SOA platform provider (BEA, IBM, Oracle, WebM etc).

2.  Adopt the registry/repository of your enterprise systems management provider (HP, IBM etc)

3.  Go independent: LogicLibrary.

There is no one right answer.  As always, act for your business.  Keep the bigger (metadata management) picture in view.

Update: 9/11/2006 11:52am - Forgot the disclosure:  None of the vendors mentioned in this post are clients of my firm, Elemental Links.

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• Anne 2.0 » Blog Archive » Office 2.0 Podcast Jam is On
  Anne Zelenka is organizing an Office 2.0 Podcast Jam. If you want to speak, or know someone who might, read this post. If like me, you want to be "an attendee", I'll send those links when I see them.
  (tags: office2.0 podcast_jam anne2.0)

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• ongoing · JRuby Love
  Tim Bray on "The JRuby Guys” (Charles Nutter and Thomas Enebo) joining Sun to continue work on JRuby. "Dynamically-typed languages like Ruby are only beginning to be accepted in the software mainstream, and many of the best practices and tools remain t
  (tags: java ruby sun)

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I'm visual by nature. I think and communicate best with a pen in my hand.  I work through ideas by drawing - mixing mindmaps, components, parties, flows, interactions and layers. I grasp concepts best when visual elements are present.  More often than not, I ask people to show/draw me a picture.  I recently bought a Tablet PC, and wonder how I survived previously.

No surprise then, I'm extremely interested in the visualization of information and intuitive interface design.  On the latter, Irving WB recently posted his thoughts on human oriented design:

I really believe that one of the most important and exciting areas of innovation is to rethink IT applications around the humans that use them not the computers that run them.  In fact, I feel that we do not have a choice -- if we want to stay one step ahead of the growing complexity of the IT systems around us.
    
When one examines the characteristics of successful IT applications – those that appeal to large numbers of people -- it is clear that they appeal to us because they are intuitive and thus easy to learn and use.  What makes applications intuitive is the fact that they are designed around objects from the real world that people are generally familiar with, and thus we can bring our real world knowledge and intuition to bear on the applications - they have a point of connection, as it were. 

The applications are then developed for the virtual world of computers, including the realistic simulations of the physical world objects on which they are based, along with added features which good designers will also make as intuitive as possible.  Since our interactions with the physical world are so visual in nature, it is not surprising that the more visual an application, the more intuitive it is likely to feel.

Are you thinking, "Ok, interesting.  But what's the tie to SOA Testing?"  Last week, I was briefed by SOASTA on the alpha version (yes alpha) of their SOA testing product, Concerto.  Concerto is designed on the visual metaphor of digital media creation - think iMovie, iPhoto, GarageBand.  You work with visual elements for messages, clips (groups of messages) and compositions (groups of clips).  Compositions are your test scenarios.  You can run (play) multiple compositions (concurrently, staggered) on a timeline based mixing board.  Below is a screen shot of the mixing board (composition editor) captured from the SOASTA Concerto Quick Tour.

As part of SOASTA's launch, they are introducing the team and product through video podcasts.  The first one was about the team.  The second, to be posted, promises an introduction to the product.  Definitely a product to keep an eye on, for its visual innovation, and the power that comes with it - intuitive SOA testing for business analysts.

[Disclosures: Neither IBM or SOASTA are clients of my firm, Elemental Links, Inc.]

Posted by brendamichelson in SOA • visualization | Permalink | Comments (2) | TrackBacks (0)

• WSJ.com - Loose Wire: Geoffrey Moore
  "...how problems get solved at a strategic level in a business...some version of scenario planning...It's story telling...come up with plausible stories that represent...the best distillation of the economic currents and competitive dynamics..."
  (tags: scenarios business)

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• Web giants lure developers | CNET News.com
  "A fundamental premise behind what we are trying to do at Amazon Web Services is provide external developers all the benefits of scale that Amazon enjoys as a large Web site and large consumer and producer of Web infrastructure,"
  (tags: amazon servicegrid)
• Net neutrality fans rally in 25 cities | CNET News.com
  Snowe-Dorgan measure: "An absence of such regulations, supporters claim, would interfere with users' ability to view all content on a level playing field, indirectly raise their surfing costs, and keep garage innovators from getting their ideas off the gr
  (tags: netneutrality)
• Save the Internet : Fighting for Internet Freedom
  I know its political, but I can't help myself: "The SavetheInternet.com coalition joins more than a million activists who are speaking out — community by community — for Internet freedom."
  (tags: netneutrality)

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