The Insider's Guide to Next-Generation BPM
By Ivan Casanova, Director of Product Management, IONA Technologies , 10/12/2005
Print this article
Email this article
Talk Back!
Write to Editor
*Editor's Note: This article is being re-issued in light of exciting news in the ESB space in the last week.
Like anything new and potentially disruptive in the technology industry, the enterprise service bus (ESB) is going through some predictable growing pains. Early vendors introduced the concept, defining it via the features and functionality contained it their own products. The industry analyst community took its own time in defining what makes an ESB an ESB. Now, throw in some fear, uncertainty and doubt from vendors dealing in more traditional EAI products and a “watch this space” product roadmap approach from some of the major platform players. What we are left with is a situation that can easily cause confusion for the companies that are looking for a way to solve the integration challenges they face today, while at the same time preparing for the inevitable evolution of their systems to meet new business requirements in the future.
In many ways, it could be argued that the ultimate goal for an ESB is be an end to integration. By that, I mean a successful ESB should be about creating service endpoints that are able to communicate directly or via composite applications, orchestration engines or transformation engines in a seamless way. This should be accomplished without the necessity to modify the endpoints, or the systems and applications behind them every time a new element is added to the architecture. A successful ESB is about having a catalog that enables convenient discovery of the endpoints in your systems. An ESB is also about interoperability with proven and established development toolsets that allow your developers to work with what they know instead of forcing them to lean something completely new. Using an ESB to achieve your enterprise architecture goals is also about seamless runtime behavior, regardless of platform and execution environment. An ESB should also allow you to modify the application after it has been deployed, without bringing the entire system down.
Unfortunately, we are finding that to a certain degree the marketplace has corrupted the concept of the ESB. Some vendors have attempted to simply reposition JMS wrapper technology as an ESB. Since this approach forces the user to revert to inefficient and inflexible hub and spoke topologies, you have already strayed from what an ESB should enable you to do. Others have combined simple Web services with legacy gateways to create a kind of integration broker that attempts to achieve the kind of interoperability associated with ESBs. No matter what the specific approach, trying to reposition a failed EAI product around a new industry buzzword does not an ESB make.
-1-
Best Practices in Moving Processes to the Clouds
How Can the Cloud Fit Into Your Applications Strategy?
Cloud Data Integration Best Practices
The Economics of Cloud Computing
Data Services Insight: Successful implementation of Canonical Information Models
SOA Software Integrates Blue Titan, Pushes ESB Federation 
LogicBlaze Broadens Offerings into SOA Platform
You Have Critical SOA Questions? We Have Answers!
Open Source Could Come On Strong For EAI
ebizQ editorial highlights and updates, compiled by Site Editor Anne Stuart
March 10, 2011
The sixth annual BPM in Action 2011 Virtual Conference will explore cutting-edge market developments in BPM and describe how to leverage them for improved business operation and performance. More
Date:Apr 07, 2010
Time:13:00 PM
ET- (17:00 GMT)
Date:Apr 07, 2010
Time:12:00 PM
ET- (16:00 GMT)
In part two of Joe McKendrick's recent podcast with Miko Matsumura, chief strategist for Software AG, they talk about how SOA and IT systems need to change and grow and adapt with the organization around it.
Listen Now
Phil Wainewright interviews David Vap, VP of products at RightNow Technologies, and finds out how sharing best practices can help businesses understand how best to engage with online communities.
Listen Now
Scott Hebner, Vice President of Marketing and Strategy for IBM Rational, discusses a topic on the top of every company's mind today: getting the most from IT investments.
Listen Now
In BI, this tough economy and the increasing role of Web 2.0 and MDM are certainly topics on people's minds today. WiseAnalytics' Lyndsay Wise addresses each of them in this informative podcast.
Listen Now
Deepak Singh, President and CTO of Adeptia, joins ebizQ's Dennis Byron in a podcast that gets its hand around the trend of industry-specific BPM.
Listen NowSmart event processing can help your company run smarter and faster. This comprehensive guide helps you research the basics of complex event processing (CEP) and learn how to get started on the right foot with your CEP project using EDA, RFID, SOA, SCADA and other relevant technologies. Learn More
A lot of people are talking about Enterprise 2.0 as being the business application of Web 2.0 technology. However, there's still some debate on exactly what this technology entails, how it applies to today's business models, and which components bring true value. Some use the term Enterprise 2.0 exclusively to describe the use of social networking technologies in the enterprise, while others use it to describe a web economy platform, or the technological framework behind such a platform. Still others say that Enterprise 2.0 is all of these things. Learn More
|
|
This new publication from our sister site SearchSOA.com explores workflow, business activity monitoring (BAM) and complex event processing (CEP) issues. |
|
|
