Web Services: Time to jump on the bandwagon?
Last month, we presented the value chain of Web Services in order to shed some light on the different technical levels and
roles of the players in this market. (Read
our article on the Web Services Value Chain).
TechMetrix's
view was that adoption of Web Services is going to be quick.
However, technologies and enterprises are certainly not
yet mature enough to extensively use Web Services in their
day-to-day business with clients and partners.
The
first practical application of Web Services has to be considered
within the enterprise. For example, using Web Service technologies
to enhance your intranet may be a great opportunity.
Most
companies already have numerous intranet applications, often
built with different technologies. When building a corporate
intranet, integrating existing applications is always challenging.
And this is where Web Services can help, because some of
the technical issues (such as security) are easier to deal
with when you are inside the corporate network.
So
that's where we recommend you start, for two reasons:
- First,
you'll see a quick return on investment for your intranet
portal, leveraging existing applications
- Second,
you'll be preparing to adopt Web Services for day-to-day
business with your clients/partners.
In
our quick poll for the month of June, we asked: "Is your
company using or building Web Services?":
(NB:
this is an open Web poll with no sampling of the respondents)
Out of the 81 respondents - which is low compared to previous
polls - 38% have started projects and 25% are currently
testing and prototyping. It appears that those familiar
with and concerned about Web Services were most likely to
cast their vote.
Based
on these results, we have decided to launch a research survey
about Web Service adoption and Technology choices. It takes
less then 10 minutes and respondents will get the results
and analysis for free, so click
here to take the survey.
Building and Consuming Web Services: what are the solutions?
In
order to help you figure out what type of solutions you
could use and what products you can buy to implement Web
Services, TechMetrix Research is launching its "Web Services
Servers and Tools Directory," the first resource referencing
key solutions with actionable information.
The
"Web Services Servers and Tools Directory" lists solutions
we have identified as potentially interesting for building
and using Web Services. We provide technical information
(technology base and platforms), basic pricing (when available
from vendor) and comments, and classify solutions into three
categories:
-
Server
- Framework
- IDE
(Integrated Development Environment)
Server
We classify as Server any solution that provides
all the features needed to call, create and host Web Services.
It should include libraries to call Web Services using WSDL
and also low-level programming (allowing manual creation
of SOAP envelopes). It should also include features to host
Web Services: SOAP/HTTP (or any additional transport protocol)
listener. A Server has to be a complete solution
that doesn't require any additional components.
Framework
We use Framework to refer to solutions that provide
features for calling and creating Web Services. A Framework
usually requires a server infrastructure (typically an application
server) to be able to deliver Web Services. A Framework
is made of a set of libraries or components that speeds
up the process of building/calling Web Services.
IDE
(Integrated Development Environment)
IDE is used for solutions that provide tools for
the developer to call and create Web Services. An IDE
typically provides wizards to generate code, tools for WSDL
generation, service mapping to existing resources, debugging
features. The main goals of an IDE are to improve
productivity at the design and development stages.
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