Requirements Modelling and Specification for Service Oriented Architecture

1.6. Benefits, Pitfalls and Prospects

The potential benefits of adopting service oriented architecture may be summarized as follows.

• Faster development.

• Faster maintenance.

• More reusable business logic.

• Greater consistency across the enterprise.

• Better alignment and understanding between business and IT.

We shall deal first with the business benefits arising from SOA, then the technical ones.

SOA offers the possibility of being able to plug in new services without disrupting existing operations (business agility). This is especially true if one is using an enterprise service bus. Modularity is based on business concepts rather than technical models, so that business goals should be better supported. Services can be shared across organizational units, companies and maybe even geographical regions, leading to both greater consistency and, potentially, more reuse. Services can be delivered on the web. Finally, there is the opportunity to share your savings with your partners (and vice versa, of course).

The technical benefits include a better separation of concerns, an improvement in the way software is built, leading to lower maintenance costs (as we shall see in the next chapter), greater productivity, greater modularity and more code reuse. Building or assembling services based on small reusable components both supports and depends on the adoption of a culture of good design. Finally, building shared understanding and a common language should lead to less conflict and better business ...