SOA Modeling Patterns for Service-Oriented Discovery and Analysis

Chapter 6. TOP-DOWN ATTRIBUTE-DRIVEN SERVICE DISCOVERY PATTERN

Unlike the service-oriented discovery model that is driven exclusively by the business process analysis discipline (discussed in Chapter 5), the Top-Down attribute-driven service discovery pattern is founded on a different study:^[33] the examination of product characteristics, descriptions, features, and requirements that stem from business, technological, and architectural imperatives. Therefore, the attribution process is not driven by business functionality and activities. Here the identification of software properties contributes to the discovery of services.

The Top-Down attribute-driven service discovery pattern is conceptual by nature. In other words, this identification process is driven by an attribution model that enables practitioners to derive service abstractions that initially do not encompass business or technical processes. To firm up and finalize this effort, architects, developers, analysts, modelers, and managers are then commissioned to complete a service's detailed discovery by adding the underpinning operations and interfaces. These are the capabilities that must be established to enable communication with the outside world and maintain relationships with corresponding consumers.

Again, as the core of this service discovery approach, the attribution model is instituted to facilitate the extraction of software product properties—namely, attributes. What type of attributes would be necessary to meet ...