RE: REST wrap-up (was Re: Web Services Architecture Document

At 12:36 AM 2004-01-30, Champion, Mike wrote:
>It's really very simple: the purported technical merit of REST for the
>problems that people are addressing with Web services remains speculative.
>Of the perhaps 100 people who participated in the working group at one point
>or another, I recall three who put forth the argument that REST is suitable
>as the "base style for Web services."  Given W3C's consensus-driven decision
>making procedures and the distribution of opinion on this subject, what
>amazes most observers is how seriously REST is taken, not that is is not
>enshrined as the True Path to Web services.

Our definition of a web service includes SOAP, and with SOAP 1.2 we have 
the web method feature to allow a GET,and it provides guidance on when that 
is appropriate.

I think there will be plenty of SOAP envelopes that contain pointers to 
things on the web, which when retrieved do not have a SOAP envelope.  Those 
pointers may not be to things we consider web services, but so what.  We 
don't say that web services cannot interact with the non-web service world 
(as we defined a web service).  On the other hand, we don't say much or 
perhaps anything about this mixed usage of web services and traditional web 
resources.  Descriptions or definitions of SOA often do not address it 
either, but system architects will certainly be building solutions that 
involve both.

Paul 

Received on Friday, 30 January 2004 10:05:28 UTC