Re: Draft definition of WS

I really see no reason to change it at all. "machine-to-machine" does not 
imply
physically separate and distinct "machines" (boxes); it is meant to imply 
that 
the interchange does not require human involvement/intervention at 
runtime.

I suppose that "application-to-application" might eliminate any confusion 
that
the definition suggests that machine=box and that it was only intended to 
support the case where there were two (or more I suppose) physically 
separate
and distinct boxes.

Application-to-application might be acceptable, but application is also 
fuzzy;
isn't a browser an application (or is it just part of the OS:-).

Maybe it would be clearer if the definition read:

A Web service is a software system, designed to support
interactions that do not require human involvement at runtime 
between agents over a network, ...

Cheers,

Christopher Ferris
STSM, Emerging e-business Industry Architecture
email: chrisfer@us.ibm.com
phone: +1 508 234 3624

www-ws-arch-request@w3.org wrote on 07/25/2003 01:04:35 PM:

> 
> Why not replace "machine-to-machine" with "application-to-application"?
> 
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "Cutler, Roger (RogerCutler)" <RogerCutler@chevrontexaco.com>
> To: "Brian Connell" <brian@westglobal.com>; "David Booth" 
<dbooth@w3.org>;
> <www-ws-arch@w3.org>
> Sent: Friday, July 25, 2003 12:28 PM
> Subject: RE: Draft definition of WS
> 
> 
> >
> > The point is valid, but I think that just about everybody agrees that
> > the basic intention behind "designed to support machine-to-machine 
..."
> > is extremely important.  That's essentially what separates Web 
services
> > from ugly things like screen scraping Web sites.
> >
> > I personally do not think that the current phrasing implies that it
> > can't be used on the same machine -- just that the common usage 
pattern
> > is different machines.  Recall, however, that I essentially brought up
> > the same point objecting to introducing the word "remote" into the
> > definition.
> >
> > I think that removing "machine-to-machine" altogether would be a very
> > bad idea, but some sort of recognition somewhere that interactions on
> > the same machine are "OK" would be useful.  I don't think that anybody
> > would object to a specific Web service implementation that, for some
> > good reason, was not actually exposed to other machines.  The 
potential
> > would exist, of course, to expose it -- one can just turn that off if
> > appropriate.
> >
> > Doesn't this sort of come under the security umbrella?  That is,
> > controlling the scope to which the service is exposed, with one 
extreme
> > being no network exposure whatsoever?
> >
> > -----Original Message-----
> > From: Brian Connell [mailto:brian@westglobal.com]
> > Sent: Friday, July 25, 2003 10:43 AM
> > To: David Booth; www-ws-arch@w3.org
> > Subject: RE: Draft definition of WS
> >
> >
> >
> > Hi,
> >
> > I have an issue I would like to raise with the phrase
> > 'machine-to-machine'.
> >
> > > A Web service is a software system, designed to support
> > > machine-to-machine interaction over a network,
> >
> > This implies that a Web service is not designed to be used if the
> > software systems are interacting on the same machine (even using the
> > same processor).
> >
> > Can I suggest that we remove the 'machine-to-machine' term altogether,
> > or that we further qualify the word 'interaction' in a way that 
includes
> > software systems on the same 'machine'.
> >
> >
> > Regards,
> >
> > Brian Connell
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
>

Received on Friday, 25 July 2003 13:44:16 UTC