R: potential users of web services

Hi all, 

I'm an Italian Ph.D. Student interested in the Web Service technology, and the first issue encountered in my research activity is: "What is a Web Service?"
I read all your proposals and, more or less, I think all are correct. Now I would propose my definition of Web Service in order to contribute to the maiing list and also obtain some suggestions.
My definition has been developed starting from the SOA (Service Oriented Architecture) definition. This context sees three players (the service requestor, the service provider and the service directory) interacting among them, by using three primitives (publish, find, bind). Any information exchange is based on a common medium transport.
Starting from that, in my opinion:

"A Web Service architecture is a SOA instance where the considered transport medium is the Web; thus a Web Service is an autonomous component handled by the three players".

On the basis of this definition, a Web Service: 
- does not need to be necessary described through XML;
- does not need to use SOAP as a transport-protocol;
- does not need to use UDDI for the registry operation;
- ...

Conversely, only the Web and its protocols (such as IP-TCP-HTTP-...), are necessary.
That's my view over Web Services. Hope somebody of you agree...
Any suggestion is of course welcome.

Gigi


> -----Messaggio originale-----
> Da: www-ws-request@w3.org [mailto:www-ws-request@w3.org]Per conto di
> Anne Thomas Manes
> Inviato: venerdì 5 aprile 2002 7.24
> A: Keith Ballinger; thomi@di.uoa.gr; www-ws@w3.org
> Oggetto: RE: potential users of web services
> 
> 
> I might be convinced to agree that XML is required, but from the 
> generic view point, I don't think that SOAP is required. I view 
> RosettaNet as a web service, but it doesn't use SOAP. 
> 
> Anne
> 
> > -----Original Message-----
> > From: Keith Ballinger [mailto:keithba@microsoft.com]
> > Sent: Thursday, April 04, 2002 10:31 PM
> > To: thomi@di.uoa.gr; www-ws@w3.org; anne@manes.net
> > Subject: RE: potential users of web services
> > 
> > 
> > I tend to agree with what this thread has stated. What do you 
> > think of Sun's claims (evidently) from this Java One session[1]?
> >  
> > "Web Services, the session told us, are not necessarily in XML 
> > and do not have to use SOAP, they just describe opening up your 
> > internal processes."
> >  
> > Seems to me that SOAP and XML are pretty required to be called a 
> > Web service. Otherwise, it's a distributed app, but not the new 
> > loosly coupled thing we are all working on.
> >  
> > Thanks,
> > Keith
> >  
> > [1] http://www.webservicesarchitect.com/content/articles/wiggers03.asp 
> > 
> >  -----Original Message----- 
> >  From: Anne Thomas Manes [mailto:anne@manes.net] 
> >  Sent: Thursday, April 04, 2002 5:48 PM 
> >  To: Hao He; thomi@di.uoa.gr; www-ws@w3.org 
> >  Subject: RE: potential users of web services 
> > 
> >  +1 
> > 
> >  I was struggling with that word. I was originally going to 
> > call it simply 
> >  software -- trying not to  imply any level of granularity, 
> > but then I 
> >  thought -- well, it might actually be implemented using firmware or 
> >  hardware. So I went with the word component. Perhaps it 
> > might be best to 
> >  call it a unit of work (although I don't want to imply that 
> > it supports 
> >  transaction semantics). 
> > 
> >  Anne 
> > 
> >  > -----Original Message----- 
> >  > From: www-ws-request@w3.org 
> > [mailto:www-ws-request@w3.org]On Behalf Of 
> >  > Hao He 
> >  > Sent: Thursday, April 04, 2002 7:35 PM 
> >  > To: 'Anne Thomas Manes'; thomi@di.uoa.gr; www-ws@w3.org 
> >  > Subject: RE: potential users of web services 
> >  > 
> >  > 
> >  > I agree most with Anne except one tiny bit: 
> >  > 
> >  > I would say that a web service is a service provided by 
> > one or more 
> >  > components that exposes 
> >  > a programmatic interface.  A compoent itself is not the service. 
> >  > Service is 
> >  > the functionality that defined in the interface. 
> >  > 
> >  > 
> >  > Hao 
> >  > 
> >  > -----Original Message----- 
> >  > From: Anne Thomas Manes [mailto:anne@manes.net] 
> >  > Sent: Friday, April 05, 2002 5:05 AM 
> >  > To: thomi@di.uoa.gr; www-ws@w3.org 
> >  > Subject: RE: potential users of web services 
> >  > 
> >  > 
> >  > Thomi, 
> >  > 
> >  > Ask five people the definition of "web service" and you'll get 
> >  > six answers. 
> >  > 
> >  > I generally describe a web service as a service that 
> > communicates over the 
> >  > web. A service is a component that exposes a programmatic 
> > interface. The 
> >  > service interface must be described; and the service 
> >  > implementation must be 
> >  > discoverable. 
> >  > 
> >  > When you relate this abstract definition to current 
> > technologies, you can 
> >  > implement a web service by creating a service that exposes a SOAP 
> >  > interface, 
> >  > which is described by WSDL, and which is registered in UDDI. But 
> >  > I wouldn't 
> >  > want to use current technologies to *define* the basic concept. I 
> >  > also don't 
> >  > think that it's essential to use any of these 
> > technologies to create a web 
> >  > service. I can certainly create a web service using XML-RPC or 
> >  > RosettaNet or 
> >  > a host of other technologies. 
> >  > 
> >  > That said, I would concur that web services are intended 
> > to be consumed by 
> >  > applications rather than humans. But keep in mind that a 
> > user interface is 
> >  > an application. If I wanted to arrange food for 500 people for 
> >  > two weeks in 
> >  > Dubai, I would use a catering application, which in turn 
> > uses web services 
> >  > to find caterers that can provide services in Dubai. The 
> > UI isn't the web 
> >  > service. The UI uses web services to accomplish its work. Hence 
> >  > an ASP page 
> >  > or HTML form aren't web services, they are an interface 
> > to web services. 
> >  > 
> >  > Best regards, 
> >  > 
> >  > Anne Thomas Manes 
> >  > CTO, Systinet 
> >  > 
> >  > > -----Original Message----- 
> >  > > From: www-ws-request@w3.org [mailto:www-ws-request@w3.org]On 
> >  > > Behalf Of Thomi Pilioura 
> >  > > Sent: Thursday, April 04, 2002 9:09 AM 
> >  > > To: www-ws@w3.org 
> >  > > Subject: potential users of web services 
> >  > > 
> >  > > 
> >  > > Hi all, 
> >  > > 
> >  > > I'm little confused about the notion of the term "web 
> > services". 
> >  > > When I'm reading papers related to UDDI,WSDL,SOAP they present 
> >  > > web services 
> >  > > as a new age of distributed computing and as such they are only 
> >  > useful to 
> >  > > developers (who are trying to build web applicattions) 
> > and not to the 
> >  > > end-users. But when I'm reading papers related to 
> > DAML-S the idea I'm 
> >  > > getting for web services is different. They are also useful to 
> >  > > end users as 
> >  > > it shown by DAML-S motivating scenarios: 
> >  > > 
> >  > > Web service discovery 
> >  > > Find me a shipping service that transports goods to Dubai. 
> >  > > 
> >  > > Web service invocation 
> >  > > Buy me 500 lbs. powdered milk from www.acmemoo.com 
> >  > > 
> >  > > Web service selection, composition and interoperation 
> >  > > Arrange food for 500 people for 2 weeks in Dubai. 
> >  > > 
> >  > > Web service execution monitoring 
> >  > > Has the powdered milk been ordered and paid for yet? 
> >  > > 
> >  > > There are also numerous papers that use the term 
> > service (and not "web 
> >  > > service") and are talking about UDDI, WSDL and DAML-S. 
> > What's the 
> >  > > difference 
> >  > > between "web service" and "service" if both of them work over 
> >  > > Internet? For 
> >  > > example, a search engine (such as google) is a service, 
> > but when it is 
> >  > > described in WSDL, published in UDDI and can be invoked using 
> >  > > SOAP becomes a 
> >  > > web service? Ia a asp or an HTML form a service or a 
> > web service? 
> >  > > 
> >  > > In summary which are the potential users of web 
> > services (web service 
> >  > > providers, developers, end-users)? 
> >  > > 
> >  > > could you please shed some light on this? 
> >  > > regards 
> >  > > Thomi Pilioura 
> >  > > 
> >  > > 
> >  > > 
> >  > > 
> >  > 
> > 
> 
>

Received on Monday, 8 April 2002 21:03:37 UTC