TECHNIQUES FOR MANAGING FUNCTIONAL SERVICE DEFINITIONS IN AN SOA DEVELOPMENT LIFECYCLE

• US 20110161913A1
• Filed: 04/28/2010
• Published: 06/30/2011
• Est. Priority Date: 12/29/2009
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Oracle International Corporation (Oracle Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Oracle International Corporation (Oracle Corporation)
• Inventors: Srinivasamoorthy, Arvind, Annadi, Thirupathi Reddy, Kola, Purushotham, Xie, Nan, Garimella, Annaji, Craig, Mark James Glenn, Sankaran, Ravindran
• Granted Patent: US 9,886,253 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 717/101
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 8/10 Requirements analysis; Specification techniques
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 8/36 Software reuse
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 8/60 Software deployment

Abstract

A framework (referred to herein as Application Integration Architecture, or AIA) that formalizes and orchestrates activities in an SOA development lifecycle. In one set of embodiments, AIA can capture development-related information in a shared data store and cause the information to flow in an automated or semi-automated manner from one lifecycle phase to the next as the lifecycle progresses. This information flow can, in turn, facilitate automations at each lifecycle phase for the responsible stakeholders (e.g., solution architects, developers, installation developers, etc.), thereby enforcing SOA best practices, enhancing development productivity, and ensuring the quality of the final SOA deliverables.

Claims

1. A method comprising:

receiving, by a computer system, a definition of a business process including a set of business tasks, the business process being a functional representation of a Service Oriented Architecture (SOA) Application;

receiving, by the computer system, a definition of a service solution component for a business task in the set of business tasks, the service solution component being a functional representation of a software service that fulfills the business task; and

storing, by the computer system, the definition of the business process and the definition of the service solution component in a shared data store.

2. The method of claim 1 wherein receiving the definition of the service solution component comprises:

receiving, from a user, a query for searching a repository of existing software services, the query being configured to find an existing software service that fulfills the business task;

executing the query; and

if the query execution identifies an existing software service that fulfills the business task, associating the existing software service with the service solution component.

3. The method of claim 1 wherein receiving the definition of the service solution component comprises receiving a description of the desired functionality of the software service.

4. The method of claim 3 wherein the description is free text.

5. The method of claim 3 wherein receiving the definition of the service solution component further comprises receiving a service type for the software service.

6. The method of claim 5 wherein receiving the definition of the service solution component further comprises receiving a product code for the software service.

7. The method of claim 1 wherein, at a time of implementing the software service, the definition of the service solution component is retrieved from the shared data store and used to generate one or more artifacts of the software service.

8. The method of claim 7 wherein the one or more artifacts are SOA artifacts.

9. The method of claim 7 wherein, once implementation of the software service is complete, metadata pertaining to the software service is associated with the service solution component and stored in the shared data store.

10. The method of claim 8 wherein the metadata includes deployment information for the software service.

11. The method of claim 10 further comprising, at a time of deploying the SOA application:

retrieving the definition of the business process from the shared data store;

generating, based on the definition of the business process, a user interface including the set of business tasks, the user interface identifying the software service as fulfilling the business task;

receiving, via the user interface, a selection of the software service;

retrieving the metadata pertaining to the software service from the shared data store;

generating, based on the metadata, a bill of materials for deploying the SOA application.

12. The method of claim 11 further comprising generating a deployment plan based on the bill of materials.

13. The method of claim 12 further comprising creating a deployable package for the SOA application.

14. The method of claim 13 wherein the deployable package includes the deployment plan and the one or more artifacts of the software service.

15. The method of claim 14 wherein the deployable package further includes the definition of the business process, the definition of the service solution component, and the metadata pertaining to the software service.

16. A computer-readable storage medium having stored thereon program code executable by a computer system, the program code comprising:

code that causes a computer system to receive a definition of a business process including a set of business tasks, the business process being a functional representation of a Service Oriented Architecture (SOA) application;

code that causes the computer system to receive a definition of a service solution component for a business task in the set of business tasks, the service solution component being a functional representation of a software service that fulfills the business task; and

code that causes the computer system to store the definition of the business process and the definition of the service solution component in a shared data store.

17. A system comprising:

a processing component configured to;

receive a definition of a business process including a set of business tasks, the business process being a functional representation of a Service Oriented Architecture (SOA) application;

receive a definition of a service solution component for a business task in the set of business tasks, the service solution component being a functional representation of a software service that fulfills the business task; and

store the definition of the business process and the definition of the service solution component in a shared data store.