SOA is Not Dead

The figures from our latest poll show us 60% of enterprise architects believe that SOA is indeed, not dead. Do you agree with these figures?

Take our Poll: Is SOA dead?

We’ve gotten quite some responses from our LinkedIn group members in a recent discussion thread, and so here is a quick poll you can take on whether or not you believe SOA is dead. We’ll be posting the results next Friday. Happy polling!

What is Enterprise Architecture?

Is there universal definition for EA? Chris Potts from CIO.com recently answered this question found on LinkedIn in this post. Here’s the question:

Do you think we need to have a universally agreed definition of Enterprise Architecture? If so what do you think it should be, in one sentence, and why?

Chris states that there is really no agreed definition of EA, but it is very important to understand what business executives think the two component words mean. Many people mistakenly believe that the term “Enterprise” means that EA has something to do with technology, when only IT at times only represents 21 percent of a company’s operating costs. So instead of coining both terms, Chris has instead summed up his definition of EA in one sentence.

"The art or science of designing and constructing undertakings, especially bold or difficult ones, and of the readiness to be involved in them; the style of such undertakings."

What’s your definition of EA?

The Importance of Enterprise Architecture

David Longworth does a great job of discussing the importance of Enterprise Architecture in this latest article in CIO. The major theme is summed up by this quote,

“For EA to move beyond its -early-adopter phase, more architects looking at the bigger picture and less navel gazing and protectionism is the order of the day -- and that will be led by the CIO”

Take a couple of minutes to go over the article. Do you agree that more architects are looking at the bigger picture?

Happy Holidays from EA

We will be taking some much needed time off for the holidays. We'd like to thank you for your readership and we encourage you to check back with us next year for more innovative thought, perspective and news surrounding the world of enterprise architecture.

We wish you a joyous holiday season!

Sun Microsystems Value Proposition

James McGovern highlights in his latest post in Enterprise Architecture how he has recently switched IDEs away from Eclipse and towards Netbeans. James believes that Sun Microsystems does not do a good job of selling their value proposition. Do you agree?

What are the Benefits of Enterprise Architecture?

It seems as if upper management still doesn’t quite understand the benefits of EA. So here’s a post from Shrikant Mulik on his blog in which he lists some business-related benefits of EA taken from a research briefing written by Jeanne Ross and Peter Weill. I’ve listed them below.

The business-related benefits include the following:

• shared business platforms - greater data sharing and integrated process standards
• senior management and business unit management satisfaction
• strategic business impact - operational excellence, customer intimacy, product leadership and strategic agility

What to Put in your First Release of EA?

Tony Abel, CEO & Chief Solutions Architect at dotNet Framework Solutions, mentions in this post on CIO Knowledge Base that a good enterprise architecture model always starts with the business element in order to encompass the entirety of the enterprise. Tony always begins his projects with top-management so that they can be more educated to the essences of enterprise architecture. Do you have a similar process in your organization?

More Findings from the Infosys Survey

Infosys recently completed their 3rd annual survey on Enterprise Architecture which you can view here. Sohel Aziz brings up some interesting findings in this post on the Infosys blog when he mentions:

One of the key findings is that participants of the survey saw Enterprise Architecture as a capability that was core to their business and inherently part of their organization's crown jewels. However, given the daunting set of activities that most Enterprise Architecture functions have to execute today, the opportunity to work with ESPs and enlist them to execute some of these activities is real. In other words, some activities (the more tactical ones), can be outsourced to a strategic vendor partner.

Read the full post here.

Enterprise Architecture is Essential to Protect Government Networks from Cyberattacks

This post on GCN discusses how EA plays an integral part on stopping cyberattacks from occurring within government networks and computers. Ron Ross, a National Institute of Standards and Technology senior computer scientist mentions:

“When I got into actual discussions, I turned my view around to the point to where I think we can’t be successful as security professionals unless enterprise architects are successful on their end. Enterprise architecture, I believe, is going to drive the ultimate success of protecting our critical infrastructures.”

Read the full article here.

No SmallTalk in Enterprise Architecture

James McGovern’s has an interesting post on Enterprise Architecture this morning. He explains how even though Wall Street has failed the consumer, the blame should be placed on the consumer themselves because they didn’t take the time to know better.

He applies this same methodology in Enterprise Architecture. Even though sales people are pitching SmallTalk in the enterprise, James claims that the marketplace knows better. I guess time will only tell.

What is the role of a Enterprise Architect in a programme?

This post on CIO Knowledge Base explains how an enterprise architect is not needed if enterprise architecture is present and a manager is simply trying to ensure that a new project will fit with the existing architecture. On the other hand, if the project involves changes a scope of the enterprise architecture, then managers will have to consult with the enterprise architect. Program managers have the ability to monitor implementation of enterprise architecture as long as no changes needed to be made to the infrastructure itself. How does your company define the role of an enterprise architect in a progamme?

Alignment of IT Strategy and Business Strategy Doomed to Fail?

Mark Blowers mentions in his latest post at the Report Buyer blog that the latest report shows that attempts to align IT strategy with am abstract business strategy are doomed for failure. Mark believes that to successfully adopt enterprise architecture across the board, the whole organization, both technology and business areas, must work together to ensure that the architecture stays in line with the strategic business objectives of the organization and reflects the IT services that are available at the current moment and the future.

Do you agree with Mark’s ideals on EA?

Enterprise Architecture as Strategy

Andrew Sparks recently posted over at the Oracle blog how the book Enterprise Architecture as Strategy written by Ross, Weill, and Robertson has helped him come to a better understanding of enterprise architecture maturity and the underlying IT architecture that supports it.

The book as described by Andrew, uses the concept of EA as a framework to bind the existing business operating model to IT architecture. Here are 3 disciplines that are needed in order to execute this foundation.

1. Operating Model The level of business process integration and standardization for delivering goods or services to a customer. a framework of four generic operating models is described, each with differing emphasis on business process integration or standardization.
2. Enterprise Architecture This is the organizing logic for business processes and IT infrastructure reflecting the integration and standardization requirements of the operating model. The book also describes how organizations go through four stages of maturity in applying Enterprise Architecture to design their business processes. It is exactly this maturity model that provided key insights for me (see below)
   
3. IT Engagement Model This is the governance that you put in place to ensure that business and IT projects meet local and corporate objectives.
   

Do you agree with the Enterprise Architecture as Strategy framework?

What impact will Cloud Computing have on your enterprise architecture?

Browsing the blogosphere I came across this podcast from the SOA Infrastructure blog where David Bressler, SOA Evangelist at Progress Software, presents his thoughts on how cloud computing will make it simpler for businesses to get critical information to their consumers, and help them make better decisions. David brings in several examples in this podcast including one from Salesforce.com. The podcast is about 10 minutes long so take a few moments to listen to it and share your thoughts here. Enjoy!

Listen to the podcast

Infosys Report: Findings from the Enterprise Architecture Survey 2008

We recently posted the findings from a recent report from Infosys that details the results of their annual EA survey. As a refresher, here are some trends we learned from those findings:

• EA is enabling business transformation
  
• EA practices continue to mature with increasing use of metrics and processes
  
• Increased outsourcing of EA functions are a strong possibility in the future
  

As an update to this, here’s the pdf of the actual report put out by Infosys. Enjoy!

Are Enterprises Training Developers to Write Secure Code?

James McGovern discusses in his latest post on Enterprise Architecture that companies are missing out on important opportunities of securing the enterprise by simply encouraging staff members to attend local OWASP chapter meetings.

Security will always be a factor in the enterprise. The training of security awareness in employees will only further their understanding about the importance of information security. It also makes architects more receptive to certain vulnerabilities that exists in current code.

Is your enterprise ensuring that developers write secure code?

Layers of Enterprise Architecture

David Linthicum discusses in this post on InfoWorld that well-designed enterprise architecture will provide a stable platform for computing. He goes to on mention how working up from ring 0-2 you will come across many different layers, and how they need to be managed very carefully to ensure that the enterprise will not lock up. So indeed, process architecture and enterprise architecture has a lot in common. Make sure to read entire article here.

Symantec Integrates Its Products with Enterprise Applications

Information Week reports that Symantec will soon adopt open architecture so that its products can be added as services to enterprise applications. Some of the products include antivirus and anti-intrusion applications.

Here’s what Christine Ewing, the director of product marketing, has to say about what Symantec is calling Open Collaborative Architecture:

"It's not a product. It's more of a strategic direction that Symantec is taking."

Symantec is relying on open web service standards in order to achieve integration with its products and enterprise third-party applications.

Apache Tuscany Enables SOA solutions to More Easily Respond to New Business Requirements

The SOA Network reports that Apache Tuscany has released version 1.3.2 of its Service Component Architecture (SCA) for Java.

Apache Tuscany provides a dependable infrastructure for deploying, running, and building SOA solutions as well as addressing real business problems posed by SOA. Anthony Elder, ASF Vice President and Chair of the Apache Tuscany Project Management Committee mentions:

"Over the past two years, the Tuscany community has focused on developing fully open, standards-based, large-scale SOA solutions. We continue to receive enthusiastic support for Tuscany's simple, highly extensible Service Component Architecture (SCA), Service Data Objects (SDO), and Data Access Service (DAS) subprojects. Becoming an ASF Top-Level Project and great ideas for future development -- including improvements in application server integration, distributed runtimes and Web 2.0 support -- underscore how Tuscany continues to go from strength to strength."

It will be interesting to see how this infrastructure will play out in the upcoming months.