Funny question to be asking when I'm posting to a SOA blog. However, I was thinking this weekend that indeed, if SOA is done right, and the right processes are in place, it's downright boring.

Case in point, the new notion that the SOA bloggers are diving at is ITIL, or IT Infrastructure Library. There is a good description of ITIL, and its relationship to SOA here. Albeit it's from IBM, so the end result is always an ESB. Not sure I agree with that. The requirements lead to the technology, and an ESB is only applicable in some cases, not all cases.

"ITIL is currently the most widely-adopted approach to IT service management available and provides a set of best-practice guidelines for IT service management developed by the British office of Government Commerce. The ITIL guide breaks down the key principles of the IT service management discipline into the following sub-categories, which are collectively known as the ITIL framework."

So, how does it relate to SOA? Well, once you get beyond the vendor stuff, it basically allows you to understand your domain, at the process, service, and semantic levels, and then apply SOA principals to that understanding, and manage the services going forward. Very much like my 12 steps to SOA, or other SOA methods for that matter, with a focus on management, and extending outside of SOA as well. It's the flavor of the month.

I came to a few conclusions this weekend.

First, truth-be-told it really does not matter what process or method you leverage to understand your enterprise problem domain best...ITIL, 12 steps, or your own approach, who cares? As long as you have a basic understanding of semantics, services, and processes so you can select the right solution.

Second, all of this process and mythology stuff we're bringing to SOA is kind of boring. I mean you're not playing with technology...instead service directories, process diagrams, and data dictionaries. What fun is that?

The reality is the core of architecture is not sexy. There is a lot of grunt work that has to occur before you get architecture right. Those who charge at this problem shouting: ESB! Governance! Data Integration! Or, whatever hype-driven buzzword is currently being tossed around, are more than likely to fail. So it's boring...but boring is good in this case.

If you want excitement, do some base jumping, extreme skiing, or shark wrestling...leave your enterprise alone.

Posted by Dave Linthicum on August 14, 2006 06:14 PM