Service-oriented architecture and Integration

Service-oriented architecture (SOA) is an architecture principle for creating flexible and interoperable service-based solutions. The key principle consists of discoverable contracts, service abstraction, loose coupling, service autonomy, service reusability, statelessness, and composability.

Rolling out successful SOA capabilities reduces IT costs by facilitating reusability in the IT landscape. SOA's ability to provide flexibility and agility to service applications reduces the time to market. SOA enables leveraging of existing IT investments by wrapping legacy solutions in reusable services.

What are the key capabilities of SOA and the benefits of SOA?

SOA is an architectural style that enables service orientation. Service orientation is a way of thinking in terms of services and service-based outcomes.

Figure 1: SOA capabilities

The following are the benefits:

• SOA creates business and IT alignment, while lending flexibility to the IT landscape

• Market...