WebSphere Application Server v7 Feature Pack for Service Component Architecture (SCA)

The WebSphere Application Server Feature Pack for Service Component Architecture (SCA) V1.0.1 helps deliver Simplified Development by providing an open-standards programming model for SOA.

In addition, the WebSphere Application Server Feature Pack for SCA V1.0.1 supports WebSphere Application Server's unique focus on investment protection. In any economy businesses need to make decisions that leverage investments from the past to quickly and effectively respond to the future. The Feature Pack for SCA helps businesses protect new IT investments and reuse legacy assets in SOA applications.

Designed by key technology vendors, including IBM, the SCA programming model, provided in the Feature Pack for SCA, supports the principles of SOA through application flexibility and agility. Service implementation and access method details are moved out of business application logic and into metadata that can be operated on by middleware. As service details or locations change, the application can remain unaffected. SCA helps application developers maximize productivity through focus on solving business problems with application code rather than protocols and locations.

Highlights of the WebSphere Application Server Feature Pack for SCA include:

• Helps improve SOA-based composite application time to market and flexibility

• Build composite applications and services using the open SCA 1.0 programming model

• Leverage the reliability and performance of WebSphere Application Server

• Works to protect application investments with a pluggable framework for the latest SCA supported implementation types and protocols

WebSphere Application Server V7 Feature Packs are optional product extensions that offer targeted, incremental new features and capabilities.

To fully achieve the benefits promised through adoption of SOA, enterprises need a programming model that can augment existing developer skills and standards to promote the concepts of flexibility and agility. In late 2003, IBM first began collaborations with other application infrastructure vendors in order to create a language-neutral way to address this need.

The product of these open collaborations became the SCA programming model. In July 2006 Open SOA Collaboration (osoa.org) (link resides outside of ibm.com) was formed as a body to promote and define this new open model. The SCA 1.0 specification was finalized by the Open SOA Collaboration and submitted to OASIS for standardization in March, 2007.

Since these initial industry collaborations, IBM has led in bringing SCA benefits to market. IBM delivered a fully-functional, early edition of SCA in WebSphere Process Server V6.0 and WebSphere Enterprise Service Bus V6.0. Additionally, IBM has played an active role in contributing to Apache Tuscany - an open source project that provides a Java implementation of the SCA 1.0 specification. The WebSphere Application Server V7 Feature Pack for SCA leverages core components of Apache Tuscany to deliver an implementation of the Open SOA Collaboration SCA 1.0 specification.

• Create SCA service compositions in POJOs, EJB 2.1-3 components, Java Servlets, and Ajax / JavaScript

• Wire a variety of service types - bindings include Web services, JMS, SCA and EJB 2-3

• Expose business logic to Web 2.0 style applications through JSON-RPC and ATOM Web feeds

• Expose EJB 3.0 and Spring components for re-use in homo or heterogeneous compositions

• Simplified flexible service deployment as a JAR (Java Archive)

• Support for data as Java Architecture for XML Binding (JAXB) or Service Data Objects (SDO) 2.1

• Additional SCA sample applications

WebSphere Application Server Feature Packs are optionally installable product extensions that offer targeted, incremental new features and capabilities. For existing WebSphere Application Server customers, feature packs are available via download for production use, given proof of entitlement (PoE) for the feature pack's prerequisite WebSphere Application Server product.

Highlights include:

• An intuitive, assisted development experience for assembling and deploying SCA application components

• Graphical assembly editor for wiring and configuring SCA components and composites

• SCA Java annotation support

• Integration with WebSphere Application Server to add, run, debug, remove contribution and hot update SCA contributions

For more information on Rational Application Developer V7.5 SCA tools click here.