Inside The Lab : SOA

Apache support for the .NET StockTrader

gregleak@microsoft.com — Mon, 10 Nov 2008 22:19:00 GMT

This week at ApacheCon 2008, WS02 announced that they will be building an open source version of the .NET StockTrader sample application under “Project Stonehenge.” Driven by WS02, “Project Stonehenge” is a new Apache incubation project. They will use this project to set up sample applications to demonstrate seamless interoperability with multiple underlying platform technologies by using currently defined W3C and OASIS standards.

I think this is really exciting news, as it gives developers best practices for interoperable applications that communicate via distributed protocols. The project will demonstrate interoperability between platforms and provide sample code upon using service-oriented architecture (SOA), which developers can use in their own work. It also demonstrates cross-platform deployments of SOA technologies, which demonstrates both the technical and business value of SOA.

WS02 has been working with us since TechEd US last June on demonstrating interoperability using the .NET StockTrader reference application. I was on stage with them as they showed their demo during Bob Muglia’s keynote, and it’s great to see them to continue their support for the .NET StockTrader. We will also continue to support their interoperability efforts and consider participating in the future, including implementations of sample applications like the .NET StockTrader app. This project could offer a forum for important interoperability efforts around WS* and SOA, which can benefit the industry and customers.

Can’t wait to see what else we see in interoperability!

.NET Customer wins RDN's Innovator Awards

gregleak@microsoft.com — Fri, 13 Jun 2008 01:58:00 GMT

Just saw this interesting article in Redmond Developer News, which focuses on .NET customer, Southwest Florida Water Management District, winning the RDN Innovator Awards. The Southwest Florida Water Management District gained acclaim, in the SOA category of RDN’s First Annual Innovator Awards in the SOA category, with a well-construction permitting application that ties into a host of legacy systems. The SOA implementation, built on the Microsoft .NET Framework, ties together disparate Cobol applications, Oracle databases, an enterprise content-management repository, and a geographic information system to process 86 percent of the nearly 17,000 permits processed electronically.

Really great to see customers use .NET to implement SOA and this such a good example of how to leverage .NET!

More and more Interop…NET FX 3.5 SP1 Beta Bits Live!

gregleak@microsoft.com — Tue, 13 May 2008 18:16:00 GMT

In the last few weeks, we’ve seen Microsoft announce several Interop-related work that the company is doing, including BizTalk R3 with expanded interop with new Web Services registry capabilities with support for UDDI (Universal Description Discovery and Integration) version 3.0 and LOB applications, Microsoft BizTalk RFID Mobile - a light weight application that works on mobile RFID devices, and will enable delivery of relevant information from these devices to central business process systems, Interop news from partners, like SAP and TIBCO, and last, but not least the .NET StockTrader 2.0/Config Service 2.0. This also only just a few examples of Interop work that’s been going on at Microsoft.

Let’s face it. Interop is very important in the industry and Windows Communication Foundation makes it easier for developers to create seamless Web Service-based applications. Today, Microsoft released Service Pack 1 (SP1) betas for Visual Studio 2008 and the .NET Framework 3.5. This is very exciting for me because the SP1 for the .NET FX 3.5 delivers WCF improvements that give developers more control over the way they access data and services, including:

Interoperable object references
Enable WCF Service template in Visual Web Developer Express sku
Hosting Wizard for Visual Studio WCF Service projects in IIS
Enable Event Logging in Partial trust

These are only a few of the new features for WCF in the .NET FX 3.5 Beta bits. This is really important also for the investment of SOA applications which enables customers and developers to create more interoperable apps. As we see more companies involved in developing SOA apps like SAP and TIBCO as well as our own technology investments in developing more interoperable features in our products, we see the importance and need of SOA in the enterprise industry.

Also, go to Scott’s blog, ScottGu’s blog, to get more details.

What is Configuration Services 2.0?

gregleak@microsoft.com — Thu, 01 May 2008 22:36:00 GMT

Last week, I presented at different types of user group sessions including the .NET Connected Systems Group in NYC and the Scalability Group in Boston. I showed a new feature of my StockTrader app, Configuration Services 2.0, which makes it easier to build services easier with .NET Framework 3.5 and WCF, and you may have read more here, Microsoft Continues Its Work On Oslo -- SOA for Windows.

Here are a few of the main objectives of the Configuration Services 2.0 and this will all be posted in the white paper on MSDN on the .NET StockTrader site:

1. Make it easier to build services with .NET 3.5 and WCF

o Includes template bindings, security examples, interoperability examples with Java

o Manages host process, endpoints, connections between services automatically

o Designed for high-performance

2. Provide centralized configuration management of service nodes

o Move host and application-specific settings from config files to a repository approach

o Provide Web-based management UI

o Provide way to automatically update settings without host restarts

3. Provide these capabilities via easily re-usable shared libraries

o Easy for customers to implement in their own applications and services

o Provides base classes, uses .NET reflection

o ~20 lines of code and not much time investment for customer to implement!

You can also call this something like a distributed “Service Network” and is one of the first examples of a general purpose Service Network built using .NET managed code. These code libraries can be leveraged as part of your SOA projects to develop new composite application that mix/match services across both .NET and Java. The Service Network should be able to automatically detect when you’ve added new computing nodes to the network and take advantage of scaling out with greater power without requiring complex setup or configuration – it should auto-detect that more resources are available for use. You can read more about Service Network on Steven Martin’s blog.

Below is also a diagram that might make more sense. Let me know what you think and would love your thoughts on this.

Dates/Times for .NET User Group Sessions this Month

gregleak@microsoft.com — Mon, 07 Apr 2008 06:45:00 GMT

Just wanted to provide more details on the .NET User Group sessions this month that I'm presenting at to include the dates and locations. I'll be showing my full demo of the .NET StockTrader 2.0 and will have a few great giveaways too, including copies of free software to raffle off. Hope to see you there and get some great feedback on my app from you!

San Francisco (April 16): 6:30 PM, Microsoft San Francisco Office, 835 Market Street, Suite 700, San Francisco, CA. Get more info and register here, http://www.baynetug.org/DesktopModules/DetailXEvents.aspx?ItemID=316&mid=49.

New York City (April 21): 6:00 PM, Microsoft NYC Office, 1290 Avenue of the Americas, 6th Floor, New York, NY. Get more info and register here, http://www.nyccsug.org/.

Boston (April 23): 6:00 PM, Microsoft Waltham Office, 201 Jones Rd., Sixth Floor, Waltham, MA. Get more info and register here, http://www.bostonsug.org/.