What is SOA?

In software engineering, a service-oriented architecture (SOA) is a set of principles and methodologies for designing and developing software in the form of interoperable services. These services are well-defined business functionalities that are built as software components (discrete pieces of code and/or data structures) that can be reused for different purposes. SOA design principles are used during the phases of systems development and integration.

- Service is the important concept. Web Services are the set of protocols by which Services can be published, discovered and used in a technology neutral, standard form.
- SOA is not just an architecture of services seen from a technology perspective, but the policies, practices, and frameworks by which we ensure the right services are provided and consumed.
- With SOA it is critical to implement processes that ensure that there are at least two different and separate processes—for provider and consumer.
- Rather than leaving developers to discover individual services and put them into context, the Business Service Bus is instead their starting point that guides them to a coherent set that has been assembled for their domain.