One of the innovations taking hold in the Information Technology (IT) community is services oriented architecture (SOA). As stated by the SOA entry in Wikipedia:
There is no widely-agreed upon definition of service-oriented architecture other than its literal translation that it is an architecture that relies on service-orientation as its fundamental design principle. Service-orientation describes an architecture that uses loosely coupled services to support the requirements of business processes and users. Resources on a network in a SOA environment are made available as independent services that can be accessed without knowledge of their underlying platform implementation.
To understand better the state and needs of the adoption of SOA in process manufacturing, the ARC Advisory Group is conducting a short 25-question survey, SOA for Manufacturers and Owner/Operators. The survey:
is designed for, and should be taken by, end users, owner/operators, etc. in process and discrete industries – as well as those with similar needs in other industries, such as utilities – with knowledge of their company’s interest, goals, and experience with Web services and SOA.
As with ARC’s other surveys, your participation earns a free copy of the results when they become available. This can help your organization better learn what other manufacturers are doing and possibly help advance your efforts.
I bring all this to your attention because I am also keenly interested in the problems you see SOA addressing and the business results you are seeking to achieve. It can have impact all the way to your process instrumentation and devices in your manufacturing processes.
If your organization is applying or investigating the application of SOA, consider investing a few minutes of your time taking the survey.
