Databases Reference
In-Depth Information
A recursive example
The SOA Suite architecture is a good example of service-oriented design principles
being applied. Common services have been identified and extracted to be shared
across many components. The high-level services such as BPEL and ESB share some
common services such as transformation and adapter services running on a standard
Java EE container.
JDeveloper
Everything we have spoken of so far has been related to the executable or runtime
environment. Specialist tools are required to take advantage of this environment. It
is possible to manually craft the assemblies and descriptors required to build a SOA
Suite application, but it is not a practical proposition. Fortunately, Oracle provides
JDeveloper free of charge to allow developers to build SOA Suite applications.
JDeveloper is actually a separate tool, but it has been developed in conjunction
with SOA Suite so that virtually all facilities of SOA Suite are accessible through
JDeveloper. One exception to this is the Oracle Service Bus, which in the current
release does not have support in JDeveloper but instead has a different tool
named WebLogic Workspace Studio. Although JDeveloper started life as a Java
development tool, many users now never touch the Java side of JDeveloper,
doing all their work in the SOA Suite components.
JDeveloper may be characterized as a model-based, wizard-driven development
environment. Re-entrant wizards are used to guide the construction of many
artifacts of the SOA Suite, including adapters and transformation.
JDeveloper has a consistent view that the code is also the model, so that graphical
views are always in synchronization with the underlying code. It is possible to
exercise some functionality of SOA Suite using the Eclipse platform, but to get
full value out of the SOA Suite it is really necessary to use JDeveloper. The
Eclipse platform does, however, provide the basis for the Service Bus designer,
the Workspace Studio. There are some aspects of development that may be
supported in both tools, but are easier in one than the other.
Other components
We have now touched on all the major components of the SOA Suite. There are,
however, a few items that are either of a more limited interest or are outside the
SOA Suite, but closely related to it.
