Jon Udell on RESTful Web Services

A thoughtful piece by Jon Udell, who elegantly introduces us to the concept of Resource Oriented Architecture (ROA) -- an interesting approach to using RESTful styles for transactions, which have been considered the exclusive realm of Service Oriented Architectures (SOA).  After going through this post, I find myself really wanting to read the Richardson & Ruby book.

RESTful Web Services « Jon Udell

In the realm of IT you could hardly pick a more controversial topic. Or, in a way, a more unlikely one, given that the REST (Representational State Transfer) architectural style has its roots in what would normally have been an obscure Ph.D. thesis. Roy Fielding, the author of that thesis, told me in an interview that he was surprised by its breakout popularity. But he probably shouldn’t have been. There are not many technologies as foundational as the Hypertext Transfer Protocol (HTTP), whose principles that thesis defines. ...
On the question of ROA versus SOA (service-oriented architecture), the authors say that for certain kinds of enterprisey problems — including advanced security protocols and complex coordinated workflows — only SOA meets the need. They recomend it for these purposes, when the need arises. But in the many situations where the need does not arise, they recommend starting with ROA.

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