Title: Service Oriented Architecture (SOA): A hype or reality
Speaker: Dr. B V Kumar
Affiliation: Director and Chief Architect, Cognizant technology solutions, Bangalore.
Date: March 2, 2009
Abstract:
Service Oriented Architecture is not new. SOA and SOA related activities have been happening in the enterprise world. Amidst all the SOA-related activities, there still remains a significant amount of confusion as to what exactly is service orientation and what exactly constitutes a service-oriented architecture. While some qualify an SOA project by the fact that Web services technologies are being used, others tend to classify SOA as a Web-centric variation of object-orientation. Moreover, many notable IT vendors and solution providers have jumped into the bandwagon and the "SOA" acronym has been freely used to brand their products, technologies, and even projects without a clear understanding of its meaning. Many of these expectations on SOA, therefore, have been and will continue to remain unfulfilled.
There is a wealth of information out there that communicates the meaning of SOA in detail. However, this information is available as fragmented - distributed across marketing literature, research reports, technology specifications, media reports, etc. However, the silver-line is that there still exists a baseline of concepts and principles that prevails among much of the organizations, platforms, and initiatives that have influenced and continue to shape the SOA movement. For any IT professional, project team, or organization interested in moving ahead with SOA, this baseline perspective is extremely important to understand whether SOA is a Hype or a Reality as it reflects a current, industry-level, and vendor-agnostic representation of what SOA is in the real world.
About the Speaker:
Dr B V Kumar has an M Tech degree from Indian Institute of Technology, Kanpur and a Ph D from Indian Institute of Technology, Kharagpur. He has more than 19 years of work experience in the field of IT and ITES. Dr Kumar currently is the Director and Chief Architect at Cognizant Technology Solutions Limited., Bangalore, India. He oversees the Asset Building, Project Support and Evangelization activities as a part of his work at the Global Technology office of Cognizant. He also oversees the activities of Java Center of Excellence at Cognizant’s facilities. Earlier, Dr.Kumar was the Principal Researcher & Technologist at Infosys Technologies Ltd, Bangalore, INDIA. He was responsible for the new technology initiatives in SETLabs. His responsibilities include developing proof of concepts (POC), prototype development, grooming of enterprise architects and consulting. He has also designed and developed many advanced technology courses, mentored many Infosys professionals, and groomed many architects at SETLabs.
Dr Kumar has worked in leading organizations such as Computervision Corporation Singapore, Parametric Technology Corporation, Seoul, South Korea and Sun Microsystems, India. He has been working in the area of Enterprise Solutionsfor over five years, primarily focusing on Sun Technologies. His other interests include the newer technologies such as RFID, Embedded Systems. His specialization includes enterprise technologies such as Web Services, Service Oriented Architecture etc.
Dr. Kumar has already published two books on the enterprise solutions, and the third book is expected to be released by Addison Wesley in early 2009. He also has published papers in journals and in conferences of national and international repute. He also has two technology patents to his credit.