Cloud Computing and SOA Convergence in Your Enterprise: A Step ...

84 Chapter 5 Working from Your Data to the Clouds
be placed on a cloud computing platform or will interact with resources
hosted in the clouds. Services provide a more granular way to deal with applications,
because you can mix and match services that exist within the enterprise
and on cloud computing resources, all bound together using processes
(discussed next).
You need to understand all business processes, the topic of Chapter 7,
“Working from Your Processes to the Clouds,” that exist within your domain,
either automated or not. This understanding is important because now that
we know which services and information sources are available, we must define
higher-level mechanisms for interaction, including all high-level, mid-level,
and low-level processes. In many instances, these processes have yet to become
automated or are only partially automated.
Data First
Let’s start with the data and work up from there. There are several reasons to
take a close look at the underlying information issues of our architecture before
moving to cloud computing. First, you must have a good architectural
foundation to move to SOA using cloud computing. You need to understand
the underlying information no matter whether it is a new or an existing system.
Again, some information is right for moving to an SOA using cloud
computing platform, whereas in other instances it is contraindicated.
Second, moving from the data to the services to the processes and applications
is a great way to move from the most primitive form of IT—simple
information—to the most complex, from processes that have information
and behavior to those with binding logic and sequence. In essence, we want
to start small and simple, then move to large and complex.
You May Work in Any Direction
We advocate working from the data to the services and then to the processes.
However, this rule is flexible. If it is a better fit, you could work from the processes
to the services and then to the data.