Web services are an industry-wide response to the need for a more flexible and efficient business collaboration environment. Web services are self-contained, modular business applications that have open, Internet-oriented, standards-based interfaces. They allow businesses to connect together applications either behind or outside of firewalls independent of hardware, operating systems, or programming environments (e.g. Java, .NET). Web services offer businesses the ability to create low-cost, many-to-many connections with their customers, suppliers, trading partners, and even within their own organizations. The result is a lower cost, more flexible, and standards-based alternative to existing EAI and B2B integration technologies.
The HP Web Services Platform delivers a modular, standards-based architecture that allows for plug-and-play assembly of XML components for developing, deploying, registering, discovering, and consuming Web services. Included in the HP Web Services Platform are tools, utilities, and a robust run-time environment for exposing new or existing Java objects as Web services, and for deploying these Web services. Additional tools included in the HP Web Services Platform enable customers to automatically register these Web services in public or private Web services registries, as well as to discover relevant Web services offered by other businesses.
Web services extend the functionality of an application server by enabling applications to connect directly with other applications in a standard fashion. The HP Web Services Platform allows businesses to expose their assets as Web services; examples include:
- Software applications such as an income tax preparation application or an application that computes the appropriate sales tax based on location
- Business processes such as a purchase order fulfillment service or a service that enables suppliers to be alerted to inventory shortages at their customer's locations
- Computing resource such as online storage or server capacity
- Content services such as stock quotes or a service that allows mobile phone users to locate the nearest hotel or restaurant
Introduction
