Writing as a neutral non-technical observer, I have to state that your points here do resonate, Sanjiva. Certain people on this Group obviously know a lot about REST and equally obviously are keen devotees of the approach. However when someone as evidently experienced and bright as Steven has such difficulty in clarifying basic issues, it does give the impression that the RESTafarians still have a bit of work to do in at least explaining the use of REST in terms that are as clear and simple as the claimed nature of REST. There is obviously far more vendor support for WS-*, and this could arguably be explained in partly politico-commercial terms, but is this widespread support entirely without technical merit??
A question for the RESTafarians: what could the vendors usefully provide (apart from some clear, simple-to-understand whitepapers!) to assist the task of REST developers? Gervas _____ From: [email protected] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Sanjiva Weerawarana Sent: 09 December 2006 11:24 To: [email protected] Subject: Re: [service-orientated-architecture] REST FAQ On Fri, 2006-12-08 at 17:51 -0500, Steve Vinoski wrote: > > Its a bit surprising how such a simple architectural pattern > > requires so > > much of explanation eh? ;-) > > Umm, remind me again how many pages of WS-* specs are there? A lot- because WS-* has standardized a lot more stuff that REST has. However, my point was that even the teeny bit that REST has standardized is sooooo poorly understood as a platform for application integration. Don't believe that? Go read the thread on a RESTful lightbulb on this list and see how much it took to get some degree of consensus. And of course the current ROA/SOA thread. Neither is a silver bullet. I don't know of any WS-* folks who seriously think that WS-* is a silver bullet. Its *amazing* to me how many REST people (especially on this list) seem to really believe that REST is the silver bullet and that it has been a silver bullet for 15 years and people just have not known about it. Wow, it must be really comfy in that world .. are there even 70 virgins that come with getting it? ;-) Sanjiva. -- Sanjiva Weerawarana, Ph.D. Founder & Director; Lanka Software Foundation; http://www.opensour <http://www.opensource.lk/> ce.lk/ Founder, Chairman & CEO; WSO2, Inc.; http://www.wso2. <http://www.wso2.com/> com/ Director; Open Source Initiative; http://www.opensour <http://www.opensource.org/> ce.org/ Member; Apache Software Foundation; http://www.apache. <http://www.apache.org/> org/ Visiting Lecturer; University of Moratuwa; http://www.cse. <http://www.cse.mrt.ac.lk/> mrt.ac.lk/
