WSCF: a framework for Web service-based application supporting environment

Web service is an Internet-based software component that can shield all sorts of resources on basis of standard protocol stack. It helps to raise the level of abstraction and simplify conventional COTS middleware for resource sharing and cooperation across organization. In this paper, a Web service container framework (WSCF) is presented to offer an effective systematic solution for Web service-based application supporting environment, referencing from CORBA and J2EE system managing architecture and using SOAP interoperation protocol. The proposed framework focuses on addressing problems in two aspects: 1) Web service runtime supporting technologies: unified resource mapping strategy, flexible service adaptation mechanism, and SOAP engine scheduling algorithm; 2) several application supporting services: publication and discovery service, Web service composition service, and security service, etc. In particular, it describes ongoing project StarWebService that has followed WSCF. Finally, some open issues about WSCF are introduced and the future direction of WSCF is pointed out.