Where Do You Want to Go in Your SOA Adoption Journey?

These days, almost every CIO or IT manager is looking into service-oriented architecture (SOA). Interestingly, adopting SOA isn't the same as deploying a software application, which can be a one-time activity. Rather, it's a journey for an organization over a long period of time - an important detail for everyone involved to understand. Although a few vendors claim that SOA can be quickly and easily implemented with their products, the overall understanding in the industry is that SOA adoption is an evolutionary, rather than revolutionary, process. Not every company has the same needs in adopting a service-oriented architecture (SOA). The authors compare four options for increasing system flexibility.