Device services as reusable units of modelling in a service-oriented environment - An analysis case study

Reusing software components is an important but not standardised task in software engineering. This will become a problem if requirements change in the future. By the use of web services in service-oriented architecture, as a communication interface for devices, the automation area has to define how to handle these reusable units. At the moment, no standardised way is defined. This publication analyses the use of web services in a service-oriented environment as a communication interface of physical devices in the area of automation. An analysis matrix will be built by the use of defined research challenges of web services and known reuse aspects in the area of software engineering. The results of a Device Profile for Web service (DPWS) case study will be compared to this matrix in order to define research steps and important factors for device services for the future.