Application integration using semantic web services

Abstract

This chapter is about a specific technology for the purpose of information integration, called semantic Web services. Plain Web services are a well-known and well-established technology, used mainly for the syntactic integration of information and for the unification of interaction. SemanticWeb services are a further development of Web services, namely the result of applying semantic Web technology to Web services. Semantic Web technology deals with making more of the meaning of information processable by machines. Process integration means unification of the way different applications interact. Organizational integration means unification of the way the applications and the infrastructural facilities to support them are managed and maintained. A common way to do the information and process integration is to transform applications into Web services and to make them accessible via a bus interface. a Web service definition is still largely syntactic in nature, and all semantic parts in its description are only human readable. Although semantic Web technology and its application to Web services are emerging standards, it is already a good idea to apply them. The semantic unification in application integration is a necessary step. Then an emerging standard, especially one that has few if any alternatives, is to be recommended over any proprietary solutions. © 2008 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.