An exploratory study for investigating the issues and current practices of Service-Oriented Architecture adoption

Abstract

Service-Oriented Architecture (SOA) is an approach that can be used to integrate different services across operating systems, platforms, languages, and networks which offer some benefits. However, many organizations fail to fully utilize SOA because the adoption processes are still immature. Therefore, an exploratory study was conducted to investigate current issues and practices of SOA adoption, the use of maturity levels for assessing SOA adoption, and the importance of information technology (IT) and business benefits in SOA adoption. Thus, the Grounded Theory approach was adapted in this study which involved seven software development companies in Malaysia. In this study, 14 SOA practitioners with at least three years of experience in SOA development were interviewed. The collected data was analyzed through three main coding stages: open, axial and selective coding. The theory which emerged from this study revealed SOA adoption issues, current practices, maturity levels, IT and business benefits. The study managed to identify five main issues in SOA adoption which were knowledge, infrastructure, costing, readiness, and documentation issues. The study also portrayed five best practices related to technology, framework, platform, standards, and tools. In addition, results from the study showed five IT and business benefits, consecutively. The findings from the study have led to theories formulation on SOA adoption which may assist researchers and SOA assessors to continuously improve the quality and maturity of SOA adoption in the future.