| Technical Term |
Defintion |
| access control |
protection of resources against unauthorized access; a process by which use of resources is regulated according to a security policy and is permitted by only authorized system entities according to that policy |
| ACK / NACK |
Role of a message used to acknowledge that a message has or has not reached a certain level of processing by the PSB or provider services |
| agent |
The agent is the concrete piece of software or hardware that sends and receives messages. It acts on behalf of an entity corresponding with the PSB |
| asynchronous messaging |
an interaction is said to be asynchronous when the associated messages are chronologically and procedurally decoupled. Participants in an asynchronous messaging system such as the PSB don’t have to wait for a response from the recipient, because they can rely on the messaging infrastructure to ensure delivery |
| authentication |
authentication is the process of verifying that a potential partner in a conversation is capable of acting as an agent for the entity in question |
| Authorization |
the process of determining, by evaluating access control information whether a subject is allowed to have the specified types of access to a particular resource. Usually, authorization is in the context of authentication. Once a subject is authenticated, it may be authorized to perform different types of access |
| business process |
a coordinated set of actions that produce a business result, either within a single organization or across several using services |
| Case Management |
a service on the PSB allowing the status of other services to be read or updated |
| Choreography |
a choreography defines the sequence and conditions under which multiple cooperating independent agents exchange messages in order to perform a task to achieve a goal |
| connection |
layer virtual circuit established between two agents for the purpose of message data exchange |
| Correlation |
message correlation is a means of associating a message within a specific business process conversational context. It may be realised by including message identifiers to enable associated messages to be identified |
| delivery notification status (DNS) |
delivery status of a message that can be optionally requested from the PSB |
| digital signature |
a value computed with a cryptographic algorithm and appended to a data object in such a way that any recipient of the data can use the signature to verify the data‘s origin and integrity |
| endpoint |
an endpoint indicates a specific location to send and receive messages on the PSB using a specific transport protocol |
| idempotent |
the property that the execution of multiple, identical operations on the same item will produce the same net effect |
| Integration Framework |
the components of the PSB infrastructure responsible for validation, routing, auditing and delivery of messages between services |
| interoperability |
the capability of distributed services to interact with each other |
| loose coupling |
the configuration in which the dependency factors between services – such as platform dependency, service availability dependency, language dependency, API dependency, etc – are reduced to a minimum |
| message |
a message is the basic unit of data sent from one web services agent to another in the context of web services |
| message correlation |
message correlation is the association of a service message with a context. Message correlation ensures that the requestor agent can match the reply with the request, especially when multiple replies may be possible |
| message exchange |
the sequence of operations required to successfully transfer a message between two points |
| message exchange pattern |
a Message Exchange Pattern (MEP) describes a generic pattern for the exchange of messages between agents. It describes the relationships of multiple messages exchanged in conformance with the pattern, as well as the normal and abnormal termination of any message exchange conforming to the pattern. |
| message gateway |
a service on the PSB that sends or receives messages from external agents. It incorporates transport services and potentially validation services |
| message reconciliation |
operational process between entities to verify that the number of messages sent by one entity were received by another agent |
| messaging bridge |
a design pattern allowing two different messaging systems to exchange messages |
| MISMO Envelope |
business envelope used for all messages exchanged between trading partners that use a MISMO format and defining the processing model to be applied to all messages |
| Non repudiation |
method by which the sender of data is provided with proof of delivery and the recipient is assured of the sender‘s identity, so that neither can later deny having processed the data |
| OASIS |
based standards for electronic business. |
| orchestration |
an orchestration defines the sequence and conditions in which one PSB service invokes other PSB registered services in order to realise some useful function |
| Public Key Infrastructure (PKI) |
Electronic framework for trusted security whereby participants each obtain a digital certificate from a trusted Certificate Authority (CA), which then authenticates their identity when initiating a secure transaction. Used in the Reach security model. |
| principal |
A system entity whose identity can be authenticated |
| property groups |
XML mechanism used for extending the message schemas of PSB services in a way which is forwards and backwards compatible |
| Protocol |
a defined procedure for transferring information between two computer systems |
| provider agent |
an agent that is capable of performing the actions associated with a service on behalf of its owner — the provider entity |
| provider entity |
the provider entity is the person or organization that is providing a service |
| proxy service |
a service that relays a message between a requestor agent and a provider agent appearing to be the actual service to the requestor |
| Public Services Broker (PSB) |
The SOA infrastructure deployed and managed by Reach to support interoperability between services |
| Publish - subscribe |
a message exchange pattern where a subscriber service sends a message to a publisher service, requesting that it be notified when an event occurs |
| quality of service |
Quality of Service (QoS) is an obligation accepted and advertised by a provider entity to service consumers |
| reliable message delivery |
ensuring that a message will be delivered in the face of communications or other failures of either the message sender or receiver |
| requestor agent |
an agent that wishes to interact with a provider agent in order to request that a task be performed on behalf of its owner — the requestor entity |
| requestor entity |
the person or organisation that wishes to use a provider service |
| REpresentational State Transfer (REST) |
A model for web services based solely on HTTP. Aspects of this model are used in the definition of a reliable transport specification for use with the PSB |
| Remote Procedure Protocol (RPC) |
Service style based on receiving a response message for each request message. It may involve either synchronous or asynchronous message exchanges. |
| Services and Data Exchange Catalogue (SDEC) |
The SDEC is a repository of documents, principally the set of documents called the Reach Interoperability Guidelines (RIGs) which are used to define both services operating on the PSB and the guidelines for deploying these services |
| security model |
a schematic description of a set of entities and relationships by which a specified set of security services are provided by or within a system |
| security policy |
a set of rules and practices that specify or regulate how a system or organization provides security services to protect resources |
| semantics |
the meaning or interpretation of a particular word in a specific context |
| service |
a service is an abstract resource that represents a capability of performing tasks that represents a coherent functionality from the point of view of provider and requestor entities |
| Service Interface Protocol (SIP) |
a document on the SDEC that describes the interface to and semantics of any PSB registered service |
| Service Oriented Architecture (SOA) |
a set of loosely coupled services which can be invoked, and whose interface descriptions can be published. The PSB is an SOA |
| SLA (Service Level Agreement) |
contractual service commitment between service entities. An SLA is a document that describes the minimum performance criteria a provider promises to meet while delivering a service |
| synchronous |
an interaction is said to be synchronous when the participating agents must be available to receive - normally by blocking and waiting on a thread - and process the associated messages from the time the interaction is initiated until all messages are actually received or some failure condition is determined |
| transaction |
a transaction is a feature of the architecture that supports the coordination of results or operations on state in a multi-step interaction. The fundamental characteristic of a transaction is the ability to join multiple actions into the same logical unit of work, such that the actions either succeed or fail as a unit. |
| transport |
the mechanism providing data transfer between two systems, usually occupying the lowest level of the “stack” of layers implementing an application |
| transport protocol |
an endpoint providing a discrete set of functionality that is accessed via World the combination of a mechanism and a procedure for data transmission |
| web service |
Wide Web technologies such as HTTP or HTTPS |
| XML (eXtensible Markup Language) |
the data tagging language used predominantly in web services and the PSB. XML is not so much a language as a standardized set of rules for adding structure to any form of data using a system of markup tags |