OIO e-Business Registry - choice of product and main use case

The OIO e-Business Registry looks like the new registry for OIO, though the focus right now is just on e-Business. The original OIO registry (UDDI) is part of the InfoStructureBase (ISB), based on a Microsoft implementation. I'm not really sure if Microsoft has officially abandoned further development, but it currently only support version 1 and 2 (see the Windows 2003 Server UDDI FAQ).

The chosen product

Following the URL to the registry website you're met by the Oracle Application Server Service Registry Business Service Control - I haven't figured out what that loooong title really means, especially the final Business Service part puzzles me. In fact it's the Systinet Registry (Supporting UDDI version 3) that Oracle has teamed up with. I didn't know, but found an article about it on techtarget from 2005 Oracle-Systinet deal a win-win:

Oracle Corp. and Systinet Corp. have entered into a strategic three-year agreement in which Oracle will embed Systinet's registry with the recently unveiled Oracle Application Server 10g Release 3, a component of Oracle Fusion Middleware.

So Oracle has realized that developing they're own registry wasn't worth it - and they are not alone with that analysis. It turns out that BEA has done something similar, as can be read in an zdnet blog post Connecting the SOA dots with UDDI:

When BEA’s "AquaLogic" hits the market, one of its most interesting features will be a service registry that employs the Universal Description, Discovery and Integration (UDDI) standard. (Details on the service registry can be found here.) BEA announced it will be reselling the Systinet Registry as this component of AquaLogic.

On the Systinet website there's an overview of the registry [HTML] and the Systinet Registry Datasheet.

The main use case

I won't go into why the choose UDDI, but instead have a quick look at how it's used in connection with OIOSI. On the overview page for OIO Service Oriented Infrastructure (english version) the document: The Architecture of the Danish OIO Service Oriented Infrastructure [PDF] (Draft version 0.8, For public review) can be found. Main section 6 Service registry describes how the UDDI fits in, and section 6.2 Functionality lists the functionality (read use cases):

• Registration

  Businesses or public authorities must register their web services with the service registry in order for others to find and use the service to send a business message. All registrations are done to the master UDDI and the registered information is copied to the replicas afterwards by the replication procedure. Registration can be done through a Web interface or by calling UDDI web services.

• Activation

  It is necessary to make sure that interfaces defined by a client are correct after a registration. Therefore a number of test requests are initiated from the national master UDDI. The test requests use dummy data and test certificates. The responses are verified by the master UDDI....After the tests have been carried out successfully, the web service entry will be active in the UDDI, enabling lookups of the particular web service.

• Endpoint lookup

  An organization needs the endpoint of another organizations web service in order to send a business message to that organization. The purpose of the lookup mechanism is to provide this endpoint, based on the information of the business.

  EAN location numbers2 and CVR numbers are used to identify organizations and based on one of these numbers, it is possible to lookup web services from the specific organization through the UDDI replicas.

With the last one being essential, that's heavy in terms of usage/volume, and the former two supporting this one. This is one of the classic UDDI use cases, though I'll gladly admit that I wasn't expecting to see this already considering dynamic lookup for a business process directly related to money and bank accounts, will need some founding business agreements and readiness in terms of both raw technology and willingness from the business perspective. In OIO e-business profile version 0.8 it's show in an activity diagram: