Under the covers, the plugability implies some tweaks to make some modular components more modular, while upping the volume on messaging. In essence, they are making it easier to upload the necessary Java classes to activate different Oracle middleware components at run time.
Before this, we were committed to a modular architecture. This differs by ramping up that commitment, said Rick Schultz, vice president for Oracle Fusion Middleware, who added, We have not described it this way until recently.
Additionally, a new business rules engine will be added so that rules can be extracted from existing applications and applied to services executing composite applications. Specifically, a business analyst uses a high level tool to make changes declaratively, without having to drill down to code, and without impacting the rules embedded in the source applications.
And, given Oracle’s support for Java Business Integration (JBI), it will embed that in the Enterprise Service Bus (ESB) available as part of release 3. Unlike IBM or third party vendors, Oracle won’t sell the ESB standalone, but unlike BEA, it will allow higher level processes, such as BPEL orchestration, to be plugged into the bus.
In one other area, Oracle is following its rivals in extending support to open source frameworks that have emerged as alternatives to official Java standards such as Spring, Apache Struts, Apache Axis, Apache MyFaces, Hibernate, Tapestry, JUnit, CVS, SubVersion, Ant, Eclipse, and Log4J.
The new release expands support of web services security standards (SOAs). Specifically, it adds support of the same SAML 1.x and 2.0 standards (including Liberty) and WS-* (pronounced WS-Star) that were announced for Oracle COREid Federation, the federated identity solution recently.
Admittedly, the close timing of the federated ID announcement and the new release 3 were a bit confusing. To clarify, the federated ID system was announced for release 2, the current version, while all of the features being announced this week apply to the next version, release 3. Release 3 will become available sometime before the end of Oracle’s fiscal year, which wraps up in May.
