The Rise of REST and the Demise of SOAP

(This is a follow-up to my previous article, "Early signs of the
death of SOA?")

A recent article by Darryl K. Taft in the online edition of eWeek,
dated 15 July 2007, and entitled, "The Merging of SOA and Web 2.0"
offers more evidence that the SOAP and WS-* standards are not
gaining wide adoption, but simpler standards such as REST and JSON
are.

Taft quotes Dan Hushon, CTO at EMC's Grid Business Unit in Hopkinton,
MA:

"Web 2.0 concepts and technologies may, over time, displace the WS-*
stack in many cases. For example, where we used to see SOAP [Simple
Object Access Protocol] and JSON [JavaScript Object Notation]/REST
APIs to services - e.g., Google - we are now seeing mainly JSON/REST.
And, in fact, REST, with its more data-centric approach, may very
well prove to be better aligned with the need for collaborating
around data. However, systemic security remains an Achilles' heel
for REST."

Note that Hushon says it's systemic security that's the challenge, not
that REST can't be made secure at all. So let's get to work on some
good security practices for REST-based services!

J.A.W.