Data integration through service-based mediation for web-enabled information systems

The Web and its underlying platform technologies have often been used to integrate existing software and information systems. Traditional techniques for data representation and transformations between documents are not sufficient to support a flexible and maintainable data integration solution that meets the requirements of modern complex Web-enabled software and information systems. The difficulty arises from the high degree of complexity of data structures, for example in business and technology applications, and from the constant change of data and its representation. In the Web context, where the Web platform is used to integrate different organisations or software systems, additionally the problem of heterogeneity arises. We introduce a specific data integration solution for Web applications such as Web-enabled information systems. Our contribution is an integration technology framework for Web-enabled information systems comprising, firstly, a data integration technique based on the declarative specification of transformation rules and the construction of connectors that handle the integration and, secondly, a mediator architecture based on information services and the constructed connectors to handle the integration process

Distributed Access Control for Web and Business Processes

Middleware influenced the research community in developing a number of systems for controlling access to distributed resources. Nowadays a new paradigm for the lightweight integration of business resources from different partners is starting to take hold – Web Services and Business Processes for Web Services. Security and access control policies for Web Services protocols and distributed systems are well studied and almost standardized, but there is not yet a comprehensive proposal for an access control architecture for business processes. So, it is worth looking at the available approaches to distributed authorization as a starting point for a better understanding of what they already have and what they still need to address the security challenges for business processes

Resource Oriented Modelling: Describing Restful Web Services Using Collaboration Diagrams

The popularity of Resource Oriented and RESTful Web Services is increasing rapidly. In these, resources are key actors in the interfaces, in contrast to other approaches where services, messages or objects are. This distinctive feature necessitates a new approach for modelling RESTful interfaces providing a more intuitive mapping from model to implementation than could be achieved with non-resource methods. With this objective we propose an approach to describe Resource Oriented and RESTful Web Services based on UML collaboration diagrams. Then use it to model scenarios from several problem domains, arguing that Resource Oriented and RESTful Web Services can be used in systems which go beyond ad-hoc integration. Using the scenarios we demonstrate how the approach is useful for: eliciting domain ontologies; identifying recurring patterns; and capturing static and dynamic aspects of the interface

Knowledge-based life event model for e-government service integration with illustrative examples

The advancement of information and communications technology and web services offers an opportunity for e-government service integration, which can help improve the availability and quality of services offered. However, few of the potential service integration applications have been adopted by governments to increase the accessibility of and satisfaction with government services and information for citizens. Recently, the 'life event' concept was introduced as the core element of integrating complexity of service delivery to improve the efficiency and reusability of e-government services, web-based information management systems. In addition, a semantic web-based ontology is considered to be the most powerful conceptual approach for dealing with challenges associated with developing seamless systems in distributed environments. Among these challenges are interoperability, which can be loosely defined as the technical capability for interoperation. Despite the conceptual emergence of semantic web-based ontology for life events, the question remains of what methodology to use when designing a semantic web-based ontology for life events. This paper proposes a semantic web-based ontology model for life events for e-government service integration created using a methodology that implements the model using the ontology modelling tool Protégé and evaluates the model using Pellet Reasoner and the SPARQL query language. In addition, this model is illustrated by two examples, the Saudi Arabia King Abdullah Scholarship and Hafiz, to show the advantages of integrated systems compared with standalone systems. These examples show that the new model can effectively support the integration of standalone e-government services automatically so that citizens do not need to manually execute individual services. This can significantly improve the accessibility of e-government services and citizen's satisfaction. © 2014-IOS Press

A semantic web service-based architecture for the interoperability of e-government services

We propose a semantically-enhanced architecture to address the issues of interoperability and service integration in e-government web information systems. An architecture for a life event portal based on Semantic Web Services (SWS) is described. The architecture includes loosely-coupled modules organized in three distinct layers: User Interaction, Middleware and Web Services. The Middleware provides the semantic infrastructure for ontologies and SWS. In particular a conceptual model for integrating domain knowledge (Life Event Ontology), application knowledge (E-government Ontology) and service description (Service Ontology) is defined. The model has been applied to a use case scenario in e-government and the results of a system prototype have been reported to demonstrate some relevant features of the proposed approach

Businesses Integration with Workflow and Web Service Technologies

If businesses want to benefit from the power of the Internet, web sites have to evolve. It is often no longer beneficial for them to only provide static information. It is necessary for these web sites to find ways that allow them to interact with other websites, operating systems, and applications. With Web services it is finally possible to create functions that can easily be accessed over the Internet by both internal and external parties. In other words, with Web services it is possible to integrate different value chains from different organizations with ease. On the other hand, workflows provide tools and mechanisms for managing the interaction between people, systems, applications and business functions. The combination of these two technologies offers a very powerful solution for businesses integration.Workflow, Web Service, Integration, Windows Workflow Foundation (WF), Service Orientated Architecture (SOA)

Web services for distributed and interoperable hydro-information systems

Web services support the integration and interoperability of Web-based applications and enable machineto- machine interaction. The concepts of web services and open distributed architecture were applied to the development of T-DSS, the prototype customised for web based hydro-information systems. T-DSS provides mapping services, database related services and access to remote components, with special emphasis placed on the output flexibility (e.g. multilingualism), where SOAP web services are mainly used for communication. The remote components are represented above all by remote data and mapping services (e.g. meteorological predictions), modelling and analytical systems (currently HEC-HMS, MODFLOW and additional utilities), which support decision making in water management