Before I say anything else I ought to declare an interest – as, along with my co-authors at Hurwitz, I’ve just completed writing the second edition of SOA for Dummies. Make no mistake about it, Wiley were very eager for us to write that 2nd edition, because the first edition sold so well. So the news, which recently broke, that “SOA is Dead” filled me with great joy.

As everyone knows, if you write a biography of someone and, just as it’s about to be published, they shuffle off their mortal coil and join the choir invisible, you’ve got a best seller on your hands. So it’s time to sit back and watch the royalties roll in. No doubt the same will happen with our new tome, if SOA really is dead.

But before charging off and selling the homestead in Texas to retire to the Bahamas, I thought I’d ping a few of my contacts, surf the web and research the matter. Sadly it isn’t long before I realize that the demise of SOA is much exaggerated. SOA is not only alive and kicking, it isn’t even confined to its sick bed on doctors orders. It’s up and out there jogging in the park with the rest of those other healthy IT concepts like mashups, Open Source and cloud computing.

The Greek Chorus

Prompted by this unwelcome discovery I surf around a little to try to discover who has been declaring SOA dead.

Wouldn’t you know it?

It’s that usual Greek Chorus of commentators, who don’t actually know how to build systems, but know how to write about building systems as if they were people who knew how to build systems. Now I’m in favor of drama, particularly classical drama, even though I’m well aware that the modern audience has real problems getting its mind around a Greek Chorus. You only need to attend a performance of the Oresteia by Aeschylus, and watch the audience instead of the play, to realize that.

Nevertheless there’s no getting away from the fact that a Greek Chorus, which comments on the action without actually being a part of the action is absolutely necessary in situations where it’s absolutely necessary. In the modern Greek Tragedy, the SOAestia the role of the Greek Chorus is utterly crucial. The story is a relatively simple one. SOA appears, conquers all previous architectures and he is elected to design all the IT sites in Ancient Greece.

Unfortunately, SOA has been too arrogant and has slighted Pallas Athena by inferring that her client/server strategy was crap. So Pallas Athena teams up with another client server buff called Poseidon, who sends a mighty tidal wave  called Recession to engulf  SOA and destroy him completely. I’m sure you’re getting the picture. Naturally, when you get to this point in the play, the Greek Chorus is chanting “SOA is Dead, SOA is dead” in the fashion of soccer fans who’ve imbibed a little too much fermented hop juice.

But – and this is definitely a departure from the usual format of Greek drama – Zeus intervenes, pulling SOA by the scruff of his neck up to the summit of Mount Olympus, and the tidal wave simply drowns the whole Greek Chorus.

Damn!

Of course the problem I have with this is that I’d prefer that SOA was dead, so that the sales of SOA for Dummies could shoot up into the stratosphere, but unfortunately I am obliged to report that all this “SOA is dead” stuff  stems from a sorry misunderstanding of the play.

P.S. Please don’t link to this posting or recommend it in any way. The more people who believe that SOA is dead, the better, as far as I’m concerned.

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