Services Relationship Modeling

Interface-based services discovery discussed in Chapter 4 is actually a functionoriented services discovery. In the real world, business services discovery typically has to consider other features in addition to business functions. Business relationship is an important one. For example, consider that a business organization

A

intends to decide from two business services serving the same functionality: service

b

produced by business

B

and service

c

produced by business C. Assuming that business

A

has formed an alliance relationship with business

B

, business

A

thus will be more likely to choose service

b

due to this existing business relationship. For another example, suppose an enterprise E

1

needs to compose a business process including service

s

. Enterprises E

2

and E

3

both provide similar service

s.

However, there is a partnership between E

1

and

E

2

leading to a service discount, and there is no specific relationship between

E

1

and

E

3

. If price is a requirement of consideration for

E

1

, the partnership between

E

1

and

E

2

shall be counted in order to form the most appropriate business process.