Assessing the replaceability of service protocols in mediated service interactions
Future Generation Computer Systems
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Given the inherent autonomy, heterogeneity, and continuous evolution of Web services, mismatches usually exist between service protocols. Adapters are typically used to reconcile these mismatches. Before synthesizing an adapter, a service requestor is often willing to assess whether her expected interactions can be conducted or not. The effort of synthesizing an adapter is beneficial only if the result of this assessment is positive. Previous effort analyzing service interactions focused on either (i) compatibility analysis for checking whether interactions can be conducted in a direct manner or (ii) adapter synthesization for reconciling mismatches. In this paper we propose a new kind of adaptability assessment that (i) determines whether two service protocols of a requestor and a provider are adaptable, (ii) computes an adaptation degree, and (iii) identifies conditions that determine when these two service protocols can be adapted. This adaptability assessment provides complementary criteria to the service requestor for selecting a suitable service protocol from a set of functionally equivalent candidates according to her requirements. Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.