Breeding Virtual Organizations in a Service-Oriented Architecture Environment

Abstract

A Virtual Organization Breeding Environment (VOBE) is an accepted concept in the research area of collaborative networks. So far, existing VOBEs are based on an infrastructure providing only limited support for efficient integration of VOBE members, and virtual organization partners on both technical and business levels. Thus, the Service-Oriented Architecture (SOA) has been proposed in this chapter as an approach to implement VOBE. A VOBE implemented in this way is called a Service-Oriented Virtual Organization Breeding Environment (SOVOBE). A SOVOBE is systematically organized around the concept of services, which are not limited to Web services, but which encompass also services performed by humans (organizations). In this chapter a set of core services is specified provided by SOVOBE to support SOVOBE members and virtual organizations throughout their lifecycle. The core services include Competence Management Service, Social Network Service, VO Collaboration Service, VO Creation Service, and VO Monitoring Service.