Next Generation Networks (NGNs) aim to provide a unified network infrastructure to offer multimedia data and telecommunication services through IP convergence. NGNs utilize multiple broadband, QoS-enabled transport technologies, creating a converged packet-switched network infrastructure, where service-related functions are separated from the transport functions. This requires significant changes in the way how networks are managed to handle the complexity and heterogeneity of NGNs. This thesis proposes a Service Oriented Architecture (SOA) based management framework that integrates heterogeneous management systems in a loose coupling manner. The key benefit of the proposed management architecture is the reduction of the complexity through service and data integration. A network management middleware layer that merges low level management functionality with higher level management operations to resolve the problem of heterogeneity was proposed. A prototype was implemented using Web Services and a testbed was developed using trouble ticket systems as the management application to demonstrate the functionality of the proposed framework. Test results show the correcting functioning of the system. It also concludes that the proposed framework fulfils the principles behind the SOA philosophy.

Using the Internet for teaching and learning has become a trend in modern higher education, facilitated through the exploitation of advanced computing technologies. Virtual Learning Environment (VLE) applications support online learning over the Internet, and VLEs have thus emerged as e-learning domains that are essential prerequisites in cutting edge design and implementation technologies in education. Service Oriented Computing (SOC), as a novel software development and implementation approach, has become an active area of research and development. Web services, as an example of SOC, support the integration of software applications in an incremental way, using existing platforms and languages that utilize and adopt existing legacy systems. Thus, VLEs should be particularly well suited to Web services through the SOC approach. VLE services is a field subjected to continuous development but VLEs as Web services are still not generally accessible for academic institutions, although they have been adopted by some scientific projects. The next generation of VLEs should address the limitations of the current online systems by providing a richer context for online learning, one that is sensitive to the specific domain requirements of e-learning. Web Services Matching and Selection (WSMS), as a part of the functional requirements of Web services, has received less attention from SOC researchers. It involves discovering a set of semantically equivalent services by filtering a set of available services based on service metadata, and instantaneously selecting the best possible service. WSMS is the discovery of a service by a user, where correspondence is established between the objectives of the consumer and the capabilities of the service. It thereby aims to match and select the optimal service that best meets the requestor's needs. The main aim of this doctoral work is to explore novel architectural designs for VLEs, based on the SOC paradigm and its related techniques. In addition, this investigation aims to extend the core ideas behind VLE tools, which are gradually becoming dominant within academic institutes. Another aim is to devise a policy- based technique to enforce security requirements for VLEs and to build a test-bed for VLE security based on Modular Moodle. The fundamental contribution of this thesis that it demonstrates that VLEs can be considered as services, which can be published, discovered and composed as perceived in the SOC paradigm. An additional contribution to the knowledge is that it has built a new extension to the structure of Web services: the Web Services Matching and Selection (WSMS) system. Another contribution to the knowledge is that traditional security requirements have been modified to cater for the highly mobile and changeable environment of VLEs; this has been achieved through policy- based techniques. These contributions to the body of knowledge have been published in learned journals and at conferences.

<p>Advanced architectures for cluster-based services that have been recently proposed allow for service differentiation, server overload control and high utilization of resources. These systems, however, rely on centralized functions, which limit their ability to scale and to tolerate faults. In addition, they do not have built-in architectural support for automatic reconfiguration in case of failures or addition/removal of system components.</p><p>Recent research in peer-to-peer systems and distributed management has demonstrated the potential benefits of decentralized over centralized designs: a decentralized design can reduce the configuration complexity of a system and increase its scalability and fault tolerance.</p><p>This research focuses on introducing self-management capabilities into the design of cluster-based services. Its intended benefits are to make service platforms dynamically adapt to the needs of customers and to environment changes, while giving the service providers the capability to adjust operational policies at run-time.</p><p>We have developed a decentralized design that efficiently allocates resources among multiple services inside a server cluster. The design combines the advantages of both centralized and decentralized architectures. It allows associating a set of QoS objectives with each service. In case of overload or failures, the quality of service degrades in a controllable manner. We have evaluated the performance of our design through extensive simulations. The results have been compared with performance characteristics of ideal systems.</p>

<p>Web service is a sophisticated SOA technology with a lot of infrastructure. In this thesis we will get to understand the core aspects and advance futures of Web services and get a solution based on Sauer-Danfoss’s requirements. The critical requirement include to find appropriate Web services application server, to realize an automatic update process and to get a general overview of Web services technology. The challenges in this thesis is obviously in getting understand Web services architecture and programming in unfamiliar language using chosen Web services framework.</p>

Web servisų galimybės geriausiai tinka e. Vyriausybės informacinių sistemų įgyvendinimui. Šiame darbe taikomi tinklo paslaugų architektūros (Service Oriented Architecture (SOA)) principai ir įvairūs standartai, naudojami e. Vyriausybės informacinių sistemų kūrimui, saugiam duomenų perdavimui, informacijos šifravimui. Paslaugų architektūra SOA (angl. Service Oriented Architecture) yra tokia programinės įrangos architektūra, kai vartotojai naudoja programinę įrangą kaip paslaugą, kuri pasiekiama tinkle per realizaciją slepiančius interfeisus. SOA grindžiama visuotinai priimtais de facto standartais, kurie padeda palaikyti vartotojams reikalingus veiklos procesus, susidedančius iš laisvai susietų (angl. loosely coupled) paslaugų. Į vartotoją sutelktas paslaugų vaizdas yra pagrindinė idėja, skirianti paslaugas nuo objektinės orientacijos. Paslaugų informacinės sistemos (angl. Service-oriented Information Systems) sudarytos iš laisvai susietų junglių (angl. Interoperable) paslaugų, kurias valdo vartotojų reikalavimai. Norint veiksmingai projektuoti paslaugas, reikia šiek tiek kitaip modeliuoti: daugiau dėmesio skirti veiklos tikslams, kurti tikslesnius modelius, labiau automatizuoti kūrimo procesą. Pagrindiniai paslaugų elgsenos modeliai yra sąveikos ir būsenų mašinos, pagrindiniai statiniai paslaugų IS modelių elementai yra dalykinės srities duomenų esybės, paslaugų interfeisai ir pranešimai, kuriais keičiasi veiklos dalyviai. Naudojant visas šias technologijas buvo siekiama... [toliau žr. visą tekstą] / Government in every country wants to enhance the quality of their services provided for citizens and business enterprises. However, due to the lack of interoperability, traditional governments and municipalities face serious problems. These are mainly poor quality and high cost of services, and low economical revenues. Lithuania e-government has been proposed for solving these problems by making the interaction between government and citizens (G2C), government and business enterprises (G2B), and inter-agency relationships (G2G) more friendly, convenient, transparent, and inexpensive. E-government unifies different software solutions to provide country citizens and business enterprises easier way to communicate with their government. Web services provide interoperability for different types of applications, and this technology fits very well for developing e-government applications. This document summarizes the development of pension fund G2B software solution which should provide effective and reliable way for Lithuanian Republic Committee of Securities and pension fund governing enterprises to interchange various reports.

Mobiliųjų žiniatinklio paslaugų projektavimas, kūrimas ir pateikimas vartotojams, vis dar yra atskiras iššūkis kūrėjams. Taip yra todėl, kad mobiliųjų prietaisų rinkoje, nėra vienodų standartų prietaisams. Tačiau yra bruožų, iš kurių šie standartai galėtų atsirasti. Šio darbo eigoje yra atskleidžiami šie bruožai ir pateikiamos rekomendacijos, kurios padėtų vartotojams pateikti patikimas, saugias ir nepriklausančias nuo vartojamo mobiliojo prietaiso, paslaugas. Darbo metu išanalizuota mobiliųjų prietaisų rinka, bei atsižvelgiama į šios rinkos tendencijas ateityje. Pateikiamos rekomendacijos verslo struktūroms, kurios nesinaudoja mobiliųjų prietaisų teikiamais privalumais. Pateikiamos rekomendacijos apie kešavimo praktiką norint padidinti mobiliųjų žiniatinklio paslaugų patikimumą. Saugumo klausimų sprendimas panaudojant SOAP protokolą, bei papildomas skirtingų platformų bibliotekas. Aprašomos ir analizuojamos alternatyvos, kuriomis galima pasinaudoti projektuojant ir kuriant paslaugą vartotojams. Pateikiamas prototipinis paslaugos, bei Android operacinėje sistemoje veikiančios klientinės programos modelis. . / There are still big challenges for individual developers to design, develop, and deliver to consumers a Mobile Web. These problems occur because in the mobile market there are no united standards for appliances. However there is some characteristics of which these standards could occur. This work is disclosed during the course of these features and provides guidance to help developers make and deliver to mobile user’s safe and independent mobile web services for variety mobile devices. Job analysis at the mobile device market, and take into account the market trend in the future. There are presented recommendations for the business structures that exploit the advantages of mobile devices. Also, there are presented recommendations for developers about usage of the cache to increase the practice of mobile Web services security. Security issues explained using the SOAP protocol, and additional libraries on different platforms. There are description and analysis of alternatives that can be used in designing and developing a service to consumers. A prototype service with the Android operating system client application show how these recommendations are adopted in the real life.

Tjänster på internet är inget nytt begrepp. Det finns otaliga leverantörer av olika typer av tjänster, onlinebutiker, och portaler. När man skapar webbtjänster kan det vara svårt att förutse hur de kommer att användas när det lanserats. I tiden mellan idé och färdig produkt finns sällan utrymme att prioritera design av god användbarhet. God användbarhet är viktig då den ger en ökad produktivitet och andra affärsfördelar i form av färre misstag och bättre kvalitet, för att nämna några. Studien behandlar hur man utvärderar webbtjänster utifrån hur användare upplever kvaliteten samt hur den uppfyller deras behov det vill säga nöjdheten. Den behandlar även hur man kan genomföra en utvärdering, dels teoretiskt och dels praktiskt genom en survey. Syftet är att förklara vad kvalitet inom tjänster är samt vilka aspekter som påverkar hur användare upplever det. Studien har en verklig förankring i och med att en utvärderande survey genomförts på en webbtjänst för mäklare skapad av Valueguard AB. Studien utfördes med hjälp av enkäter som besvarades av aktiva användare av tjänsten. Olika aspekter som påverkar kvaliteten undersöktes och resulterade i att man kan se ett tydligt samband mellan upplevda kvaliteten och nöjdheten. Det framgick även att användbarheten har en väldigt stor påverkan på kvaliteten. / Services on the Internet are not a new concept. There are countless suppliers of various types of services, online stores, and portals. When creating Web services it can be hard to predict how it will be used once launched. The time between idea and finished product time is rarely prioritized for design of good usability. Good usability is important because it provides increased productivity and other business benefits in terms of fewer errors and better quality.This study deals with how to evaluate Web services based on how users perceive quality and how it meets their needs of user satisfaction. The study also deals with how to conduct an evaluation, partly theoretical and partly practical through the use of a survey. The purpose is to explain what quality of service is and what aspects affect how users experience it. The study has a real presence in that an evaluative survey is conducted on a Web service created for estate agents by Valueguard AB.The study is conducted using questionnaires answered by active users of the web service. Various aspects that affect the quality was investigated and resulted in a clear correlation between perceived quality and satisfaction. It was also confirmed that usability has a very large impact on perceived quality.

In addition to storing 70-75% of their data and business logic in legacy mainframe systems, global corporations have countless custom applications and off-the-shelf ERP products residing within their networks. Increasing competition and shrinking budgets have left managers scouring for innovative, cost-effective methods to maximize the potential of these enormous sunk costs. There is, as a result, an overwhelming need to not only web enable these existing legacy assets in order to quickly and cost-effectively deliver data to both customers and business partners alike, but also to amalgamate these disparate systems into a unified, homogeneous, real-time enterprise. Integration efforts to date, focused predominantly on the development of proprietary point-to-point adapters, have unfortunately proven to be a daunting task with countless failed projects and losses in the millions. The advent of XML web services does, however, have the potential to revolutionize existing integration strategies; the cost savings and ease of implementation associated with wrapping virtually all systems, past, present and future, with standardized, code-independent, data-centric interfaces is truly astounding. As the future success of this platform is, however, strictly dependent upon the interoperability of its endpoints, we have proposed several fundamental amendments to the existing flawed WSDL specification. A generic reference architecture, leveraging both this improved web services model as well as established component middleware technologies, is then proposed for the web enablement of legacy assets on an enterprise scale. In order to ensure the adoption of this methodology, a toolkit designed to automate the transformation has also been devised. This new paradigm will not only allow information to flow freely from deep within the enterprise, but will ultimately serve as the cornerstone of a new generation of enterprise integration solutions.

This thesis presents a framework for semantic Web Service discovery using descriptive (non-functional) service characteristics in a large-scale, multi-domain setting. The framework uses Web Ontology Language for Services (OWL-S) to design a template for describing non-functional service parameters in a way that facilitates service discovery, and presents a layered scheme for organizing ontologies used in service description. This service description scheme serves as a core for desigining the four main functions of a service directory: a template-based user interface, semantic query expansion algorithms, a two-level indexing scheme that combines Bloom filters with a Distributed Hash Table, and a distributed approach for storing service description. The service directory is, in turn, implemented as an extension of the Open Service Discovery Architecture. <br /><br /> The search algorithms presented in this thesis are designed to maximize precision and completeness of service discovery, while the distributed design of the directory allows individual administrative domains to retain a high degree of independence and maintain access control to information about their services.

Remote attestation is a promising mechanism for assurance of distributed systems. It allows users to identify the software running on a remote system before trusting it with an important task. This functionality is arriving at exactly the right time as security-critical systems, such as healthcare and financial services, are increasingly being hosted online. However, attestation has limitations and has been criticized for being impractical. Too much effort is required for too little reward: a large, rapidly-changing list of software must be maintained by users, who then have insufficient information to make a trust decision. As a result attestation is rarely used today. This thesis evaluates attestation in a service-oriented context to determine whether it can be made practical for assurance of servers rather than client machines. There are reasons to expect that it can: servers run fewer programs and the overhead of integrity reporting is more appropriate on a server which may be protecting important assets. However, a literature review and new experiments show that problems remain, many stemming from the large trusted computing base as well as the lack of information linking software identity to expected behaviour. Three novel solutions are proposed. Web service middleware is restructured to minimize the software running at the endpoint, thus lowering the effort for the relying party. A key advantage of the proposed two-tier structure is that strong integrity guarantees can be made without loss of conformance with service standards. Secondly, a program modelling approach is investigated to further automate the attestation and verification process and add more information about system behaviour. Several sets of programs are modelled, including the bootloader, a web service and a menu-based shell. Finally, service behaviour is attested through source code properties established during compilation. This provides a trustworthy and verifiable connection between the identity of the software on a service platform and its expected runtime behaviour. This approach is applicable to any programming language and verification method, and has the advantage of not requiring a runtime monitor. These contributions are evaluated using an example e-voting service to show the level of assurance attestation can provide. Overall, this thesis demonstrates that attestation can be made significantly more practical through the described new techniques. Although some problem remain, with further improvements to operating systems and better software engineering methods, attestation may become a trustworthy and reliable assurance mechanism for web services.