An overview of IBM UDDI Registries
The Universal Description, Discovery and Integration (UDDI) specification defines a way to publish and discover information about Web Services. The term Web service describes specific business functionality exposed by a company, usually through an Internet connection, to allow another company, or its subsidiaries, or software program to use the service.
Universal Business Registries (IBM UBR)
The IBM Universal Business Registry is one of a group of web-based registries that expose information about a business or other entity and its technical interfaces (or APIs). These registries are run by multiple operator sites, and can be used by anyone who wants to make information available about one or more businesses or entities, as well as anyone that wants to find that information. Although there are Universal Business Registries (sometimes referred to as public UDDI registries) hosted worldwide, including one hosted by IBM, enterprises may want to host their own internal registries behind their firewall to better manage their internal implementation of Web Services.
IBM WebSphere UDDI Registry
The IBM WebSphere UDDI Registry is a directory for Web services that is implemented using the UDDI specifications. In contrast with the IBM UBR, this component of WebSphere Network Deployment is a product offering for companies or industries to implement.
A critical component of IBM's dynamic e-business infrastructure, IBM WebSphere UDDI Registry solves the problem of discovery of technical components for an enterprise and its partners by:
- Providing control, flexibility and confidentiality so that an enterprise can protect its e-business investments
- Increasing efficiency by making it easier to identify technical assets
- Leveraging existing infrastructures
For example, the IBM WebSphere UDDI Registry could be used in the following way within a large enterprise:
A company has a legacy application that provides phone numbers and Human Resources (HR) information of employees. This is turned into a Web service and published to the registry. A developer in the same company needs to write an application for a procurement function that also needs to provide HR information to the supplier. The application should allow the supplier to have access to the employee account codes once the employee provides his name or serial number. Before Web Services, the developer had three choices:
- Would not have known about the similar application
- Knew about it but could not reuse due to technical barriers
- Knew about it and reused only after significant time and negotiation
With UDDI, you can search for the web service and reuse the existing technical component in your new application for the supplier in a matter of minutes. You save time and get the application up and running sooner than you would have otherwise -- increasing efficiency and saving the company time and money. The IBM WebSphere UDDI Registry is the first version 2 standard-compliant UDDI registry for private enterprise work. The IBM WebSphere UDDI Registry:
- Supports the public UDDI V2.0 standard
- Leverages the proven, reliable WAS technology
- Uses a relational database, such as DB2, for its persistent store.