Synapse

A new project, Synapse, has been proposed for Apache incubation. The project aims to build an ESB/broker that will complement the Apache WS stack. The main initiators of the proposal are some of the Apache WS heavyweights like Dims. While I still need some convincing of whether “the principles of service oriented architectures” is the final solution to integration, the proposal is interesting. If the project is successful (and I have no doubts it will) it will be a strong contender in the quickly evolving ESB/BPM/JBI space. It sure will be interesting to see how it will stand up against the giants, primarily IBM’s WBI and BEA’s AquaLogic. History has shown that open-source software can be very successful in the middleware space. Since that has made app servers commondity, this area has lately attracted a lot of interest from the vendors as a way of building added value on their existing infrastructure. One can not help but wondering how long that will last.

I must say that I’m a but surprised that the ServiceMix people doesn’t seem to be involved in this. It does seem to fit them like a glove, maybe some more people-level integration is needed?

Update: seems like the ServiceMix are joining in