Web services networks are rapidly evolving technology architectures allowing applications to tap into a variety of services in an extremely efficient and cost effective manner. Web services enable cost-effective and efficient collaboration among entities within an enterprise or across enterprises. Web services are URL or IP addressable resources that exchange data and execute processes. Essentially, web services are applications exposed as services over a computer network and employed by other applications using Internet standard technologies, such as XML, SOAP, WSDL, etc. Accordingly, web applications can be quickly and efficiently assembled with services available within an enterprise LAN or external services available over open computer networks, such as the Internet.
A web services network can be deployed across an enterprise LAN or across a Wide Area Network, such as the Internet. A typical web services network includes at least one network services broker that is operative to receive a service request and route the service request to the appropriate resource. A broker is a specially configured server or cluster of servers acting as an intermediary for web service requests and responses. As web services network usage increases, however, the broker can become a bottleneck. To ease this bottleneck, the prior art solution is simply to add additional processing power to the broker (e.g., additional servers), which is costly, inefficient, and fails to leverage the enterprise's investments in its existing network infrastructure. Moreover, the centralized nature of the broker creates reliability concerns in that failure of the broker disables the applications accessing services through it.
In light of the foregoing and the rapidly expanding use of web and network services, a need in the art exists for methods, apparatuses and systems that reduce the cost associated with operating web services networks. In addition, a need in the art exists for technology that leverages existing network infrastructure to create an efficient and cost effective web services network. As described below, the present invention substantially fulfills these and other needs associated with web services networks.