What would one gain by turning an existing Web Service into a Grid Service?
Grid Services are Web Services that provide a well-defined set of basic functionality. Specifically, all Grid Services provide the basic set of methods described in the OGSI (Open Grid Services Infrastructure) specification. The general value added for Grid Services above and beyond ordinary Web Services includes: • A sophisticated security infrastructure (see question on security below) • A standard service invocation mechanism for service lifetime management • State management • A standard service inquiry mechanism Grid Services are invoked using a “service factory” mechanism. When an application needs to use a Grid service, it contacts a “factory” and requests an instance of the service. The factory creates a service instance and gives the application a reference to the instance. This standard mechanism enables sophisticated service management capabilities. Service lifetime management provides a mechanism for ensuring that services are “cleaned up” when they are no longer needed. Ea
