Embedded Systems

The IT assets of an enterprise can often be considered as actors that perform services. A CPU performs an information processing service; a filestore performs an information storage service; and so on. This includes software as well as hardware assets. A database management system performs a database management service; an accounts package performs a financial information processing service.

This is called asset wrapping. From a component-based software engineering point of view, the assets and the façade are components that are assembled to form a software service. The software services formed in this way can be used in service composition, have registry entries, and be dynamically discovered, in the same way as other services.

When an enterprise adopts an Embedded System, asset wrapping is typically applied to existing application software packages. This provides a significant benefit: Ability to integrate existing assets – which means that the value of an enterprise’s existing assets is preserved, the cost of developing or acquiring replacements is avoided.