Monoliths to Mashups: Increasing Opportunistic Assets

Opportunities are available resources that yield desired results. An opportunity's suitability depends on who seizes it and the context for its use. Opportunistic development builds hybrid software systems from reusable resources called opportunistic assets. Mashups are Web application hybrids that consume these assets. Monoliths are self-contained systems that can produce such opportunistic assets if they can expose key functions that are easy to mash. A major barrier to reusing legacy monoliths is integration. Elevating integration connectors to first-class opportunistic assets reduces this barrier by linking to and presenting monolith applications as opportunities for mashups. © 2008 IEEE.