As expected here are some predictions (not in order) for 2007:
o OASIS finally approves WS-ReliableMessaging and we don’t hear about WS-Reliability anymore.
o The rise of Semantic Web: We should see more vendors supporting RDF, SPARQL, etc and consequently more developers changing the way Web sites exposes data.
o SaaS adoption keeps growing: We should expect to see more and more classic enterprise applications moving to SaaS models.
o .NET 3.0 established itself as a foundation for other Microsoft products: You can argue that’s already true but we should see more products leveraging .NET 3.0 (particularly WCF, WF and Card Space). Among others BizTalk R2, Speech Server 2007, MIIS 3.5 already announced the use of .NET 3.0
o SCA-JBI becomes an alternative to classic J2EE: Fortunately will be a clear fragmentation between the classic J2EE model (EJB, JMS, JNDI, etc) and the new series of SOA-based Standards (JBI, SCA, etc)
o WS-* are finally implemented for Ruby On Rails, PHP and Python: WS-Addressing and WS-Security will be the first ones as always.
o SOA Governance becomes real: Together with the rise of IT Web Services solutions. IT departments will start investing on SOA Governance Frameworks
o The rise of resource-oriented services: I think we should stop thinking of resource-oriented services as just REST and start implementing more serious alternatives like WS-ResourceTransfer, WS-Resource Framework, RDF, etc.
o More Domain Specific Languages for vertical markets: Arguably some of the most notable DSLs have been applied to horizontal solutions (WSBPEL, XAML, WSCI, etc). I expect to see more architects designing DSLs to address Standard problems for vertical industries.
o Two Connect opens 6 new consulting practices: This one is important enough for me to be on this list.