We've been looking for some research to benchmark the maturity of SOA Testing efforts in isolation of SOA Governance as a whole. So when I heard Perry Donham was doing this over at Aberdeen, we wanted to participate in underwriting the survey and asking our users to contribute.

"SOA and Web Services Testing: How Different Can It Be?"
A free copy of the report is available here: http://www.aberdeen.com/link/sponsor.asp?spid=30410567&cid=4117

Of particular interest was less emphasis on component-level testing, and from 63% (average) to 81% (best in class) finding complete lifecycle testing to be a key to success - and these firms are overwhelmingly measuring quality by lifecycle metrics (time to release functionality, process quality) instead of counting the number of bugs per KLOC.

One area of concern was in the level of SOA training or expertise within organizations -- averaging 35% right now. A shortage of good architectural talent is certainly evident, but fortunately a majority of the responding companies are planning to address that over the coming year.

Anyway, it's fresh research, grab your own copy and join the discussion. Thanks to all of the LISA enterprise and WS-Testing users who took the time to participate in the sample group for Aberdeen.

- Jason