GXA (Global XML Web Services Architecture)
A framework, being developed by Microsoft and IBM (along with Verisign, BEA Systems, SAP and RSA Security),to give Web services additional, higher-level, abilities for security, reliability and transactions.
GXA offers developers a consistent way to build these protocols, primarily via headers in SOAP. At its heart is WS-Security, which describes how to attach security tokens (such as Kerberos tickets or X.509 certificates) to SOAP messages. However, the goal is to create an extensible umbrella of additional protocols to handle everything from routing and federation to security policies.
Some key design goals of GXA include transport independence - the use of SOAP headers means it is not HTTP or message specific and decentralization (or federation), rather than requiing a single, monolithic system.
Additional resources
Understanding GXA
Series of Microsoft papers that explains and documents GXA.
Web Services Security and More: The Global XML Web Services Architecture (GXA)
Overview by Joseph M. Chiusano, Booz Allen Hamilton for developer.com.
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