System and method for meta-data driven, semi-automated generation of web services based on existing applications

A system for facilitating the reuse of logic implemented in an existing software application, the system comprising:

• a first computer system in a design-time environment, the first computer system being configured to:
• receive a selection of an existing software application, wherein the existing software application is built using an application technology that is not Web service-enabled;
• generate metadata based on data parsed from program code for the existing software application;
• receive one or more customizations to be applied to the metadata;
• modify the metadata based on the one or more customizations;
• and
• generate artifacts for a Web service based on the modified metadata, the Web service being configured to expose a Web service operation that, when executed, causes an existing operation implemented in the existing software application to be executed, wherein the generating the artifacts for the Web service based on the modified metadata comprises:
• generating a mapping file identifying the existing operation, its associated data objects, and a mapping between the existing operation and an alternative operation name;
• and
• generating a template payload file defining a template payload to be transmitted to the existing software application at a time of invocation of the Web service operation, the template payload including an invocation of the existing operation, one or more placeholder values for one or more input parameters, and a sequence of zero or more sub-operations to be executed by the existing software application in order to carry out the existing operation.

A non-transitory machine-readable medium having stored thereon program code which, when executed by a processing component of a computer system, facilitates the reuse of logic implemented in an existing software application, the program code comprising:

• code for receiving a selection of an existing software application, wherein the existing software application is built using an application technology that is not Web service-enabled;
• code for generating metadata comprising code for parsing data from program code for the existing software application;
• code for receiving one or more customizations to be applied to the metadata;
• code for modifying the metadata based on the one or more customizations;
• and
• code for generating artifacts for a Web service based on the modified metadata, the Web service being configured to expose a Web service operation that, when executed, causes an existing operation implemented in the existing software application to be executed, wherein the generating the artifacts for the Web service based on the modified metadata comprises:
• generating a mapping file identifying the existing operation, its associated data objects, and a mapping between the existing operation and an alternative operation name;
• and
• generating a template payload file defining a template payload to be transmitted to the existing software application at a time of invocation of the Web service operation, the template payload including an invocation of the existing operation, one or more placeholder values for one or more input parameters, and a sequence of zero or more sub-operations to be executed by the existing software application in order to carry out the existing operation.