BEA is introducing a BEA-branded version of the former Flashline repository, gearing it to SOA environments.

BEA acquired (http://www.infoworld.com/article/06/08/23/HNbeaflashline_1.html) Flashline in August. The BEA AquaLogic Enterprise Repository 2.5 is intended to assist customers with governance in SOA, specifically in dealing with managing IT assets in these architectures. Information is maintained about Web services types and definitions, service dependencies and ownership of services, said Paul Patrick, vice president and chief architect for AquaLogic at BEA.

New features include support for XPDL (XML Process Definition Language) and support for the BEA WebLogic Server 9.2 application server. XPDL is used for business process assets management.

"The real business value that [XPDL] brings is you can connect the business process management activities with SOA activities," said Charles Stack, BEA vice president of engineering. While SOA deals with Web services, WSDL, and schemas, business process management is concerned with business processes and workflows.

WebLogic Server 9.2 features zero-downtime capabilities, although this was first offered in the Version 9.0 release of the application server, according to BEA. BEA's repository also can run on the IBM WebSphere and Apache Tomcat platforms.