The IEEE Computer Society has issued a call for papers in connection with a special issue of Computer dedicated to Web Services Computing. IEEE "invites articles relating to integration architectures for Web Services and/or application case studies that use Web Services technology." This issue will be guest edited by co-chairs of the IEEE Computer Society Task Force on Electronic Commerce (TFEC). The special issue will be published August 2003. Papers should be submitted by January 15, 2003 and may address any of these topics: (1) Web Services architecture and security; Frameworks for building Web Service applications; Composite Web Service creation and enabling infrastructures; (2) Web Services discovery; Resource management for web services; Solution Management for Web Services; (3) Dynamic invocation mechanisms for Web Services; Quality of service for Web Services; Web Services modeling; UDDI enhancements; SOAP enhancements; (4) Case studies for Web Services; E-Commerce applications using Web Services; Grid based Web Services applications."

Guest editors for the Computer special issue are Jen-Yao Chung (IBM T. J. Watson Research Center), Kwei-Jay Lin (University of California, Irvine), and Rick Mathieu (Saint Louis University).

Background: "Web services are Internet-based, modular applications that perform a specific business task and conform to a particular technical format. The technical format ensures each of these self-contained business services is an application that will easily integrate with other services to create a complete business process. This interoperability allows businesses to dynamically publish, discover, and aggregate a range of Web services through the Internet to more easily create innovative products, business processes and value chains. Typical application areas are business-to-business integration, content management, e-sourcing, composite Web Service creation, and design collaboration for computer engineering."

Related item: Call for papers in connection with the IEEE 2003 Conference on E-Commerce, to be held June 24-27 2003, Newport Beach, California, USA.

About the IEEE Computer Society Task Force on Electronic Commerce:

Information systems and their application play a major role in today's business. Besides the introduction of new technologies to streamline processes within companies, Electronic Commerce over the Internet has become a major trend. Though only a few years old, it has the potential to radically alter economic activities. Electronic payment technologies, electronic procurement and electronic markets are only a few of the challenges that future businesses will have to meet. The current success of Electronic Commerce is based on the fundamental work done in earlier years in various disciplines. EDI, WWW, cryptography, databases and distributed object standards form a mix of technologies and standards for the development of Electronic Commerce applications. This means that Electronic Commerce does not describe a single new technology, but it is a patchwork of tools and techniques combining contributions of various disciplines. Together they should enable the fair exchange of goods and services over the Internet.

While computer and engineering sciences have laid the foundation for Electronic Commerce, Electronic Commerce technologies are no longer simple efficiency tools that automate various types of transactions. By equipping economic agents with tools to search, negotiate and transact on-line and real time, various applications of Electronic Commerce technologies promise an unprecedented opportunity to rethink fundamental assumptions about markets and economic efficacy through electronic markets and open a whole range of new research questions.

The Task Force on Electronic Commerce (TFEC) will act as an international forum to promote E-Commerce research and education, and participate in setting up technical standards in this area. Issues related to the design, analysis and implementation of E-Commerce systems and solutions are of interest. These include design and analysis of distributed architectures and enabling technologies (e.g., Autonomic computing, Grid, Web Services, etc.) and application development on E-Commerce system.

The Task Force on Electronic Commerce (TFEC) plans to sponsor professional meetings, publish newsletters and other documents, set guidelines for educational programs, as well as help co-ordinate academic, funding agency, and industry activities in the above areas. The TFEC organizes annual conferences. In addition, TFEC publishes a quarterly newsletter to help IEEE/Computer Society members keep abreast of the events occurring within this field. The International Workshop on Advanced Issues of E-Commerce and Web-Based Information Systems (WECWIS 2002) was sponsored by the TFEC.