Patent ID: 8032894

Claim:
In a computer system for providing logical isolation and reducing message format transformation between a plurality of computer applications, a service bus comprising: computer readable memory having stored thereon computer executable instructions for integrating the plurality of computer applications via a service oriented computer architecture; a service locator module for communicating configuration information associated with a service, the configuration information comprising a plurality of fields for identifying message data formats associated with each of the plurality of applications and with the service bus; a service initiator module for forwarding a service request message from a consumer application to a service terminus module, the service terminus module forwarding the service request message to a service provider application to execute the service; and the service terminus module receiving a service response message from the service provider application and forwarding the service response message to the service initiator module, the service initiator module forwarding the service response message to the consumer application to provide the requested service; wherein at least one of the service initiator and the service terminus modules relay the service request and service response messages in a message data format native to at least one of the consumer and the service provider applications when the configuration information indicates that the service bus supports a message data format of at least one of the consumer application and the service provider application, the service request and the service response messages comprising a unified header including command and control information, the unified header comprising at least one header key identifying the configuration information at the service locator module.