Combining Different Multi-tenancy Patterns in Service-Oriented Applications

Abstract

Software as a service (SaaS) providers exploiteconomies of scale by offering the same instance of an applicationto multiple customers typically in a single-instance multitenantarchitecture model. Therefore the applications must bescalable, multi-tenant aware and configurable. In this paper weshow how the services in a service-oriented SaaS applicationcan be deployed using different multi-tenancy patterns. Wedescribe how the chosen patterns influence the customizability,multi-tenant awareness and scalability of the application. Usingthe patterns we describe how individual services in a multitenantaware application can be not multi-tenant aware whilemaintaining the overall multi-tenant awareness of the application.We show based on a real-world example how the patternscan be used in practice and show how existing applicationsalready use these patterns.