In this paper, we discuss the use of abstract platforms and transformation for designing applications according to the principles of the service-oriented architecture. We illustrate our approach by discussing the use of the service discovery pattern at a platform-independent design level. We show how a trader service can be specified at a high-level of abstraction and incorporated in an abstract platform for service-oriented development. Designers can then build platform-independent models of

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... plications by composing application parts with this abstract platform. Application parts can use the trader service to publish and discover service offers. We discuss how the abstract platform can be realized into two target platforms, namely Web Services (with UDDI) and CORBA (with the OMG trader).