Abstraction ties into many aspects of service-orientation. On a fundamental level, this principle emphasizes the need to hide as much of the underlying details of a service as possible. Doing so directly enables and preserves the previously described loosely coupled relationship. Service Abstraction also plays a significant role in the positioning and design of service compositions.
Various forms of meta data come into the picture when assessing appropriate abstraction levels. The extent of abstraction applied can affect service contract granularity and can further influence the ultimate cost and effort of governing the service.