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How Siebel C/OM Can Be Integrated with Other SOA Applications

Web Services is the most common enabler of SOA. Siebel Business Applications support both inbound and outbound Web Services. The Siebel Business Application can:

• Generate and read WSDL
• Process and transform XML
• Receive and process Web Service requests over HTTP
• Invoke an external Web Service from any Siebel event, script, or Workflow

Outbound Integration of C/OM Services

You can call an external service from C/OM. Predefined integration interfaces can be implemented or hosted by an external application. Service can be provided by an external application, an integration server, a Siebel business service, or a Siebel business process (Siebel Workflow).

Figure 2 illustrates services integration for outbound integration.

Figure 2. Services Interfaces for Outbound Integration

External Service Call from C/OM

The workflow process shown in Figure 3 provides an example of calling an external service from Siebel Order Management . The figure shows a workflow process that includes a subprocess named Check Inventory Levels. The subprocess includes a step named Perform Inventory Check, which involves a Web service invocation.

Figure 3. Example: Check Inventory Level During Product Recommendations Algorithm

Web Service Performance

C/OM services such as Pricer or Eligibility are designed to work on batches of data to improve end-user response times. Any external service called by Pricer or Eligibility must support a batched interface that processes an entire set of data (such as all line items in an order) in a single invocation. Thus the overhead associated with Web Service invocation and with context establishment within the Web Service is only incurred once instead of, potentially, hundreds of times.

Inbound Integration of C/OM Services

You can expose C/OM functions as services.

Figure 4 illustrates services integration for inbound integration.

Figure 4. Services Interfaces for Inbound Integration

C/OM Functions Exposure as Services

The following workflow process (shown in Figure 5) provides an example of exposing C/OM functions as a service.

Figure 5. Example: Price a Quote or Order

In this example, a Web Service call is mapped to a controller workflow that transforms the inputs and outputs and invokes the standard pricing procedure.

This is stateless; no customer data or order data is stored in the Siebel Business Application.

Exact inputs are defined by the organization's specific pricing procedure. Inputs can include the following:

• Customer and order header information required for pricing
• A collection of line items for product ID, quantity, line level discount, and so on

Output is a collection of line items with prices attached, and a child waterfall collection for each line item.

Suggested C/OM External Services

C/OM business processes and functions that can be exposed as external Web Services and used by an external application include the following:

• Price List of Products
• Check the Configuration of a Product Instance
• Check Eligibility/Compatibility of a List of Products
• Compare Before and After Product Instances
• Apply Order Changes to a Product Instance
• Create, Validate, and Price Quote
• Create, Validate, and Price Order
• Update Order Status
• Get Quote
• Get Order
• Create Asset
• Disconnect Asset
• Suspend Asset
• Resume Asset

NOTE:  These Web services are not provided as prebuilt services, but they can be configured by administrators and integrators, or with the assistance of Siebel Global Services.