Chapter 1 Overview of eXchange Integrator

This chapter provides a general overview of eXchange Integrator and its place in the Java Composite Application Platform Suite (Java CAPS), including system descriptions, general operation, and basic features.

What's in This Chapter

This chapter covers the following topics:

• Summary of Features

• eXchange Integrator and Java CAPS

• Architectural Overview

• Process Overview

• Prerequisites Checklist

Summary of Features

eXchange Integrator provides an open B2B protocol framework to support standard EDI and B2B business protocols and delivery protocols. Not only does it support existing standard protocols, with an extensive set of prebuilt business processes (BPs), it also provides the tools and framework to create and adopt new protocols and to build custom BPs.

B2B modeling semantics are exposed so that business rules can be added and tailored to address the particular needs of each eBusiness challenge. The tight integration with the rest of Java CAPS provides validation, logging, and reporting capabilities. Because each logical step within any business rule is accessible anywhere along the entire business process, the design tools provide complete end-to-end visibility.

The trading partner management facility, eXchange Partner Manager (ePM), is provided via a Web interface. Trading partner profiles can be created from scratch and configured manually; or, for easy interoperability, they can be imported. Each trading partner profile is identified by a unique ID determined by the enterprise. ePM is also used to configure parameters for acknowledgments, compression, industry-standard encryption and decryption, and non-repudiation.

At run time, key steps in the business process, from initial receipt of the message to final delivery to the trading partner, are tracked in real time and also stored in the eXchange Integrator database. The Web-based message/package tracker provides tools for retrieving and filtering tracked message and envelope information. Used in conjunction with the other monitoring tools of Java CAPS, this provides the enterprise with a complete solution for troubleshooting and managing all eBusiness activities.

eXchange Integrator and Java CAPS

eXchange Integratorrelies on the Java Composite Application Platform Suite (Java CAPS). eXchange Integrator provides a Web-based trading partner configuration and management solution for automating and securely managing business partner relationships for real-time interaction between the enterprise and its partners, suppliers, and customers.

Integration with Java CAPS

eXchange Integrator is tightly integrated with Java CAPS and runs as a component within the Java CAPS environment. Figure 1–1 shows how eXchange Integrator and other Java CAPS components work together.

Figure 1–1 eXchange Integrator and the Java CAPS Framework

Architectural Overview

eXchange Integrator centers around the concept of a transaction profile for each trading partner relationship. Each transaction profile specifies values for parameters used in three different protocol layers:

• Business protocols such as X12 or HIPAA that codify agreements at the level of business messages/envelopes: business transaction types, validation, enveloping, batching, acknowledgment, and so forth

• Delivery protocols that codify agreements at the level of packaging and delivery: compression/decompression, encryption/decryption, signing/verification, and so forth

• Transports such as HTTP or FTP that codify agreements on where and how to deliver messages to and from trading partners.

eXchange Integrator uses the following key components:

• B2B Host Designer and attribute definitions— Using the Enterprise Designer GUI framework, eXchange Integrator provides an editor for setting up B2B environments, called the B2B Host Designer. Each B2B Host provides metadata for transports, delivery protocols, and business protocols, in the form of attribute definitions. The attribute definition metadata is stored on a directory server via LDAP. See Figure 1–2.

• Business Services (BPs, JCDs, OTDs)—eXchange Integrator leverages eGate and eInsight GUIs in theEnterprise Designer framework to provide a substantial library of prebuilt Business Processes (BPs) and Java Collaboration Definitions (JCDs) for selecting and handling protocols and accomplishing such tasks as batching, checking duplicates, and handling errors, as well as Object Type Definitions (OTDs) for communicating with transport-specific eWays and handling the ExStdEvent message.

  In addition to the core services supplied by eXchange Integrator, there are protocol-specific BPs, JCDs, and OTDs in each separately installable add-on Protocol Manager, for such industry-standard B2B protocols as X12 and HIPAA.

• ePM— eXchange Integrator provides a Web-based GUI called eXchange Partner Manager (ePM). This allows you to configure and manage B2B hosts and trading partners. and to assign the parameters that are used in transaction profiles. See Figure 1–5.

• LDAP Server—eXchange Integrator uses an LDAP-compliant directory server to mediate retrieval of trading partner information.

• eXchange Integrator Database—eXchange Integrator uses an Oracle database to store run-time information on correlation and message tracking.

• Message Tracker — eXchange Integratorprovides a Web-based message tracking GUI with powerful filtering and searching capabilities. See Figure 1–6.

The illustrations in Figure 1–2, Figure 1–3, and Figure 1–4 show some of the features provided by the various GUIs.

Figure 1–2 B2B Host Designer in Enterprise Designer

Figure 1–3 Example of a User-Created Business Process

Figure 1–4 Example of a Prebuilt Business Process (bpEX_DialogTOTP)

Figure 1–5 eXchange Trading Partner Configuration

Figure 1–6 eXchange Message Tracker

Process Overview

Using eXchange Integrator to create a business solution consists of three phases:

• Design phase within Enterprise Designer

• Design phase within eXchange Partner Manager (ePM)

• Runtime phase

The purpose of the design phases is to: Create metadata for business protocols, delivery protocols, and transports; set up business logic for business services (BPs and JCDs); configure connections with external systems; create and configure trading partners; and associate each trading partner relationship with a fully configured transaction profile. When a trading partner is saved, its transaction profile settings are stored on the LDAP server. See Figure 1–3.

At run time, the Logical Host reads the transaction profile settings from LDAP to determine how to receive and process inbound messages, which business logic to run, and how to process and deliver outbound messages. Results are written to the Oracle database, where they can be filtered and viewed by the Message Tracker facility.

These phases are explained in the following sections:

• Design Phase: Using Enterprise Designer

• Design Phase: Using ePM

• Runtime Phase

Design Phase: Using Enterprise Designer

Within Enterprise Designer, theB2B Host Designer is used to create B2B Hosts. Each B2B Host is a logical collection of business and enveloping attribute definitions, messaging and packaging attribute definitions, and transport attribute definitions.

Attribute definitions supply metadata for a transaction profile — in other words, the types of parameters to be supplied for exchanging messages with trading partners.

After the B2B Host is set up, a connectivity map is created to connect it to both an LDAP external and an Oracle external. Building a deployment using this connectivity map and an environment creates an eXchange Service object in the same environment that contains the LDAP and Oracle externals and a B2B Configuration object. Entries related to the host attributes are updated in the LDAP database. (In future releases, the eXchange Service corresponding to the B2B Host is configurable with keystores, trust stores, and certificates for authentication and non-repudiation. ) Other connectivity maps are created, built, and deployed to connect the ePM GUI application with the LDAP external and the Message Tracker application with the Oracle external.

After the eXchange Service is created, it is used in connectivity maps (both user-created and also pre-supplied) to expose services such as batching/unbatching, dialogs with the trading partner, error-handling, and so forth. When a deployment profile is built and deployed that references the connectivity maps located in the eXchange⇒;Deployment project folder, the selector/handler BPs are exposed to ePM and made available for run time.

Design Phase: Using ePM

eXchange Partner Manager (ePM) is used to create and configure trading partners and to create transaction profiles — an association between a particular trading partner and a set of parameters whose metadata are defined by the B2B Host’s attribute definitions.

For example, if a B2B Host uses the HTTP transport attributes definition, then a transaction profile for that B2B Host can use HTTP for transport, and must therefore be provided a value for the URL parameter. Or, if it uses the FTP transport, then it must be provided values for hostname, target directory, and so forth.

Saving a Trading Partner profile stores all of its transaction profiles’ configuration settings in the LDAP database.

Runtime Phase

The Logical Host reads the transaction profile configuration and receives messages from all inbound delivery channels it references. The parameters for each transaction profile dictate how to handle the inbound message, in terms of acknowledgment, decryption, de-enveloping, authentication, and so forth. The business logic of the associated business services (BPs and JCDs connected to the eXchange Service) provide further routing and processing. For an outbound message, the transaction profile parameters dictate how to handle it (in terms of compression, encryption, signature, enveloping, and so forth ) and how and where to send it.

The Oracle database keeps track of all messages sent and received. It checks for duplicates and acknowledgments, performs correlations, and also allows you to use the message tracker application to search, filter, and view message-related information, such as receipts, acknowledgments, notifications, errors, and message attributes.

Prerequisites Checklist

This section provides a checklist of prerequisite tasks that you must complete prior to runtime deployment.

One-Time Setup Tasks

1. Ensure that external systems are installed and available.

2. Make sure that you have done the following:

   1. Installed the product .sar files.

   2. Created Logical Host domains.

   3. Downloaded and run the Oracle scripts.

Enterprise Designer Tasks

1. Create or import environments, and then configure them.

2. Create and build the B2B Host projects.

3. Start the Logical Host (if you have not already done so).

4. Build and deploy the GUI and Error projects.

5. Create a validation Connectivity Map, and then build and deploy the eXchange deployment.

6. Customize the sample project components, and then build and deploy the sample projects.

ePM Tasks

1. Start ePM.

2. Import or create Hosts and Trading Partners.

3. Configure or customize Hosts and Trading Partners as needed.

Run-Time Tasks

1. Feed the input data (run the projects).

2. Verify the output data.

3. Track messages.