Some thought after using WWF (Windows Workflow Foundation)

by community-syndication | May 4, 2006 | BizTalk Community Blogs via Syndication

I thought WWF would be similar to HWS, but I was wrong. After spending some times to use WWF, I realized that it is so cool and I’m convinced that it will be great if the next version of BTS adopts the technology.
I think it provides a good programming model for human-based workflow as well as structured business process, and rule engine. (It should also be interesting to compare it with that of J2EE.)

By the way, I think the WWF APIs heavily use two design patterns named “dependency injection” and “dynamic service locator”. Some of you are already familiar with them. Otherwise, I think understanding those patterns can help to use the APIs. For more information about those patterns, see the Fowler’s article at http://www.martinfowler.com/articles/injection.html.

Thanks,
Young

"multiple schemas match the message type"may be caused by web services

by community-syndication | May 3, 2006 | BizTalk Community Blogs via Syndication

I was stuck recently with what seemed like a pair of contradictory errors.

I had an application deployed which was exposed as a web service. To test the application we built a test harness which picked up a flat file and called the web service for us and then dumped the result on the file system to see the result.

This testing system worked fine until I needed to use that same deployed schema to do some additional messaging. I wanted to route a message via a receive port and have a send port subscribe to it, then map the message to a new format and deliver it to a destination. Pretty simple, right?

Well, no. When I have my project deployed I got the following error when routing:

There was a failure executing the receive pipeline: “Microsoft.BizTalk.DefaultPipelines.XMLReceive” Source: “XML disassembler” Receive Location: ” D:\dat\FileReceive\RoundTrip\*.xml Reason: Cannot locate document specification as multiple schemas match the message type “http://BO.Get.EV2#Method“.

That error left me scratching my head. It means I probably have the schema deployed twice, right? I didn’t, so I thought. When I undeployed the application the messaging engine could no longer match my message type:

There was a failure executing the receive pipeline: “Microsoft.BizTalk.DefaultPipelines.XMLReceive” Source: “XML disassembler” Receive Location: “D:\dat\FileReceive\RoundTrip\*.xml”
Reason: Finding document specification by message type “http://BO.Get.EV2#Method” failed. Verify that the schema is deployed properly.

When I deployed the project with the schemas, everything suddenly worked fine. That means that, somewhere, the schema was again deployed.

So I looked thru the BizTalk Server Assemblies viewer and discovered that the web reference which existed in my test harness was the culprit. The messaging engine recognized the web reference as a second deployment of my schema. This was technically accurate but rather frustrating to find. I’ve seen so many of these errors posted on the newsgroups that I thought I’d mention this as a possible cause.

If you are using test harnesses coupled with web services be aware that your schema is actually deployed twice.

Xtreme Techover anyone?

by community-syndication | May 3, 2006 | BizTalk Community Blogs via Syndication

Avanade, NPower NY and Microsoft invite New York/New Jersey nonprofits to apply for an “Xtreme Techover” organizational makeover, to help transform their community technology centers and administrative systems to better serve their communities.  Organizations can apply online by May 26, 2006 at www.avanadeadvisor.com/xtremetechover.

One nonprofit will receive the grand prize, consisting of:

·         Consulting services worth $150,000 – including two consultants for 4-6 weeks – from Avanade, the leading global integrator specializing in the Microsoft enterprise platform

·         $50,000 in software licenses and $50,000 for physical improvements to a technology center or training from Microsoft

·         Server and storage value of $150,000 from Network Appliances

Second and third place winners will receive an online Microsoft certification course and access to an online library of the latest technical and business books.

All applicants will receive a free one-year membership or auto-renewal to NPower NY, which includes access to discounted or free volunteer resources, software, hardware, workshops and Webinars.  Winners will be announced at a June 20^th breakfast for all applicants.

Deadline:        May 26, 2006

Who’s Eligible:  New York/New Jersey metro region nonprofit organizations that are registered as a 501(c)(3), have between 20 and 50 technology users, not affiliated with any school or hospital organization, and currently have an on-site community technology center delivering technology access to its constituents.

Launch of BizTalk Server 2006 Tech Center

by community-syndication | May 3, 2006 | BizTalk Community Blogs via Syndication

I’m pleased to announce the launch of the new BizTalk Server TechCenter and that BizTalk Server 2006 is now featured on the BizTalk Server Developer Center.

BTS TechCenter: http://www.microsoft.com/technet/prodtechnol/biztalk/default.mspx. May is Learning BizTalk Server 2006 Month.

The site features:

• Virtual labs from Marketing.
• The end-to-end tutorial as downloadable Word docs.
• New content on Clustering BizTalk Server.
• Links to the Installation Instructions.
• Links to the Production Documentation published on MSDN.  

BTS Developer Center: http://msdn.microsoft.com/biztalk/default.aspx – May is Orchestration Month:

BizTalk Server Developer Center and the Microsoft BizTalk Server TechCenter have been renewed.

by community-syndication | May 2, 2006 | BizTalk Community Blogs via Syndication

It has been long time since I posted. I’ve been too pressed with my works and survival in the whole new country.

By the way, the BizTalk Server Developer Center and the BizTalk Server TechCenter  are renewed with BizTalk Server 2006.

Unfortunately, my samples weren’t yet published. I wrote the samples to demonstrate how use SSO as a configuration store, how atomic scopes work, how long-running transactions work, and how to use SQL adapter with atomic scopes. Each sample I wrote includes a test projects using BizUnit, since I think BizUnit is a great tool to repro the samples as well as do unit test.

If you have any ideas or feedbacks about the samples, don’t hesitate to let me know..

Thanks,
Young

BizTalk Server 2006 TechCenter has been launched

by community-syndication | May 2, 2006 | BizTalk Community Blogs via Syndication

Yesterday, May 1st, we launched the BizTalk Server 2006 TechCenter (http://www.microsoft.com/technet/prodtechnol/biztalk/). The TechCenter provides easy access to BizTalk Server 2006 technical documentation, downloads, and community, as well as to IT Pro favorites such as the Events & Errors Message Center. Each navigation page within the technical library includes quick access to search BizTalk Server newsgroups and knowledge-base articles as seen, for example, on the Getting Started page. Among many things, the site contains 

Developer Center and Tech Center for BizTalk Server 2006

by community-syndication | May 2, 2006 | BizTalk Community Blogs via Syndication

Important Biztalk 2006 links

by community-syndication | May 2, 2006 | BizTalk Community Blogs via Syndication

I am trying to put all the links in one place…

Biztalk 2006 Resources 

MSDN Biztalk 2006 Online Help   : Online documentation with Whats New, Architecture, Reference,Utilities, Deployments etc.

Microsoft Biztalk Server 2006 Help in PDF format : Download the above Help in PDF format

MSDN Biztalk 2006 Code Samples : Download the samples on orchestrations, messaging etc.

MSDN Biztalk 2006 SDK Samples : Downloadable SDK samples with guidance for installing and testing the samples.

Microsoft Biztalk Home page   :  Microsoft’s Homepage for Biztalk Server

MSDN On-Demand Downlodable Webcasts : You can now download all the archived webcasts and watch them anytime. Must see.

Expert Biztalk Server 2006 Videos and Samples : Stephen W. Thomas given well demonstrated, downloadable videos and code samples . These work great and one can get over all hands-on practice for Biztalk 2006 !!!

Biztalk Server 2006 First look Clinic for Developers : 90 minute demonstration and instroduction to Biztalk on developer perspective. Good to begin with.

Biztalk Server 2006 First look Clinic for IT Professionals : 90 minute demonstration and instroduction to Biztalk on IT-Pros perspective.

Biztalk Server 2006 Whitepapers : These downlodable white papers give over all understanding of Biztalk Architecture, New features etc.

Biztalk Server 2006 Virtual Labs : Get hand on experience without downloading Biztalk. Go to Microsoft virtual labs and work on various features on Biztalk server 2006.

Biztalk 2006 Unit testing using BizUnit Explained : Unit testing Biztalk server made easier with BizUnit (remember nUnit for .NET?).

Biztalk 2006 Unit testing using BizUnit Download : Download the Beta version of BizUnit and test your Biztalk Server App.

Biztalk Server 2006 New Functoids explained : Biztalk 2006 has few new functoids which make life easier for mappings. See how in this article.

Biztalk 2006 Documentor by Eric : You can create documentation about various artifacts of your Biztalk application.

Biztalk 2006 Deployment Explained 

One feature everyone liked most about Biztalk Server 2006 is the ease of deployment.

Everyone who deployed apps in Biztalk 2004 (and also earlier versions.. of course) knows how painfull it can be sometimes.

With Introduction of “Biztalk Application” and in-built MSI packaging, export and import features deploying a Biztalk 2006 application is very easy.

See how in the following articles…..

Biztalk 2006 Packaging and Deployment -1

Biztalk 2006 Packaging and Deployment -2

Biztalk 2006 Packaging and Deployment – 3

Biztalk Interview Questions

Biztalk Server Interview Questions & Answers – 1 : Few Interview questions and answers

Biztalk Server Interview Questions & Answers – 2 : Few Interview questions and answers

Other Biztalk Resources

Find all Biztalk related news : Look for the latest news

Code Project Biztalk Resources :  There is lots of information on Biztalk 2004 and 2006 here …

 More on Biztalk  From MSDN TV : Watch whats happening in Biztalk…

Hope it will be of some help for beginners…..

Consolidate to a single BizTalk database? Yes you can!

by community-syndication | May 1, 2006 | BizTalk Community Blogs via Syndication

I ran into a interesting and undocumented feature of BizTalk 2006 a couple weeks ago that I thought I’d share.  A colleague of mine, Jim Bowyer, had found out that with BizTalk 2006, you can consolidate most of your BizTalk database into a single one. 

For those of you that aren’t completely familiar with the internals of BizTalk, the following SQL Server databases are used to power a BizTalk environment (Note: some may not appear in your environment if you chose not to install all available BizTalk features)

1. MessageBox Databases


2. SSO Credential Database


3. BizTalk Analysis Database


4. BizTalk Configuration Database


5. Human Workflow Services Admin Database


6. BizTalk Rules Engine Database


7. BizTalk Base EDI Database


8. BizTalk Tracking Database


9. Notification Service


10. Windows SharePoint Services Configuration


11. Windows SharePoint Services Content


12. BAM Star Schema


13. BAM Primary Import


14. BAM Archive


15. BAM Analysis (OLAP)


16. BAM Notification

 (For a more complete outline of these DB’s (and what they are used for) check out this page )

Now that’s quite a number of databases to maintain and manage, so it’s natural that smaller organizations might be slightly intimidated about having to install, manage and support so many.  I found out last week that a new feature has been introduced to BTS 2006 that will allow smaller customers to consolidate nearly all of these databases into single one. (The exceptions being the BAM Notification and EDI DBs).

Now since this feature was introduced post Beta 2, the documentation surrounding it is pretty weak.  Additionally, the guidance around this concept is still almost non-existent. So here’s what I’ve been able to find out from our product team.

Reasons for:

• You are looking for a simplified install


• You are looking for simplified management post install


• You are looking for new variations of disaster recovery beyond the standard ones recommended with a multi-DB installation (i.e. you might be able to use database mirroring instead of having to rely on log shipping. Note: our product team has fully tested this and therefore doesn’t support it yet)

Reason against:

• You are really going to limit your ability to scale out your DB tier. Under a normal install, you would be able to place different DBs on different machines. You lose that ability under this type of set


• The testing that has been done for this type of install is admittedly very small. I haven’t seen any real numbers around potential performance impacts that this might have.


• The lack of documentation, testing and formal support for this feature

It should be noted that this feature is included for small BTS installations and shouldn’t be considered for larger enterprises. 

If you do decide that you do want to go ahead with this, here’s how:

During the configuration stage of your install, you can specify that you would like to install all features into the same database.  (All except for the EDI and BAMAlertsNSMain databases – as stated above).   When you fire up the BizTalk Server Configuration tool, and you’re at the stage where you can select the features you want to install. This is where you can specific the consolidation. You’ll need to specify the same database name for each feature (except EDI and BAM Alerts). After you do this, remember to adjust the connection settings when you use the BizTalk Server 2006 Administration MMC Snap-in.  By default, it will want to connect to a database called BizTalkMgmtDb.  If you consolidate your databases into a one new database then you need to specify that new one in the MMC.  You do this by right-clicking the BizTalk Server 2006 Administration node and selecting “Connect To Existing Group“.  This gives you the option to select a SQL Server and Database that the management db lives on. 

Hope that helps and keep on BizTalking…