Videos from the BizTalk Conference in Stockholm available on Channel9

by | Oct 15, 2010 | BizTalk Community Blogs via Syndication

All the videos from European BizTalk Conference in Stockholm has been published on Channel9. Thanks to everyone attending, and of course also Richard, Ewan and Stephen for coming over to Sweden.

All sessions relates to the Applied Architecture Patterns on the Microsoft Platform book that came out just after the conference. It’s a great book, and I hope you feel compelled to buy it after you’ve seen these presentations 🙂

Enjoy

Day 1 (Sessions from 8th of September)

Title Description Speaker
Welcome and Introduction   Richard Seroter
Choosing The Right Tool in the Application Platform Discuss the challenge of choosing the right technology for a given situation and present a decision framework for guiding evaluation. Richard Seroter, Ewan Fairweather & Stephen W. Thomas
Tech Overview: SQL Server Look at the core components of SQL Server that are used to build applications (e.g. SSIS) and when to use them. Ewan Fairweather
Tech Overview: BizTalk Server Discuss what BizTalk is and when to use it. Richard Seroter
Tech Overview: WCF/WF, Server AppFabric Highlight key capabilities in WCF and WF and benefits offered by Windows Server AppFabric. Stephen W. Thomas
Tech Overview: Windows Azure Platform Discuss Microsoft’s cloud offering and best usage scenarios. Richard Seroter
Pattern #1 – Simple Workflow Evaluate scenario that involves aggregating data from multiple sources and presenting a unified response Ewan Fairweather

Day 2 (Sessions from 9th of September)

Title Description Speaker
Pattern #2 – Content Based Routing Consider options for effectively transmitting data to multiple systems that perform similar functions Richard Seroter
Pattern #3 – Low Latency Request/Reply (coming soon) Assess a retail scenario where high performing query services are created Stephen W. Thomas
Pattern #4 – Cross Organization Supply Chain Evaluate how to build a supply chain to integrate systems in a PO scenario Ewan Fairweather
Pattern #5 – Remote Message Broadcast Demonstrates a scenario where traditional polling solution is augmented to support real-time updates Stephen W. Thomas
Pattern #6 – Complex Event Processing Addresses click stream analysis and creating actionable events from user and system behavior. Richard Seroter

Azure Applications: 3D Animation Rendering using Azure Worker Roles

by | Oct 15, 2010 | BizTalk Community Blogs via Syndication

I’ve added another webcast look looking at an application build on the Windows Azure platform. Like the last one on file transfer, this is a hybrid application with components running on premise and “In the Cloud”.
The webcast demonstrates the use of Azure worker roles to render a 3D animation. The animation is rendered in the cloud by 16 worker roles running a legacy DOS text-based ray tracer. Queues, blobs and tables in Azure storage are used to manage the render job and on premise applications used to upload the job details, monitor the job, and download the animation files.
I used PolyRay.exe to render the frames which is cool as PolyRay was the first application I used when I started my IT career 15 years ago as a 3-D animator.
The webcast is here.

Patch for VS 2010 “Scrolling Context Menu”

by | Oct 15, 2010 | BizTalk Community Blogs via Syndication

One of the top reported Microsoft Connect issues with VS 2010 has been an issue where context menus scroll even when there is sufficient screen real estate to show the menu in its entirely (with no scrolling required).

The VS and WPF teams issued public hotfixes today that you can download to fix this issue. You can learn more and download them here.

You can review my previous posts about other public VS 2010 hotfixes that are available below:

Hope this helps,

Scott

P.S. In addition to blogging, I am also now using Twitter for quick updates and to share links. Follow me at: twitter.com/scottgu

Using PowerShell to verify BizTalk Map Deployment

by | Oct 14, 2010 | BizTalk Community Blogs via Syndication

[Source: http://geekswithblogs.net/EltonStoneman]

You can actually use this to check for correct deployment of any .NET stack where you want to verify that assemblies and dependencies in the GAC are correctly deployed. Mostly I use it for troubleshooting when BizTalk can’t load maps or schemas.

With PowerShell you can instantiate any .NET object, and if there are any issues in loading the assembly or its dependencies, you’ll see the whole error message, which might otherwise be truncated or buried in a stack trace somewhere.

Firstly load the assembly so PowerShell can locate the type. Use the full name if you’re loading from the GAC, or the basic name if you’ve navigated to a program’s bin directory:

[System.Reflection.Assembly]::Load(‘x.y.z.Integration.Maps, Version=1.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=104fee075643f423’)

Next use Activator to create and unwrap an instance from the assembly and type name. If this fails, it will highlight any issues with missing dependencies:

$map = [System.Activator]::CreateInstance(‘x.y.z.Integration.Maps, Version=1.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=104fee075643f423’, ‘x.y.z.Integration.Maps.x_yService_Getz’).Unwrap()

If you don’t have any error messages, then your object ($map in this example) is ready to use, and you’ve verified the deployment is correct. For BizTalk maps you have the additional benefit that running ToString() (or just entering the object name) will show you the underlying XSLT:

$map

If you get do get errors along the way, they should tell you where the problem is. You can get more detail by querying the PowerShell $error object.

Coming up for Air: Rules Fest 2010

by | Oct 14, 2010 | BizTalk Community Blogs via Syndication

Jason Morris called it ’decompression’. After 10 months of planning and three packed days of presentations here in San Jose, Rules Fest 2010 is now in ’boot camp’ mode.More than half the attendees stayed for today’s sessions, and are currently spread between four boot camps – JBoss Rules, IBM JRules, OpenRules and Jess.My role as MC and catwalk model (don’t ask!) came to an end last night, and I am sitting in my hotel room, shattered, happy, but also with a distinct feeling of the ’bends’ as I emerge blinking into the warm Californian sunshine.
We are really happy with the way this year’s conference has gone.These are constrained times, economically, and we needed to prove the viability of the event and the ability of new management, and a new owner, to organise and host an international conference that provides real benefit to its attendees and sponsors.The post mortem will begin in earnest in a few days, and knowing our committee, will be a frank, open and critical appraisal of the last few days.However, we hit our targets, substantially grew the event from last year, garnered great feedback, had a really excellent line-up of speakers and all enjoyed the occasion immensely.
Rules Fest will strive to deepen its commitment to provide a technical conference ’for developers, by developers’.As I tried to explain to one bemused non-Microsoft person yesterday, we aim to be the ’PDC’ of the rules processing world, and refuse to be just another trade show.Next year, we will evolve the program to provide deeper developer content and more opportunity for rules developers to share their experience and get direct input into the issues they face.We plan to significantly increase the attendance again (we learned so much this year about how to market it, and are confident that we can hit significantly higher targets next year), attract wider sponsorship and broaden the pool of presenters.
My one on-going pain point is the lack of a really good .NET story.Now don’t get me wrong.I love the Java and C/C++ guys/gals to bits, but I really, really want to see the .NET developers who turn up to the event get more for their money.Mark Proctor quizzed me on my interest in the event last night (and immediately provided a litany of answers to his own questions!).I understand why he is a bemused.Where are the .NET rule vendors?Everyone else is there.Where were you, InRule? We tried to get you interested.Where were you, Microsoft (I know Karl would have loved to be there, as he has been in previous years)? And Dan, can’t we get IBM to push ILOG.NET a bit more? I said to Mark that at some point, the .NET rule logjam has to break, and I fully intend to be there when it does. Rules belong to businesses, not to the JRE. .NET developers do rules as well!
Big thanks to the team at the Hayes Mansion.Inga, you are an absolute star!Big thanks to Brenda who helped make the event a success. And big, big thanks to Jason and Brian who never lost faith.

BizTalk: Timeline: Development Tools

by | Oct 13, 2010 | BizTalk Community Blogs via Syndication

Now it is the timeline of the development tools only. It is a little bit “unofficial”. For example, I included the ESB but not RFID. Versions 2000 and 2002 are not covered , there only placeholders. Mainly because since the 2004 version it is completely new product from many points of view, including the developer’s point of view.

It is interesting, the main tools: the Schema Editor, Mapper, Orchestration Editor, Pipeline Editor were not changed since version 2004. BizTalk was heavily expanded over new areas and technologies. The core principle was “do no change things that work, add new features”.
Several tools were discarded, because of lack of user’s interest or because of the technology trends. For example, HWS, BAS, ODBA.

The High-quality PDF file

Please, let me know if you find out errors or weak points. Suggestions would be very-very appreciated.
It is version 1.

How to Go Online after working offline in Visual Studio Projects?

by | Oct 13, 2010 | BizTalk Community Blogs via Syndication

If you have been working with Visual Studio for a while I am sure you came across situations where the TFS Server was unavailable when you were working on the Project source code. Its nice to know that TFS allows you to continue working on your project offline when your TFS server is down. That’s really cool and you do that by opening your Project Solution file (.sln) and if TFS is not available it will ask if you want to work offline and lets you work offline.

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