by community-syndication | Feb 10, 2011 | BizTalk Community Blogs via Syndication
With a hotfix that was introduced in BizTalk Server 2006 you can now specify the hour that you want the Backup BizTalk Server SQL Agent job to do the full backup of the BizTalk Server Databases, the default behaviour for this step of the job is to create the full database backups at change of day GMT time. For Melbourne, Australia this means that your full backup will happen at either 10am or 11am, depending on daylight savings time, this is typically not the time you want full database backups to happen.
After the hotfix and in subsequent releases of BizTalk Server you can now specify the hour that you want the full backups create, you can also now specify on the MarkAndBackupLog step to use local time for the log marks name that get created, so the log mark name and file date time match and additionally with BizTalk Server 2010 you can specify to use local time for the Clear Backup History step also.
The interesting side-effect that I found was that if you do not specify BackupHour on the BackupFull step and your machine, In my case a development server, was powered off for a couple of day, the first time that the Backup BizTalk Server jobs run after powering on the server a full backup is created. If you specify a BackupHour on the BackupFull step the job continues to create only transaction logs until the BackupHour is reached.
Also in BizTalk releases prior to 2010, if your server has been off for more days than you have DaysToKeep specified (default 14), it will delete the only full backup and not create another one until the BackupHour is reached, this was fixed in BizTalk 2010 with a change to the Clear Backup History step stored procedure.
Although this side-effect will typically not effect production environment that are up and running always, it may effect other environment that are not running always.
by community-syndication | Feb 10, 2011 | BizTalk Community Blogs via Syndication
Microsoft Dynamics CRM 2011 is the latest version of Microsoft’s CRM platform. The SaaS version is already live and the on-site version will likely be released within a couple weeks. Unlike previous versions of Dynamics CRM, the 2011 release does NOT have a BizTalk-specific send adapter. The stated guidance is to use the existing SOAP […]
by community-syndication | Feb 10, 2011 | BizTalk Community Blogs via Syndication
Part 1: BizTalk: Instance Subscription and Convoys: Details
This is a Part 2.
I am discussing the Suspend shape together with Convoys and going to show that using them together is undesirable.
In previous article we investigated the Instance Subscriptions and how they could create situation with dangerous zones in processing.
“You can use the Suspend shape to make an orchestration instance stop running until an administrator explicitly intervenes, perhaps to reflect an error condition that requires attention beyond the scope of the orchestration. All of the state information for the orchestration instance is saved, and will be reinstated when the administrator resumes the orchestration instance.
When an orchestration instance is suspended, an error is raised. You can specify a message string to accompany the error to help the administrator diagnose the situation.”
On the Suspend shape the orchestration is stopped in the Suspended (Resumable) state. Next we have two choices, one is to resume and the second is to terminate the orchestration.
Is the orchestration is stopped or unenlisted? You don’t find a note about it anywhere. The fact is the Orchestration is stopped and still enlisted. It is very important.
So again, the suspended orchestration can be resumed or terminated. The moment when the operator or the operation script resumes or terminates can be far away. It is also important too.
Let’s go back to the case from previous article. Make sure you notice the convoy and the dangerous zone after the last Receive shape.
Now we have a Suspend shape inside the orchestration.
The first orchestration instance is suspended. Next messages start new orchestration instance and have been consumed by this orchestration, right? Wrong!
The orchestration is stopped on the Suspend shape but still enlisted. Now the dangerous zone, the “zombie zone” is expanded to the interval between the last receive and the moment of termination or end of the orchestration. The new orchestration instance for this convoy will not start till this moment. How fast operator finds out this suspended orchestration? Maybe hours or days. All this time orchestration is still enlisted and gathering the convoy messages. We can resume the orchestration but we cannot resume these messages together with orchestration.
Seems the name Suspended of the orchestration is misleading. The orchestration can be in the Started (and Enlisted)/Stopped (and Enlisted)/Unenlisted state. The Suspend shape switches orchestration exactly to the Stopped state. The Stop name would describe the shape clearly and unambiguously and the Stopped state would describe the orchestration.
Imagine we can change the BizTalk.
- The Orchestration editor can search these situations and returns the compile error. In similar case the Orchestration Editor forces us to use only ordered delivery port with convoys.
- The run-time core can force the orchestration with convoy be suspended in Unresumable state, that means the run-time unenlists the orchestration instance subscriptions.
- The Suspend shape name should be changed.The “Suspend” name is misleading. The “Stop” name is clear and unambiguous. The same for the orchestration state, it should be “Stopped” not “Suspended (Resumable)”.
Conclusion:
- It is not recommended using a Suspend shape together with the convoy orchestrations.
by community-syndication | Feb 9, 2011 | BizTalk Community Blogs via Syndication
For the BizTalk Portuguese Community, Microsoft Business Integration RoadShow in Lisbon – February 28, 2011 As empresas de hoje trabalham num ambiente heterog%u00e9neo com sistemas d%u00edspares. Conectar sistemas e aplica%u00e7%u00f5es que se encontram nas diferentes plataformas e junt%u00e1-los aos processos de neg%u00f3cio, tornou-se umas das principais prioridades para a maioria das organiza%u00e7%u00f5es, e um dos […]
by community-syndication | Feb 9, 2011 | BizTalk Community Blogs via Syndication
Over Christmas I got to play a bit with the W3C RIF PRD and came across a few issues which I thought I would record for posterity.Specifically, I was working on a grammar for the presentation syntax using a GLR grammar parser tool (I was using the current CTP of ’M’ (MGrammer) and Intellipad – I do so hope the MS guys don’t kill off M and Intellipad now they have dropped the other parts of SQL Server Modelling).I realise that the presentation syntax is non-normative and that any issues with it do not therefore compromise the standard.However, presentation syntax is useful in its own right, and it would be great to iron out any issues in a future revision of the standard.
The main issues are actually not to do with the grammar at all, but rather with the ’running example’ in the RIF PRD recommendation.I started with the code provided in Example 9.1.There are several discrepancies when compared with the EBNF rules documented in the standard.Broadly the problems can be categorised as follows:
%u00b7Parenthesis mismatch – the wrong number of parentheses are used in various places.For example, in GoldRule, the RHS of the rule (the ’Then’) is nested in the LHS (’the If’).In NewCustomerAndWidgetRule, the RHS is orphaned from the LHS.Together with additional incorrect parenthesis, this leads to orphanage of UnknownStatusRule from the entire Document.
%u00b7Invalid use of parenthesis in ’Forall’ constructs.Parenthesis should not be used to enclose formulae.
Removal of the invalid parenthesis gave me a feeling of inconsistency when comparing formulae in Forall to formulae in If.The use of parenthesis is not actually inconsistent in these two context, but in an If construct it ’feels’ as if you are enclosing formulae in parenthesis in a LISP-like fashion.In reality, the parenthesis is simply being used to group subordinate syntax elements.The fact that an If construct can contain only a single formula as an immediate child adds to this feeling of inconsistency.
%u00b7Invalid representation of compact URIs (CURIEs) in the context of Frame productions.In several places the URIs are not qualified with a namespace prefix (’ex1:’).This conflicts with the definition of CURIEs in the RIF Datatypes and Built-Ins 1.0 document.Here are the productions:
CURIE ::= PNAME_LN
| PNAME_NS
PNAME_LN ::= PNAME_NS PN_LOCAL
PNAME_NS ::= PN_PREFIX? ‘:’
PN_LOCAL ::= ( PN_CHARS_U | [0-9] ) ((PN_CHARS|’.’)* PN_CHARS)?
PN_CHARS ::= PN_CHARS_U
| ‘-‘ | [0-9] | #x00B7
| [#x0300-#x036F] | [#x203F-#x2040]
PN_CHARS_U ::= PN_CHARS_BASE
| ‘_’
PN_CHARS_BASE::= [A-Z]| [a-z]| [#x00C0-#x00D6] | [#x00D8-#x00F6]
| [#x00F8-#x02FF] | [#x0370-#x037D] | [#x037F-#x1FFF]
| [#x200C-#x200D] | [#x2070-#x218F] | [#x2C00-#x2FEF]
| [#x3001-#xD7FF] | [#xF900-#xFDCF] | [#xFDF0-#xFFFD]
| [#x10000-#xEFFFF]
PN_PREFIX ::= PN_CHARS_BASE ((PN_CHARS|’.’)* PN_CHARS)?
The more I look at CURIEs, the more my head hurts!The RIF specification allows prefixes and colons without local names, which surprised me.However, the CURIE Syntax 1.0 working group note specifically states that this form is supportedand then promptly provides a syntactic definition that seems to preclude it!However, on (much) deeper inspection, it appears that ’ex1:’ (for example) is allowed, but would really represent a ’fragment’ of the ’reference’, rather than a prefix!Ouch!This is so completely ambiguous that it surely calls into question the whole CURIE specification. In any case, RIF does not allow local names without a prefix.
%u00b7Missing ’External’ specifiers for built-in functions and predicates.
The EBNF specification enforces this for terms within frames, but does not appear to enforce (what I believe is) the correct use of External on built-in predicates.In any case, the running example only specifies ’External’ once on the predicate in UnknownStatusRule.External() is required in several other places.
%u00b7 The List used on the LHS of UnknownStatusRule is comma-delimited.This is not supported by the EBNF definition.Similarly, the argument list of pred:list-contains is illegally comma-delimited.
%u00b7Unnecessary use of conjunction around a single formula in DiscountRule.This is strictly legal in the EBNF, but redundant.
All the above issues concern the presentation syntax used in the running example.There are a few minor issues with the grammar itself.Note that Michael Kiefer stated in his paper “Rule Interchange Format: The Framework” that:
“The presentation syntax of RIF is an abstract syntax and, as such, it omits certain details that might be important for unambiguous parsing.”
%u00b7The grammar cannot differentiate unambiguously between strategies and priorities on groups.A processor is forced to resolve this by detecting the use of IRIs and integers.
This could easily be fixed in the grammar.
%u00b7The grammar cannot unambiguously parse the ’->’ operator in frames.Specifically, ’-’ characters are allowed in PN_LOCAL names and hence a parser cannot determine if ’status->’ is (’status’ ’->’) or (’status-’ ’>’). One way to fix this is to amend the PN_LOCAL production as follows:
PN_LOCAL ::= ( PN_CHARS_U | [0-9] ) ((PN_CHARS|’.’)* ((PN_CHARS)-(‘-‘)))?
However, unilaterally changing the definition of this production, which is defined in the SPARQL Query Language for RDF specification, makes me uncomfortable.
%u00b7 I assume that the presentation syntax is case-sensitive.I couldn’t find this stated anywhere in the documentation, but function/predicate names do appear to be documented as being case-sensitive.
%u00b7The EBNF does not specify whitespace handling.A couple of productions (RULE and ACTION_BLOCK) are crafted to enforce the use of whitespace.This is not necessary.It seems inconsistent with the rest of the specification and can cause parsing issues.In addition, the Const production exhibits whitespaces issues.The intention may have been to disallow the use of whitespace around ’^^’, but any direct implementation of the EBNF will probably allow whitespace between ’^^’ and the SYMSPACE.
Of course, I am being a little nit-picking about all this.On the whole, the EBNF translated very smoothly and directly to ’M’ (MGrammar) and proved to be fairly complete.I have encountered far worse issues when translating other EBNF specifications into usable grammars. I can’t imagine there would be any difficulty in implementing the same grammar in Antlr, COCO/R, gppg, XText, Bison, etc.
A general observation, which repeats a point made above, is that the use of parenthesis in the presentation syntax can feel inconsistent and un-intuitive. It isn’t actually inconsistent, but I think the presentation syntax could be improved by adopting braces, rather than parenthesis, to delimit subordinate syntax elements in a similar way to so many programming languages.The familiarity of braces would communicate the structure of the syntax more clearly to people like me.
If braces were adopted, parentheses could be retained around ’var (frame | ’new()’) constructs in action blocks.This use of parenthesis feels very LISP-like, and I think that this is my issue.It’s as if the presentation syntax represents the deformed love-child of LISP and C.In some places (specifically, action blocks), parenthesis is used in a LISP-like fashion.In other places it is used like braces in C.I find this quite confusing.
Here is a corrected version of the running example (Example 9.1) in compliant presentation syntax:
Document(
Prefix( ex1 <http://example.com/2009/prd2> )
(* ex1:CheckoutRuleset *)
Group rif:forwardChaining (
(* ex1:GoldRule *)
Group 10 (
Forall ?customer such that And(?customer # ex1:Customer
?customer[ex1:status->”Silver”])
(Forall ?shoppingCart such that ?customer[ex1:shoppingCart->?shoppingCart]
(If Exists ?value (And(?shoppingCart[ex1:value->?value]
External(pred:numeric-greater-than-or-equal(?value 2000))))
Then Do(Modify(?customer[ex1:status->”Gold”])))))
(* ex1:DiscountRule *)
Group (
Forall ?customer such that ?customer # ex1:Customer
(If Or( ?customer[ex1:status->”Silver”]
?customer[ex1:status->”Gold”])
Then Do ((?s ?customer[ex1:shoppingCart-> ?s])
(?v ?s[ex1:value->?v])
Modify(?s [ex1:value->External(func:numeric-multiply (?v 0.95))]))))
(* ex1:NewCustomerAndWidgetRule *)
Group (
Forall ?customer such that And(?customer # ex1:Customer
?customer[ex1:status->”New”] )
(If Exists ?shoppingCart ?item
(And(?customer[ex1:shoppingCart->?shoppingCart]
?shoppingCart[ex1:containsItem->?item]
?item # ex1:Widget ) )
Then Do( (?s ?customer[ex1:shoppingCart->?s])
(?val ?s[ex1:value->?val])
(?voucher ?customer[ex1:voucher->?voucher])
Retract(?customer[ex1:voucher->?voucher])
Retract(?voucher)
Modify(?s[ex1:value->External(func:numeric-multiply(?val 0.90))]))))
(* ex1:UnknownStatusRule *)
Group (
Forall ?customer such that ?customer # ex1:Customer
(If Not(Exists ?status
(And(?customer[ex1:status->?status]
External(pred:list-contains(List(“New” “Bronze” “Silver” “Gold”) ?status)) )))
Then Do( Execute(act:print(External(func:concat(“New customer: ” ?customer))))
Assert(?customer[ex1:status->”New”]))))
)
)
I hope that helps someone out there 🙂
by community-syndication | Feb 9, 2011 | BizTalk Community Blogs via Syndication
Jesus Rodriguez has blogged recently on Tellago Devlabs’ release of an open source RESTful API for BizTalk Server Business Rules. This is an excellent addition to the BizTalk ecosystem and I congratulate Tellago on their work.
The Microsoft BRE was originally designed to be used as an embedded library in .NET applications.This is reflected in the implementation of the Rules Engine Update (REU) Service which is a TCP/IP service that is hosted by a Windows service running locally on each BizTalk box.The job of the REU is to distribute rules, managed and held in a central database repository, across the various servers in a BizTalk group. The engine is therefore distributed on each box, rather than exploited behind a central rules service.
This model is all very well, but proves quite restrictive in enterprise environments.The problem is that the BRE can only run legally on licensed BizTalk boxes.Increasingly we need to deliver rules capabilities across a more widely distributed environment.For example, in the project I am working on currently, we need to surface decisioning capabilities for use within WF workflow services running under AppFabric on non-BTS boxes.The BRE does not, currently, offer any centralised rule service facilities out of the box, and hence you have to roll your own (and then run your rules services on BTS boxes which has raised a few eyebrows on my current project, as all other WCF services run on a dedicated server farm ).
Tellago’s API addresses this by providing a RESTful API for querying the rules repository and executing rule sets against XML passed in the request payload.As Jesus points out in his post, using a RESTful approach hugely increases the reach of BRE-based decisioning, allowing simple invocation from code written in dynamic languages, mobile devices, etc.
We developed our own SOAP-based general-purpose rules service to handle scenarios such as the one we face on my current project.SOAP is arguably better suited to enterprise service bus environments (please don’t ‘flame’ me – I refuse to engage in the RESTFul vs. SOAP war).For example, on my current project we use claims based authorisation across the entire service bus and use WIF and WS-Federation for this purpose. We have extended this to the rules service.I can’t release the code for commercial reasons 🙁 but this approach allows us to legally extend the reach of BRE far beyond the confines of the BizTalk boxes on which it runs and to provide general purpose decisioning capabilities on the bus.
So, well done Tellago. I haven’t had a chance to play with the API yet, but am looking forward to doing so.
by community-syndication | Feb 9, 2011 | BizTalk Community Blogs via Syndication
Our first UK connected system user group is scheduled for Feb 15th 2011. There are two sessions planned for this meet.
Session 1
Speaker: Saravana Kumar (BizTalk 24/7 & BizTalk BlogDoc & BizTalk MVP)
Topic: Instrumentation and Diagnostics in BizTalk Projects
Session 2
Speaker: Richard Blewett
Topic: WCF 4.0 Routing Service
I’ll be presenting the first session on how to instrument and diagnose a BizTalk solution. I’m trying to address some of the bad practices we acquired over the years in this space and suggesting few best practices moving forward. It’s only a 45 min session, so its going to be challenging.
The tickets are going fast, when I checked few minutes ago only 8 left. So be fast, if you are planning to attend.
Nandri!
Saravana
by community-syndication | Feb 8, 2011 | BizTalk Community Blogs via Syndication
When you are trying to build a solution that contains Silverlight or WPF projects using MsBuild you may encounter the error “CS0103: The name ‘InitializeComponent’ does not exist in the current context”. While searching I have found various tactics that involves editing the project files, including namespaces etc.
But the real reason is you are using the wrong version of Msbuild. Multiple versions of Msbuild gets installs in your machine, through various versions of .NET framework, Visual Studio etc. So, check the path variables and make sure you are using the correct version. If you are using Silverlight 4, you need to use MsBuild.
Nandri!
Saravana
by community-syndication | Feb 8, 2011 | BizTalk Community Blogs via Syndication
Tellago DevLabs keeps growing as the primary example of our commitment to open source! Today, we are very happy to announce the availability of the BizTalk Business Rules Data Service API which extends our existing BizTalk Data Services solution with…(read more)
by community-syndication | Feb 8, 2011 | BizTalk Community Blogs via Syndication
I am busy creating schema's and exposing them as a web service. I always generate a client and try to post some messages and this time I was again surprised by BizTalk. (or should I say XML). When creating a schema you can chose several types for…(read more)
