ACSUG February Meeting – “Oslo” modelling platform overview – Jeremy Boyd

ACSUG February Meeting – “Oslo” modelling platform overview – Jeremy Boyd

by | Feb 4, 2009 | BizTalk Community Blogs via Syndication

Here are the next Auckland Connected Systems User Group meeting:
"Oslo" modelling platform overview – Jeremy Boyd
Jeremy Boyd (JB) is an experienced solutions architect, developer and consultant with over 7 years experience in the New Zealand market. He is a Microsoft MVP and Regional Director, and a Director of Mindscape.
JB will be […]

Reconfigure BizTalk with MsBuild

by | Feb 4, 2009 | BizTalk Community Blogs via Syndication

The other day I was having an issue with our build server so I decided to write a script to reconfigure BizTalk on our build or development servers. My plan was to run this regularly on a scheduled basis to ensure our build servers were kept clean.

I thought id write a little about this as it may be useful to others. Note the script is aimed at a single machine hosting BizTalk 2006 R2 and SQL Server.

Before I started I exported the configuration of our BizTalk Group to a file and then amended the credentials etc.

The list of tasks I would perform to clean and reconfigure our server is as follows:

Task

Description

Delete log file

When I run the BizTalk Configuration tool from the command line I will make it log to a file for troubleshooting any problems. Before I start the first clean up activity is to delete any old logs

Stop the following services:

  • W3SVC
  • SQLServerAgent

I stop any services which may want to access the BizTalk databases

Restart the following services:

  • MsSQLServer
  • MsDTSServer

Remove the EDI BAM definitions

When EDI is setup the BAM definitions for this feature are configured creating the usual BAM components. We need to remove these using BM.exe before we unconfigure BizTalk because unconfiguring the group will not remove the BAM Definitions

Use the BizTalk Configuration Editor to unconfigure the group.

Stop the WMI Service and any dependant services as advised by the BizTalk documentation

Delete the backup of the SSO Key

Note this is just for a development machine, you need to be careful about this on any real environment. I just delete the backup file here so I can recreate it when configuring the group

Unregister and delete the SSNS application for BAM Alerts

I will use NsControl.exe to do this

Run a SQL Script to drop the BizTalk databases

Delete the share and folder used by BAM Alerts

These are not removed when the group is unconfigured so need to be done manually

Start the following services:

  • Winmgmt (and any dependant services which I stopped earlier)
  • Start w3svc

Ensure any services which may be used while configuring BizTalk are started

Run the BizTalk Configuration Editor passing in the file containing the desired configuration.

To implement this I created a Visual Studio solution and wrote an MsBuild script and used some of the Microsoft.Sdc tasks. The below picture shows the files in this solution.

Its pretty simple and I will provide a link to the sample at the end of this post.

Some of the other ways I have extended this script since include:

  • Using an MsBuild task to register some custom adapters
  • Using an MsBuild task to register the WSE2 and Enterprise LOB adapters
  • Using an MsBuild task to add adapter handlers
  • Using the MsBuild configuration dictionary stuff I have blogged about in previous posts to configure the BizTalk Configuration xml file for different environments

The link to the sample for this post is: http://www.box.net/shared/t4k0m6ps5y

FOR XML PATH

by | Feb 4, 2009 | BizTalk Community Blogs via Syndication

In creating xml data from table data, I came across the need to create empty elements even in there are null values in the columns I am querying.

I first used this logic to force the generation of the tag:

SELECT EmployeeID as "@EmpID", 
       FirstName  as "EmpName/First", 
       MiddleName as "EmpName/Middle", 
       LastName   as "EmpName/Last"
FROM   HumanResources.Employee E, Person.Contact C
WHERE  E.EmployeeID = C.ContactID
AND    E.EmployeeID=1
FOR XML PATH, ELEMENTS XSINIL

However that returned the result:

<row xmlns:xsi="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance" EmpID="1">
  <EmpName>
    <First>Gustavo</First>
    <Middle xsi:nil="true" />
    <Last>Achong</Last>
  </EmpName>
</row>

I just wanted:

<row EmpID="1">
  <EmpName>
    <First>Gustavo</First>
    <Middle></Middle>
    <Last>Achong</Last>
  </EmpName>
</row>

So I changed the code to:

SELECT EmployeeID as "@EmpID", 
       ISNULL(FirstName,'')  as "EmpName/First", 
       ISNULL(MiddleName,'') as "EmpName/Middle", 
       ISNULL(LastName,'')   as "EmpName/Last"
FROM   HumanResources.Employee E, Person.Contact C
WHERE  E.EmployeeID = C.ContactID
AND    E.EmployeeID=1
FOR XML PATH, ELEMENTS

‘Oslo’ SDK – January 2009 CTP

by | Feb 4, 2009 | BizTalk Community Blogs via Syndication

The latest CTP version of the Oslo SDK was released a few days ago. I spent some time yesterday installing it and having a look. From a functionality perspective, there is not very much difference to the October 2008 CTP released after last year’s PDC. However, if you open up the main assemblies in Reflector, it quickly becomes apparent that the code has undergone significant refactoring and improvement. The code looks much tidier and closer to production quality. For example, the October 2008 CTP contained generated parser/lexer code for MGrammar. In the latest version, this has been removed, and it appears that the parser code is now dynamically generated at runtime (the ‘preferred’ Oslo approach). There has been lots of tidying up done in terms of type and method names. Additional functionality has been added to manage various issues, and the entire code base looks tighter and better constructed.

In terms of new functionality, this has been discussed elsewhere. See, for example, http://www.alexthissen.nl/blogs/main/archive/2009/01/31/improvements-and-changes-to-oslo-sdk-and-repository-in-january-ctp.aspx. Most attention has been given to the ability to include actions on the RHS of token productions. In the work we have undertaken to date, we have come across at least one situation which requires this new feature, and which we could not properly address in the October 2008 CTP.

Perhaps the most intriguing aspect of the January 2009 CTP is the way this new feature is described in the Release Notes. I suspect that Microsoft has inadvertently let slip a feature that they didn’t mean to go public on. The Release Notes published on the web site state that:

“Any production in a token can now have a code action or a graph action (formerly known as term construction)! You can now specify a return type for a token definition in the case of code actions, similar to a syntax definition.”

In the October 2008 CTP, actions are limited only to MGraph expressions. An action is an optional implication of a production that controls the output of the MGraph abstract syntax tree created by the parser. As far as I can tell, this is still the case in the new CTP. Unlike many similar technologies, the CTP version of MGrammar does not support the inclusion of code statements as semantic actions. This was discussed by Clemens Szyperski (an Oslo architect) in a comment to the blog article at http://weblogs.asp.net/fbouma/archive/2008/11/05/designing-a-language-is-hard-and-m-won-t-change-that.aspx, and the suggestion appears to be that this is a deliberate strategy in order to ensure that MGrammar remains (relatively) simple to write and focussed only on composable DSL creation.

The Release Notes statement suggests that Microsoft is looking at including code actions in MGrammar. As I say, it would appear that this feature is not actually supported in the January 2009 CTP. If it is, there is certainly no documentation explaining how to use this feature. Interestingly, this may be the explanation for a feature within the October 2008 CTP which seems to have disappeared from the current version. In the previous CTP, the MGrammar assembly included code for parsing C# statements. The parser didn’t appear to be designed as a full-blown C# parser, but looked like it was designed to parse code statements and expressions. This code appears to be missing from the January 2009 CTP.

It is generally a fool’s errand to speculate on what is happening behind the scenes, and I certainly have no special insight or knowledge about Microsoft’s intentions. However, I can’t help wondering if Microsoft has accidently let us see that they are considering supporting code actions in MGrammar when it is released, and have built code to support this feature which they do not wish to make public at the current time. If this is the case, there is no guarantee that this feature will make it into the final release. For my part, I have been thinking about this issue for a few months now, and am undecided, myself, as to the desirability of supporting full-blown semantic actions in this fashion. The issue, I think, is about how useful this feature will really be in mainstream DSL creation. Does the reduced problem domain of a domain-specific language imply language simplicity that generally avoids the need to handle complex semantics at the parser level? Clearly, there is no fundamental reason why a DSL should not exhibit such complexity, but if the vast majority of DSLs are inherently simple, maybe it would be wiser to stick to the current labelled graph-only model employed by MGrammar parsers, and work around this restriction. As I say, I am undecided. It may be that the Oslo team are currently also uncertain of the best strategy. It would be interesting to hear views from the wider modelling community.

In a related issue, am I the only person to spot an uncanny philosophical resemblance between MGrammar and Labelled BNF (LBNF)? Did LBNF have any bearing on the Oslo team’s thinking? The mechanics of the Oslo approach are different, and IMHO generally superior, to LBNF, but some of the underlying thinking is similar, including the emphasis on creation and shaping of labelled graph ASTs.

Aded functoid that converts a string of substrings into lowercasse with a capital first letter.

by | Feb 3, 2009 | BizTalk Community Blogs via Syndication

Hi all

So, a colleague of mine is integrating with AS/400 and this system seems to be sending
all strings as all-uppercase. So a company name might look like this: “JANS SUPERCOMPANY
A/S”. This really isn’t what he wants output in the end, so I have built a functoid
and added it to my downloadable collection, which converts the “JANS SUPERCOMPANY
A/S” into “Jans Supercompany A/S”. It has an optional set of strings that are not
to be messed with 🙂

Examples of output from the functoid. The second parameter is optional.

First input Second input Output
jan eliasen   Jan Eliasen
jan eliasen A/S JAn JAn Eliasen A/s
JAN ELIASEN A/S Jan,A/S Jan Eliasen A/S
This is a test string for the functoid tHIS,A,fOr,silly tHIS Is A Test String fOr the functoid

As always, you can download the functoid at http://www.eliasen.eu/DownloadSoftware.aspx –
where you can also download the documentation.

—

eliasen

BizTalk Server 2004 Mainstream Support Ends July 14, 2009

by | Feb 3, 2009 | BizTalk Community Blogs via Syndication

For all those still running BizTalk Server 2004, they should be aware that the Microsoft Mainstream support will end this year (http://support.microsoft.com/lifecycle/search/default.aspx?sort=PN&alpha=2004&Filter=FilterNO).

One other point to remember about with the release later this year of BizTalk Server 2009 and according to all the existing documentation there is not a direct upgrade path from BizTalk Server 2004 to BizTalk Server 2009, you must first upgrade to either 2006 or 2006 R2.

Also for those still on BizTalk Server 2000 or BizTalk Server 2002 the migration to BizTalk Server 2009 is not supported, so you will also need to migrate to 2004, 2006 or 2006 R2 and then upgrade to 2009.