Kuali Rice: Cross Project Middleware

May 21, 2007

Aaron Godert - Cornell UniversityNate Johnson - Indiana University

The Goals The board vision for Kuali is a plug and play

module by module approach to software Kuali started as financials, but has evolved

into a suite of administrative software (KFS, KRA, KS)

Highly productive development environment For Kuali projects For non-Kuali projects

Goals cont. A common and consistent architecture

Allow developers to understand other rice enabled projects

Infrastructure would not need to be reinvented on each project - focus on functionality!

Rice team can focus on IT standards, like SOA, that will benefit the entire Kuali software suite

Adoption of other Kuali modules feasible

Rice is middleware Made up of several, possibly standalone

and swappable, middleware components Applications can use a “Rice Client” to

easily integrate with this middleware By using this client, interacting with other

rice enabled applications comes for free KRA using services deployed in other projects

How we got here Several separate applications needed

to be connected and share services in a loosely coupled fashion

Kuali products needed to be technically consistent under the hood For end user support For different development methodologies

How we got here cont. More reasons for technical

consistency Most administrative applications have a

common need for middleware services Avoid design and code duplication Consolidate configuration

Rice Components KEW Kuali Enterprise Workflow KNS Kuali Nervous System KSB Kuali Service Bus KEN Kuali Enterprise Notification

We should take a look at the history of each of these products before talking in more detail how they apply to Rice

The History of KEW Kuali Enterprise Workflow existed at Indiana

University as a stand alone integration project before Kuali began

Provided common engine to drive business processes electronically

Provided relatively simple API allowing choices on how to create workflows

When Kuali came along, the IU workflow engine became Kuali Enterprise Workflow (KEW)

The history of KNS KFS spent a large amount of

development time up front, using its best and brightest people, and came up with a great foundation on which to build KFS - the Kuali Nervous System!

This history of KNS cont. It focused on a unified approach

A standard way to use workflow A standard way to maintain support

tables using CRUD operations A standard way of creating business

transactions, which in the case of KFS was posting financial transactions

This history of KNS cont. The KNS abstracted a lot of the

complexity of developing the functionality of a financial system

By doing so it provided a large set of reusable code Enforced consistency in the KFS codebase Enhanced productivity for KFS developers

But this only benefited the KFS

The history of the KSB Other Kuali projects came along: i.e. KRA They needed to be able to seamlessly “talk”

to other Kuali services/applications in real time Reducing the need for offline batch Increasing business process agility

The KSB was born Currently used by KEW and hence KFS Will be 0.9 version by July 1, 2007

The history of KEN Kuali applications wanted an

advanced model for end user communication

The concept of Kuali Enterprise Notification was born

KEN unifies different communications for users

The history of KEN cont. It allows user preferences for notification

Users can choose how they are notified Preferences are saved for future notifications

Could be used for emergency communication in times of campus crises Cell phones, instant messages, email, etc Mass notification from user’s preference to

better reach the campus community quickly

Why does a project need Rice? KNS and KEW enhance developer

productivity and enforce standards KSB provides a SOA approach for cross

project interoperability KEN enhances the user experience while

fulfilling a general need for notification across all rice enabled applications

Let’s take a closer look at these components

The Rice Interactive Diagram

Available at http://rice.kuali.org Click anywhere on the diagram to

begin Click on any component for details

Kuali Rice as it stands Today Version 0.9 will be released July 1, 2007 This is the version KRA will start with Well tested

Rice is being used in KFS Both unit and functionally tested with

JUnit/HtmlUnit Set up in Continuous Integration environment

Let's take a closer look at each of these pieces in more detail

KSB Overview - The Goals1. Enable applications and services

deployed on the bus to interact with other applications and services

2. Provide (a)synchronous communication

3. Provide flexible security4. Provide Quality of Service (QoS)

Goal 1 - General Bus Mechanics A common registry of services

Lists all services on the bus and how they can be connected

Through simple configuration, most java based services can be “exported” from a rice enabled application, which is then ready to be consumed by another application

Goal 1 - General Bus Mechanics cont. A common resource loading layer that

provides access to services (bus or local) Services can be local to the application, in

which case the bus is short circuited and services are loaded directly and efficiently from inside the application

Services can be remote, in which case the service registry is queried for a service endpoint

Goal 1 - General Bus Mechanics cont. Most java services inside a rice-

enabled application can be exported to a variety of endpoints Java serialization, SOAP, JMS, etc.

A rice-enabled application can easily connect to any service on the bus

Let’s take a closer look - http://ksb.kuali.org

Goal 2 - Communication Models Synchronous communication = point to point :

a method call that waits for a response Asynchronous communication = usually

messaging : fire and forget : possible callback KSB has a proprietary messaging model out of the

box that needs minimal configuration JMS can be used : Good if you have IBM or Tibco Could plug in open source JMS when one matures

Goal 2 - Communication Models cont. Queue and Topic style messaging

Queues are a model where a single service is retrieved from a (possibly) redundant set of services and only that one is invoked

Topics are a model where all services with a given name are retrieved from a (possibly) redundant set of services and invoked

Goal 3 - Security Bus Security : Option to digitally sign

internal bus communication Service level security : done with open

source standard project, Acegi Can be protected at the service level Can be protected at the individual method

level Can be protected by many of the standard

security models such as CAS or Kerberos Can act as the user performing the activity

Goal 3 - Security cont. A “Security Context” is passed along with

service invocations This context holds

The user logged in The authentication token (from CAS or Kerberos) The users roles (for Authorization)

Services can then call an authentication authority to validate the user and optionally authorize the user with the roles

An application gets all of this "for free" by using the KSB via standard Acegi configuration

Goal 4 - Quality of Service (QoS) Failover - the ability to automatically switch to

another service w/o the calling service noticing Reliability - guaranteed delivery of messages Availability - services on the bus are available

real time -- if service is down, reliability ensures messages are delivered when service is available again

Time to live and retry counts - ensure that an institution can set their own QoS settings. If QoS is not met messages enter exception routing.

KNS Overview Provides reusable code, shared

services and a development strategy Provides a common look and feel

through screen drawing framework A document or transaction centric

model with workflow as a core concept

KNS Overview cont. More Core Concepts / Features

Transactional documents Maintenance documents Inquires Lookups Rules Questions Data dictionary

Transactional Documents These are data-entry centric

documents or “transactions” that model the business processes

Examples include: Proposal Development and Protocol

Built on a case by case basis using the Kuali tag libraries (soon to be a part of Rice)

Integrated with workflow

Maintenance Documents They do not need to be build case by case - just

one JSP that draws them all These are the CRUD documents - an easy way

to maintain support tables in a Kuali database C: Create new business objects R: Read or query business objects U: Update existing business objects D: Delete existing business objects

Examples include: budget rates and cost elements

Inquiries A way to drill down and get more

read-only information about a business object

Inquiry Screenshot

Inquiry Example Configuration<inquiry> <title>Travel Account Inquiry</title> <inquirySections> <inquirySection title="Travel Account"> <inquiryFields> <field attributeName="number" forceInquiry="true" /> <field attributeName="name" /> <field attributeName="accountType" /> <field attributeName="foId" forceInquiry="true" /> </inquiryFields> </inquirySection> </inquirySections></inquiry>

Lookups A way to search for data by a set of

criteria Results of lookups can be returned to

other lookups or documents

Lookup Screenshot

Lookup Example<lookup> <title>Travel Account Lookup</title> <menubar> <a href="/SampleRiceClient/index.html">Main</a> </menubar> <instructions>Look up Inst.</instructions>

<defaultSort sortAscending="true"> <sortAttributes> <sortAttribute attributeName="number" /> </sortAttributes> </defaultSort>

Lookup Example cont. <lookupFields> <lookupField attributeName="number" required="false" /> <lookupField attributeName="name" required="false" /> <lookupField attributeName="accountType" required="false" /> <lookupField attributeName="foId" required="false" forceLookup="true" /> </lookupFields>

<resultFields> <field attributeName="number" forceInquiry="true" /> <field attributeName="name" forceInquiry="true" /> <field attributeName="accountType" forceInquiry="true" /> <field attributeName="foId" forceInquiry="true" /> </resultFields></lookup>

Rules These are programmatic events defined in

Java Another way to think of them are as hooks

in a document lifecycle They can return errors and stop the lifecycle

until user input is corrected A lot have to do with the workflow lifecycle

processSaveDocument(…) processRouteDocument(…)

Questions A configurable way to ask a question

of the person using the Kuali application

Example: “Are you sure you want to cancel this operation? Yes or No”

Questions Screenshot

Data Dictionary Configure all of the above concepts

into a “usable document” XML based configuration Three types of dictionaries

Business Object Maintenance Document Transactional Document

Data Dictionary cont. Business Object Data Dictionary

Defines how to draw an inquiry (which fields to show the user)

Defines how do draw lookup and the result fields returned from a lookup as well as the default sort order of the lookup

Defines the business object’s attributes as well as how they are drawn and validated

Data Dictionary cont. Maintenance Document Data Dictionary

Defines the BO that is being maintained Defines the business rules for the document Defines the authorizations (initiator group) Defines the maintainable sections (tabs) and

layout of the attributes And various metadata (descriptions,

summaries, titles, etc.)

Data Dictionary cont. Transactional Document Data Dictionary

Defines the document Java bean Defines the business rules for the document Defines the document type Defines the document’s attributes as well as

how they are drawn and validated And various metadata (descriptions,

summaries, titles, etc.)

KEW Overview Facilitates routing and approval of business

transactions (documents) throughout the university

Provides re-usable rule creation which defines how transactions (documents) should be routed Bind business data to users

Provides hooks for client applications to handle workflow lifecycle events of transactions (documents)

KEW Overview cont. End users interact with workflow GUIs

Doc Search: Allows users to search for documents (transactions)

Action List: One place to go to find all documents that apply to you

Document Search Screenshot

Action List Screenshot

KEW Overview cont. Route log : document history, audit

trail

KEW Overview cont. Stand-alone: a centralize hub and spoke approach

Good if you just want to support one workflow server Centralize Action List and Doc Search Possibly easier to connect non-Java client

Embedded: a decentralized, almost P2P approach Fast for developers because workflow is local Distributes workflow across the university

Provides distributed transactions so that workflow and client applications stay in synch with each other (easier in embedded)

Services reachable via the KSB

KEN Overview Works with the action list to provide a single

place for all university related communications Workflow items come from KEW Non-workflow items from KEN

Non-workflow Examples Overdue library book A concert on campus Graduation checklists for seniors A crisis on campus

KEN Overview cont. Provides a secure and controlled

environment for notifying the masses Eliminate sifting through email Communication broker which provides

any combination of action list, text messages, email, etc...

Audit trail just as in KEW

KEN Overview cont. User preferences for notification types End user interfaces

Viewing notification details Maintaining the system (admin) Sending messages (admin)

KEN: Sending Notifications A developer can send notifications by:

Calling the sendNotification() service on the KSB

Invoking the service via a SOAP WS (exposed by the KSB)

Future: integration with KNS’s document frameworks

A user can send notifications using a provided workflow enabled form

KEN: Send Notification WS Input

KEN Screenshot: My Notifications

KEN Screenshot: Notification Details

KEN Screenshot: Notification Approval

KEN Screenshot: Delivery Type

What’s next? Looking to the future… Coming soon

Maven2 archetype for project template Distributed user and group services Out of the box web application for

management of users, groups, and adding application specific user attributes

The Future… cont. Rice components will piggy back on each other

KEW and KEN will use KNS to draw screens, etc. Standards

JSR 186/286 portlets for user interfaces (portals) BPEL for process orchestration in workflow JPA for data Lots of web service interoperability specifications

Possibly easier configuration through DSL Possibly better data mapping through JPA

More easily move away from OJB to Hibernate, EJB or any J2EE container if that is more desirable

The main Rice Site http://rice.kuali.org

Rice has a sub-site for each component Nervous System http://kns.kuali.org Service Bus http://ksb.kuali.org Workflow http://kew.kuali.org Notification http://ken.kuali.org

Still a work in progress Documentation stable and finished by July 1, 2007

About the website

The Team Brian McGough - Indiana University Nate Johnson - Indiana University Ryan Kirkendall - Indiana University Eric Westfall - Indiana University Tom Clark - Indiana University Aaron Godert - Cornell University John Fereira - Cornell University Aaron Hamid - Cornell University Scott Battaglia - Rutgers University Dmitriy Kopylenko - Rutgers University

That’s it!

Q & A