Message Brokers and B2B Application Integration

Chap 13

B2B Application Integration

Sungchul Hong

Message Brokers

• Message brokers can be positioned between any number of source or target systems that exist within any number of organizations and broker the information exchange between them.

• They can account for differences in application semantics and database structure or format of the information

• Message brokers also provide a mechanism to integrate multiple business processes.

Message Broker

Middleware

data

Custom Applications

Packaged Applications

Message Broker Services

• Message transformation• Intelligent routing• Rules processing• Message warehousing• Flow control• Repository services• Directory services• Management• APIs and adapters

Message Broker Service

• Leave systems “where they are”

• Minimizing change while allowing data to be shared

• Lends tremendous value to B2B application integration.

Message Transformation

Rules Engine

Intelligent Routing

Information in

Information Out

Message broker have three primary components: the message transformation layer, the rules engine, and the intelligent routing mechanism

Message Broker Service

• Asynchronous– Target systems need not be active.

• Store-and-forward messaging• Manage interactions between applications and

other information resources.– Translate and convert data– Format and reconstitute messages– Any-to-any and many-to-many capability

• Utilizing abstraction techniques

Source & Target

• Database server

• Web server

• Host application

• User screens

• Distributed objects

• ERP applications

• Custom applications

Source & Target

• The source and target applications don’t require many changes in order for information to be moved among them.

• API is the mechanism that allows an application to access the services of a message broker.

• Costly approach• Adapters can link deeply into an application

Message Transformation

Rules Engine

Intelligent Routing

Adapter API

ApplicationApplication

Message Transformation Layer

• It understands the format of all messages– Fixed or variable

• It translates those messages.• Restructuring data from one message so that it

makes sense to the receiving application.• It provides common dictionary• It has application information in a repository

Transformation Layer

Source Target

F_Name: Dave

L_Name: Linthicum

SSN1: 999

SSN2: 99

SSN3: 9999

City: Reston

State: Virginia

Name: David Linthicum

SSN: 999-99-9999

City: Reston

State: Va

Conversions

• Schema conversion– Date_of_last_Bill Date– Last_Billed Alphanumeric

• Data conversion– Floating point– Alphanumeric– Integer

Intelligent Routing

• Flow control

• Identifying the source

• Understand schema

• Rules and services are applied

• Message transformation

• Rout the processed message to the target

Rules Processing

• The rule processing engine provides the B2B application integration architect and developer with the ability to create rules that control the processing and distribution of messages.

• Special requirements of integrating applications• Intelligent message routing and transformation

Message Warehousing

• A database that is able to store messages that flow through the message broker.– Message mining, message integrity, message

archiving, and auditing

• Buffer or queue function

Repository Services• A database of information about source and target

applications.• Owner of the system (company)• Location of the system (directory)• Security parameters• Massage schema information• Metadata• Enabling technology• Transformation information• Rules and logic for message processing• Object information

Directory Services

• Message broker requires directory services to locate identify, use, and authorize network resources for those systems.

• Using directory services, the message broker or B2B application integration developer can build applications that are able to negligently locate resources anywhere on the network.

Adapters• Adapters are layers between the message broker and

the source or target application.• Hide the complexities • Thin Adapters

– API wrappers that map the interface of the source or target system to a common interface.

• Thick Adapters– Many functions– Using abstract layer, it negotiate the differences between all

the applications requiring integration.– No programming is needed. (use repository)

Adapters

• Static adapters– Manually coded with the contents of the source

and target systems.

• Dynamic adapters– Learning capability– Discovery process (reading repository)– Determine the structure, content and application

semantics

Topologies

• Multihub– A number of message brokers are linked, whit the

source and target applications connected to any of the brokers in the configuration.

• Federated– Supports several message brokers working together to

solve a B2B application integration problem.

– Must learn inter operations

– Use common interchange format (XML)