Integration using INDEX, SAP and IBM WebSphere Business Integration

Transcription

1 Integration using INDEX, SAP and IBM WebSphere Business Integration A description of proposed architecture keithprabhu@hotmail.com

2 Integration using INDEX and IBM WebSphere Table of contents 1. Requirements Proposed Integration Solution Description of Proposed People Integration: Application Server Interfaces: Process Integration: Messaging Platform: Enterprise Service Bus: References...6 Prepared by: 2 of 8

3 Integration using INDEX and IBM WebSphere 1. Requirements The main requirements of this integration solution are: 1. Interfacing the INDEX application with other enterprise applications like SAP with a view to enable quick creation and use of Business Logic Modules. 2. Integration of SAP XI and WebSphere Integration Products at a process level to enable other enterprise applications that already use WebSphere Integration products to interact with SAP using SAP XI. 3. Build an ESB that allows applications to easily connect to the ESB and enable a Service Oriented (SOA) Prepared by: 3 of 8

4 2. Proposed Integration Solution Fig. 1: Proposed

5 3. Description of Proposed 3.1. People Integration: In order to establish people level integration, the use of the IBM WebSphere Portal is envisaged. This portal will act as a front end for the INDEX application. As stated by (Davies, Birkler et al. 2004), the portal is accessible by using a Web browser and it can also be extended to support pervasive computing devices like mobiles and PDAs through use of WebSphere MQ Everyplace and ESB. The IBM Portal Server provides for page aggregation, markup transcoding, language translation, multi-device support and internationalisation. The INDEX application, being a Web Service, will communicate with the IBM Portal Server using SOAP. However, as stated by (Will, Ramaswamy et al. 2004; IBM Corporation 2005), enabling this through development of a standard Portlet requires substantial programming effort. To make this easy as stated by(will, Ramaswamy et al. 2004; IBM Corporation 2005), it is possible to use the Web Services for Remote Portals (WSRP) standard that simplifies integration of remote applications and content into a portal via Web services without programming Application Server The INDEX application will be hosted on the IBM WebSphere Application Server, that as stated by (Davies, Birkler et al. 2004), provides support for J2EE, XML, Messaging and Web Services programming models Interfaces: There are two interfaces required by the IBM WebSphere Business Interchange Server for the proposed architecture. WBI Adapter for SAP XI: This adapter can communicate with SAP XI using XML and with the WebSphere ICS using Business Objects Web Services Adapter: Communication between INDEX Web Services and the ESB is enabled through use of a Web Services Adapter. Other adapters: There are various application, technology and mainframe adapters available that provide connectivity between the different data sources and applications and the integration products like the Message Broker and the Interchange Server Process Integration: In order to establish process level integration between SAP XI and other applications the WBI Interchange Server (ICS) is used. As described by (Gavin, Diederichs et al. 2003; Davies, Birkler et al. 2004), this product has a library of pre-built integration processes and business objects that enable creation of a collaboration process isolated from the end-point applications.

6 3.5. Messaging Platform: Integration using INDEX and IBM WebSphere The messaging platform that will be used by this solution is IBM WebSphere MQ. As stated by, (Gavin, Diederichs et al. 2003), it can provide queue based messaging services to enable communication between the connected applications Enterprise Service Bus: As mentioned earlier, one of the requirements is to build an ESB that will be capable of providing enterprise connectivity to enable a SOA. As described by (Keen, Acharya et al. 2004; Keen, Adinolfi et al. 2005; Nott, Edwards et al. 2005), this is accomplished by use of IBM WebSphere MQ Series in conjunction with IBM WebSphere Business Integration Message Broker. As shown in the table below, this product provides a very strong platform for an ESB. 4. Benefits Table 1: Comparison of ESB capabilities in IBM products (Source: (Keen, Acharya et al. 2004) As mentioned earlier, the proposed architecture is based on a SOA model. As pointed out by (Davies, Birkler et al. 2004), there are numerous advantages using this approach like: Lower development costs Less pain when integrating assets across heterogeneous environments Greater reuse of IT assets More effective security and manageability (Taken from (Davies, Birkler et al. 2004) As described by (Keen, Acharya et al. 2004; Keen, Adinolfi et al. 2005), this architecture enables creation of an ESB which replaces point-to-point connectivity between enterprise applications with a bus thus allowing easy interface between the connected enterprise applications. Prepared by: 6 of 8

7 Integration using INDEX and IBM WebSphere The proposed architecture allows leverage of the integration strengths of the IBM WebSphere Business Integration suite of products. As stated by (Davies, Birkler et al. 2004; IBM Corporation 2005), this allows standards based integration between IBM WebSphere products and SAP. In addition this solution also enables connection to other application and technology platforms by using WBI adapters as shown in Fig. 1. Another benefit of this architecture is ease of access of data by the end-user. As pointed out by (Will, Ramaswamy et al. 2004), the IBM Portal Server enables user level integration and can be extended to cover pervasive computing devices like mobiles and PDAs. The architecture is suitable for an application like INDEX that is based on Web Services. As mentioned by (Davies, Birkler et al. 2004), the IBM WebSphere Application server supports a Web Service environment. The INDEX application adds further functionality to the overall solution. The INDEX application can easily generate Business Logic Modules that can be used to meet dynamic business need and changing requirements. These BLMs can be easily maintained at the owner s convenience. Further these BLMs can be used to generate business models. Using IBM WebSphere Business Integration products, INDEX can retrieve data from the Enterprise Applications connected to the ESB. This data can be delivered to the user s browser by using the IBM Portal Server. In addition, the entire solution is based on IBM MQ Series platform which is an acknowledged leader in the messaging domain. 5. Conclusion The proposed architecture is standards based. It uses technologies like Web Services, SOA and ESB that enable business to be truly flexible in terms of their IT assets. At the same time, this architecture enables companies to protect their investments in their existing enterprise applications. By using, IBM WebSphere Integration products, it is possible to enable user, application, data and process level integration. In conclusion it can be stated that use of INDEX in conjunction with IBM WebSphere technologies can provide a stable and reliable platform to meet the changing needs of businesses. 6. References Davies, S., K. Birkler, et al. (2004). WebSphere Business Integration for SAP. viewed on August 13, 2005 Gavin, L., G. Diederichs, et al. (2003). An EAI Solution using WebSphere Business Integration (V4.1). IBM Corporation. viewed on August 10, 2005 IBM Corporation (2005). Integrating SAP solutions with IBM WebSphere products - An interoperability survey. viewed on August 10, 2005 Prepared by: 7 of 8

8 Integration using INDEX and IBM WebSphere Keen, M., A. Acharya, et al. (2004). Patterns: Implementing an SOA Using an Enterprise Service Bus. IBM Corporation,. viewed on September 13, 2005 Keen, M., O. Adinolfi, et al. (2005). Patterns: SOA with an Enterprise Service Bus in WebSphere Application Server V6. IBM Corporation,. viewed on September 13, 2005 Nott, C., P. Edwards, et al. (2005). Using Message Sets in WebSphere Business Integration Message Broker to Implement an ESB in an SOA. IBM Corporation,. viewed on September 13, 2005 Will, R., S. Ramaswamy, et al. (2004). "WebSphere Portal:Unified user access to content, applications and services." IBM Systems Journal 43(2): pp Prepared by: 8 of 8