White Paper icore Integration Suite

Transcription

1 White Paper icore Integration Suite

2 Table of Contents Summary... 1 How do companies spend their IT budget?... 2 What icore offers... 3 The icore Integration Suite... 4 The icore Process Server... 5 What are the advantages of icore Process Server?... 5 icore Accelerators... 5 An industrial approach saving time and money... 6 General concept... 6 Tailor-made solutions... 7 Advanced and basic Accelerators... 8 icore Basic/technical Accelerators... 8 icore Advanced Accelerators... 8 On-premise or in the cloud? Why icore Integration Suite? The technology behind icore Integration Suite Automating business process flows with intelligent accelerators and icps Format conversion and transformation Multi-communication and multi-protocol support Traceability About icore Solutions , icore Solutions AB icore Integration Suite All rights reserved

3 Summary Research shows that companies spend a large part of their IT budget on software integration. Many of today s ERP systems, as well as other applications, are based on a monolithic architecture which is difficult to modify or change. Integrating monolithic architecture often require customized solutions involving a lot of hardcoding which ends up being complex, expensive and poorly documented. However, companies that invest in proper integration tools can reduce their costs significantly. At icore, our goal is to provide a superior solution for companies that wish to integrate and automate business processes without getting stuck in rigid solutions made in older generation language tools or through traditional custom development. In a world where companies need to be able to quickly respond to changing business demands, the IT environment needs to be equally flexible. The icore Integration Suite (icis), includes advanced functionality, such as wizarddriven Adapterflow configuration, a component-based Enterprise Service Bus, development tools, and advanced track and trace functionality. Integration solutions implemented with icis are scalable and flexible, allowing your business processes to constantly change and grow. icis facilitates a gradual transformation into a Service- Oriented Architecture. icore Accelerators are packaged configurators that contain adaptable functionality for standardized integration with an ERP, SCM, CRM or any other business-critical system. The icore Accelerator concept offers a rational integration method which shortens the integration process considerably. The Basic Accelerators handle technical message transport mechanisms (information flows between files, FTP, message queues, web services etc.), while the Advanced Accelerators handle integration with ERP, SCM and CRM systems and let you create Adapterflows with advanced functionality. icore Integration Suite is available both as locally installed software ( icore onpremise ) or as a cloud solution (icore as a Service, or icaas). You can easily switch between solution models at any time, which means you can let the present business situation decide. icore Integration Suite has been developed with Microsoft as the target environment

4 How do companies spend their IT budget? Research shows that companies spend a lot of money on integration. Forrester research: up to 80% of the total implementation cost of a new application is spent on integrating it with other applications. Radar Group: The IT budget is 3,1% (calculated average in the Nordic countries) of the company turnover and 6,7% of the IT budget is spent on integration (provided the company actually has an integration tool). A contributing factor to high integration costs is that many ERP systems, as well as other applications, are based on a monolithic architecture which is difficult to modify or change. Furthermore, various critical systems often run in different environments. These systems may be more or less integrated, and the integration solutions are often hardcoded. Traditional integration Adding new tasks or making changes in an IT environment characterized by monolithic systems and limited, hardcoded integration, is likely to be complicated and expensive. IT development projects end up taking a lot of time, and errors are often difficult to locate and correct. However, in a world where companies need to be able to quickly respond to changing business demands, the IT environment needs to be equally flexible. Customers Suppliers emarket places ERP Portal SCM CRM Intranet Product db WWW Traditional, hardcoded and project-oriented integration. When there is a change in one system, other systems are often affected unintentionally

5 What icore offers Our goal is to provide a superior solution for companies that wish to integrate and automate business processes without getting stuck in rigid solutions made in older generation language tools or through traditional custom development. Our integration software, the icore Integration Suite (icis) has a modular architecture and includes a robust and scalable runtime environment, advanced functionality (such as wizard-driven Adapterflow configuration), various development tools, and advanced track and trace functionality. Integration solutions implemented with icis are scalable and flexible, allowing your business processes to constantly change and grow. icis facilitates a gradual transformation into a Service-Oriented Architecture (SOA 1 ). Users User interface - GUI Composite applications Applications Consumers Accelerators/adapter flows Basic/Intelligent Service oriented ESB Enterprise Service Bus Accelerators/adapter flows Basic/Intelligent Service oriented Applications Providers icore Process Server used as an Enterprise Service Bus (ESB) combined with icore Accelerators allow you to build a service-oriented architecture. icore Accelerators may also be combined with other integration platforms or ESBs. The above illustration shows a layered approach, where the end-user (composite) applications are built on top of the provider (traditional) applications. We recommend loosely coupled applications, so that the sender and receiver may operate unaware of each other. 1 For more information, see icore Solutions, White Paper: SOA The icore Way

6 The icore Integration Suite icore Integration Suite (icis) is a product range for intelligent business integration developed by icore Solutions. With icore Integration Suite you get: A flexible infrastructure built for efficient application integration and enhanced cooperation with business partners. It includes packaged accelerators enabling automated integration with a large number of ERP systems and other applications. Wizard-driven configuration and a graphical development tool for more advanced interaction logic. All designed for time-effective, robust and re-usable integration development without traditional coding. An integration runtime environment, where Components (built on Adapterflows, Workflows and Scripts) are executed and secured. It allows you to build a truly event-driven Service Oriented Architecture (SOA), with a real time core and support for genuine multitasking. icore Integration Suite includes: icore Process Server A high-level ESB (Enterprise Service Bus) runtime product from which icore Adapters can be executed. No limits regarding the amount of Partners (connection points). icore Administrator An administration and monitoring tool (included in all Run-time options). Free software for icore users. icore Accelerators Prepackaged, easily configurable tools for building Adapterflows. There are large number of ERP, application and technology accelerators. icore Accelerators may be connected with any ESB or integration platform. icore Adapterflow Wizard Powerful wizard-driven tool that provides a fast and structured process for creating single control-flow logic definitions. icore Developer A dialog-driven script development tool for definitions with complex control flow and complex data processing. icore CodeGen A code generator working as a developer accelerator. By using icore CodeGen, development time can be significantly shortened. icore Workflow Designer A graphical editor that can be used to create and edit definition with complex control flow, custom extensibility and.net framework functionality. Additional tools Tools for import/export, Component execution and management through PowerShell Cmdlets, and more

7 The icore Process Server icore Process Server (icps) is our own Enterprise Service Bus (ESB). If you don t currently use one of the major ESB solutions (for example Tibco, IBM, BizTalk, etc) we can offer this functionality in icis. icps is a component-based integration bus to which old and new applications standardized ERP systems as well as legacy systems can be connected. It routes messages between any applications and allows loosely coupled connections and information exchanges, in real-time as well as in batches. icps supports a large number of communication methods and protocols. icps can be hosted externally or in-house and can be used to integrate any computer environment. What are the advantages of icore Process Server? icore Process Server combined with icore Accelerators enable a versatile IT structure that can be adapted to new business requirements. It allows you to integrate external partners as well as internal applications in the same time- and cost effective way based on any given standard and methodology. icps secures the message routing connections and information flows between applications with agile technology supporting future needs and changes. icps contributes to the economic competitiveness of an enterprise. icps is scalable. icps provides stability and failover facilities. icps offers outstanding functions for monitoring, logging, alarm and traceability. icps is a complete toolbox with integration technology, time-saving templates and packaged accelerators which can be tailored to suit to your specific needs. Our licensing model allows you to grow in steps, adding more connection points (partners/applications) when your organization is ready. The licensing is based on the number of computers/cpus deployed in the solution. All native technology and templates included may be used in any combination without changing the license costs. icore Accelerators icore Accelerators offer a time- and cost-effective way to configure Adapterflows, which connect systems in your IT environment. An Accelerator is a packaged configurator that contains adaptable functionality for standardized integration with an ERP, SCM, CRM or any other business-critical system. The icore Accelerator concept offers a rational integration method and shortens the integration process considerably

8 Users User application Composite applications, for example Webframeworks, CRM or SaaS icore Accelerator Enterprise Service Bus (ESB) icore Accelerator Provider applications For example ERP or other legacy systems An industrial approach saving time and money icore Accelerators are packaged solutions which provide the following advantages: Efficient, wizard-driven Adapterflow setup install and configure without coding. A robust and scalable runtime. Outstanding track and trace functionality. Easy to manage and overview the human factor becomes less critical. Separated test and production environment. Low cost of ownership. Fits any integration strategy or ESB vendor. General concept The Accelerator connects in two directions: - towards an ERP system or other application - towards the ESB (IBM, BizTalk, Tibco, icore...) Loosely coupled, easy to change by using a generic XML format between the two sides. Exposing composite services to the ESB less complexity and transaction traffic. Application side - Transformation - Enrichment - Business logic ESB side icore Accelerators can be centrally or locally deployed, depending on the organizational demands and the desired enterprise architecture

9 Tailor-made solutions We think it is unlikely that you will find pre-configured, plug-and-play adapters for every desired application no matter who the supplier is. Our packaged, wizard-driven Accelerators constitute a powerful toolkit for building flexible Adapterflow for efficient integration with a large number of applications. We continuously add new Advanced Accelerators to the product suite. If you cannot find a packaged accelerator for integration with your preferred application, icis contains a number of templates and shortcuts that will facilitate the configuration of a new one considerably. The capability to integrate two applications efficiently depends primarily on the architecture of the source and target applications. This may sometimes complicate the integration, but with our templates and best practises the time and effort spent on the configuration process will be significantly reduced. Sample of activities ready to be used and configured in an Adapterflow

10 Advanced and basic Accelerators icis offers a number of Accelerators, facilitating the configuration of integration Adapterflows towards a number of applications. There are two types of Accelerators: icore Basic Accelerators adaptable configurators for technical message transport mechanisms, enabling seamless information flows to or from files, FTP, message queues, web services etc. icore Advanced Accelerators pre-packaged configurators for integration with ERP, SCM and CRM systems, and other applications, allowing you to build Adapterflows with advanced functionality (for example, performing a credit check in an application and returning the result). icore Basic/technical Accelerators Below are some examples of basic accelerators provided by icore: icore File Accelerator an adaptable file transport mechanism. It can be used to build Adapterflows for file integration between backend applications, for example an ERP system and another administrative in-house application or it may be connected to a central integration platform, thereby extending its coverage. icore FTP Accelerator for building an Adapterflow that acts as an FTP communication gateway. The icore FTP Accelerator supports a number of different communication protocols, for example FTP, FTPS and SFTP. icore Microsoft MQ Accelerator for configuring an Adapterflow that sends messages to or fetches messages from a Microsoft Message Queue. icore Tibco EMS Accelerator interfaces a Tibco queue. The icore Tibco EMS Accelerator can be configured to listen for messages, write messages and make a request and wait for the response. icore WebSphere MQ Accelerator for configuring an Adapterflow that sends messages to or fetches messages from an IBM WebSphere Message Queue. It can also create and extract RFH2 headers. icore X.400 Accelerator acts as a User Agent (UA) on behalf of the end-user. It requires an external Message Transfer Agent (MTA), containing a Message Store (MS). The accelerator supports X.400 as well as X.420. icore Advanced Accelerators icore provides ready-made accelerators for integration with a number of different applications. An accelerator has a user-friendly integration interface, which speeds up the configuration procedure considerably. Below is a list of some of our most popular Advanced Accelerators: icore B2B/EDI Accelerator & Solution acts as an EDI or B2B integration gateway, which can also be connected to a central integration platform or to other applications. Our B2B/EDI solution supports a number of different communication protocols, for example FTP, HTTP(s) and SMTP. There are also optional solutions such as OFTP, OFTP2 and AS1/AS2. icore Movex Accelerator provides a cost-effective interface between M3/Movex and a central integration platform, or other applications. It supports a number of technical interfacing methods, such as Movex API's, Movex EDI enable, Movex

11 ecollaborator (MeC), 5250/screen scraping, ODBC, XML, print capture, text files etc. icore Salesforce Accelerator uses the Salesforce Partner Web Services API, which is metadata-driven and dynamic in nature. This API is especially useful for multiple organizations, as a loosely typed representation of the Salesforce data model. icore Palette Accelerator enables a fully automated integration between the ESB and Palette, to make a loosely coupled solution. An ERP Accelerator is easily added to make the business flow complete. icore EPiServer Accelerator enables a fully automated integration between the ESB and EPIServer Commerce to make a loosely coupled solution. An ERP Accelerator is easily added to make the business complete

12 On-premise or in the cloud? icore Integration Suite is available as: Locally installed software icore on-premise Cloud solution icore as a Service (icaas) Hybrid solutions let the customer decide the degree of icore implementation in the cloud and locally. We offer several alternatives since we know that our customers preferences change over time. We recommend you let the present business situation decide which model you choose. icore Integration Suite allows you to switch easily from one solution model to the other at any time

13 Why icore Integration Suite? The icore Integration Suite is a highly adaptable product suite, developed as a response to the ever-increasing demands for business flexibility, decreased IT costs and shorter lead times. icis interconnects internal IT applications and enables the infrastructure to support a collaborative e-business strategy, also in real time. icis automates information flows between applications, databases and the Internet, regardless of platform, operating system and language. icis includes efficient development tools with advanced functionality. icis includes a robust and scalable integration engine (the runtime environment), which is fault redundant and genuinely multi-tasking. icis makes it easier for your business to start using new technology. It is designed for business-critical solutions and has a very high service level, while at the same time requiring a minimum of future maintenance. The technology behind icore Integration Suite We decided to use Microsoft as a target environment for icis since we wanted to provide our customers with cost-effective tools without losing the capability to integrate with other computer environments. The development of icore Process Server was based on a detailed product specification and system design. Our development team uses a structured methodology when writing code and have an all-embracing quality assurance. icore Process Server is delivered with detailed technical documentation, including HTML online help, which is being produced and updated in close cooperation with the system developers. Automating business process flows with intelligent accelerators and icps icore Process Server works as the Enterprise Service Bus for the Adapterflows that integrate your business systems with one another. We recommend you to start the integration with a pre-study. The pre-study will show which business processes are suitable for integration in the first step. With our business model 2, you start small and simple. Building a service-oriented architecture is a step-bystep process and advanced functionality should be added in later steps. When linking commonly used applications and processes, icore Accelerators radically reduce project lead times and minimizes integration investments. The unique heritage functionality built into the products will shorten the implementation and upgrading time even more. 2 For more information, see icore Solutions, White Paper: Integration projects with icore

14 Format conversion and transformation The advanced version of icore Process Server has built-in functionality to convert files between any formats. In addition to the conversion, you can transform data, add arithmetic, add counters, perform cross-reference lookups etc. Our B2B/EDI Solution has a strong support for XML and EDIFACT conversions, which is widely used in B2B interactions. Multi-communication and multi-protocol support There are several icore Accelerators designed to support a wide range of communication methods and protocols. icore Process Server natively supports for example, TCP/IP, FTP, HTTP/(S), SMTP, MAPI. Additional options are, for example, OFTP. Traceability The traceability in an icore system is based on associating each separate part of the processing in an information flow to a node. If anything goes wrong, the node association allows you to review every step in the processing, to find the cause of the error. After correction, the processing is started again, from any desired location in the processing flow, with a minimum of time loss. Logging and error reporting are central functions and log records are created dynamically. The log module may be customized to suit your demands. You may specify the type of occurrences to be logged, for example errors of a certain dignity, and select how the alarm is to be sent, for example by , SMS or another preferred channel

15 About icore Solutions icore Solutions provides products and knowledge for business integration. We develop, market and implement the business integration software suite icore Integration Suite. icore Solutions is a privately held company experienced in e-business and application integration. icore Integration Suite is our 5th generation software, which is currently installed at more than 1000 companies in over 30 countries. We distribute our products through a network of professional partners with proven integration expertise. icore Solutions provides accelerators for integration with many ERP and business applications, particularly within the medium-sized and large business segment. We deliver complementing solutions to several market players within business integration and SOA. icore Solutions is a certified Microsoft Silver Independent Software Vendor, an EPiServer Add-On Partner, Unit4Agresso OEM partner, an IBM Advanced Independent Software Vendor and has a Master Subcontractor Service Agreement (MSSA) with Salesforce.com. We have also developed special tools, approved by these companies, facilitating integration with their software