Designing Processes using HWSBizTalk 2004

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Designing Processes using HWS/BizTalk 2004
Serge Lenbet slenbet_at_microsoft.com Business
Solutions Specialist Microsoft South Gulf
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Outline

• Why would I use HWS instead of writing a regular
  orchestration?
• Designing a Process in HWS

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HWS vs. Orchestrations

• Human oriented
• Regular orchestrations are based on machine
  interaction (eg. Loan processing)
• Ad-hoc features
• Many human-based processes have random deviations
• Discoverable
• Humans beings arent good at keeping track of
  tasks or messages
• Re-use
• HWS Actions are intended to be created as small,
  re-useable pieces
• Constraints
• Different people have different levels of
  authority

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Designing a Process in HWS

• What is a predefined process in HWS?
• What is the design process?
• Demo

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Functional Architecture
Activity Model Designer API
HWS Web Service
Administration (MMC and API)
Activity Flow Queries
Model Discovery
Workflow Guidance
Workflow Activation
Composition Service (Actions and Activity Models)
Activity Flow Tracking Service
Administration DB
AD (Role, Org., )
Tracking DB (Activity Flow)
Orchestration Engine
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Workflow Building Blocks
Action
Activity Model
Task

• WF Servicesfeature
• Composableat runtime

• WF Servicesfeature
• A priori composition
• of Actions

• Communication with Actor

Action
Activity Model
Task
Activity Flow
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Action Development Experience (VS.NET)
Business Logic that an Action executes at runtime
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HWS web service API

• Web Service API enables
• Workflow Composition
• AddActionToActivityFlow, AddActivationBlockToActiv
  ityFlow,
• Workflow guidance
• GetTargetList, GetActionParameters,
• Workflow viewing
• GetActivityFlowInfo, GetTaskInfo,
  GetAllTasksForUser,
• Workflow Interrupt
• InteruptAction

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Activity Model API

• ActivityModel class
• Represents an activity model that is being
  designed, and contains the steps, transitions,
  and constraints.
• DesignManager class
• Manages activity models and can be used to
  discover, deploy and retrieve information about
  activity models.

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Activity Model Design Process

• Define the process
• Determine the Actions required
• Develop the missing Actions
• Develop the Activity Model
• Deploy the solution

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Define The Process

• What is the process I want to model?
• What are the individual steps involved in the
  process
• Who is involved at each of those steps?

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Determine The Actions Required

• Always think generically about actions
• If the action name describes the step, most often
  its too specific
• Specific Action Conduct Phone interview
• Generic version Approval
• The more generic an action, the less work you
  will have to do the next time around

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Actions for Interview Process

• Approval
• Sends a message to multiple people, asking for a
  yes or no answer
• Communicate
• Sends a message to one or more users, and may
  wait for a response from the users
• Route
• Decides on a branch of the workflow based on a
  previous action

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Developing A New Action

• Define the Action messages (Schemas)
• Define the Action Logic (Orchestration)
• Add the action to the HWS system (Deployment)
• There is a VS.NET project template used to
  develop new actions.
• Current the Approval Action

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The HWS Web Service

• Centralized point of communication for all
  workflow users
• Greatly simplifies UI creation
• Web based
• Discoverable
• A user does not need any prior knowledge to
  access the Web service
• The Web service can be queried for all context
  information about the user, any possible next
  steps, and the information required to start
  those next steps.

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Executing Dynamic Workflows

• The only HWS surface a client UI needs to
  interact with is the Web Service
• Example code

_HwsService new Hws.HwsService() _HwsService.Cr
edentials CredentialCache.DefaultCredentials /
/ Start a new activity flow Guid FlowId
_HwsService.GetNewActivityFlowID() // What can
I dot in this new activity flow Activity
activities _HwsService. GetActivityList(FlowId,
Guid.Empty, Guid.Empty, null, null)
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Demo
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InfoPath and BizTalk

• InfoPath is to BizTalk Server
• as Outlook is to Exchange

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Project Proposal Demo

• Rick Product Planner for Contoso
• Jane Claudio Management
• John East Asian Marketing Lead
• Scenario Rick proposes a project idea to
  management. Management must approve before
  funding for the proposal.

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Introducing InfoPath

• What does InfoPath provide?
• Easy rapid design of rich forms
• User-friendly environment for entering data
• Ready-to-use sample forms
• Built natively on top of XML
• What customer scenarios does it address?
• Organizational processes
• Workgroup collaboration

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Start wherever you like

• Starting from InfoPath
• Create a template and save it out
• Hint InfoPath often has multiple schema files
  (schema1.xsd, schema.xsd)
• Hint Open both inside the BizTalk Editor
• Starting from BizTalk Editor
• Create schema, maps, orchestrations and make
  available to InfoPath
• Hint Use fields for data, not records (ie. good
  schema design)

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Project Proposal Rick
Rick opens the InfoPath Project Proposal form.
He sees on the taskpane the Actions that are
associated to the project proposal feedback and
approval.
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Project Plan Claudio
The xml document opens in InfoPath. In the
taskpane, he sees that he is requested to respond
to the task from Rick.
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Project Proposal Claudio
Claudio receives a notification via email that he
has a task assigned to him. Claudio opens the
attached xml file.
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Integration Approach

• Biztalk has two approaches for entertaining a
  Customers Human Workflow needs
• 1. Building the Human Workflow in .Net
• 2. Integrating easily into another Human Workflow
  Solution like Ultimus

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HWS-BizTalk 2004 and partners
Over time when Jane completes her task, the
approval is complete.
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Ultimus and Biztalk

• Biztalk allows you to integrate into another
  World Class workflow solution
• Build an orchestration to talk to ultimus in
  Biztalk

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Ultimus and Biztalk

• 2. Configure ultimus Biztalk flobot Easy to
  configure and all graphical
• 3. Deploy

HWS URI
Process Variables
BizTalk Action Parameters
Linked Data
Error Variable
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Ultimus and Biztalk

• Advantages
• Getting a world Class Human Workflow Solution
• Being able to build your processes faster and
  more robust
• Being able to Launch Ultimus process from Biztalk
  and vice versa
• Getting 250 out-of-the-box features from Ultimus
  (such as dynamic routing of incidents, parallel
  routing, generating emails, being able to read /
  write from databases)
• LOWEST TOTAL COST OF OWNERSHIP for their
  Enterprise Solutions

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Thanks for attending this session