1. Automated Software Integration
Dmitriy Bespalov
Department of Computer Science
College of Engineering
Drexel University
3141 Chestnut Street
Philadelphia, PA 19104

2. Overview Introduction of automated software integration Related work
Challenges of Automated Integration
Testing
Future work
Conclusions

3. What is automated software integration?
System A
System B
Information Flow

4. Why is it important? Complex Time consuming VERY Expensive
Manual software integration:
Complex
Time consuming
VERY Expensive

5. Related Work Automated Methods for Integrating Systems (AMIS)
Investigate whether we now have the technology to perform automated software integration
Identify integration activities that may benefit from automation
Identify methods and technology to be used in the process
Characterize common problems that could be solved by automation

6. AMIS
An algorithm for finding optimal solution for information flow between applications
Given rules for one-to-one, one-to-many and many-to-many information type transformation
Cost is associated with each rule
Probabilities may be associated with multiple outcomes rules
Algorithm returns optimal (based on the cost) path from initial input to required outcome

7. AMIS Input: A Outcome: D Rule 1 Input: A Output: B Cost: c1 Rule 3
Output: C
Cost: c2
Rule 3
Input: B,C
Output: D
Cost: c3
Input: A
Outcome: D

8. AMIS Algorithm is an example of semi-automatic integration
Complexity of the algorithm is NP-Hard (very slow)
Approximation can not be used

9. Related Work
The Stanford-IBM Manager of Multiple Information Sources (TSIMMIS)
Develop tools that facilitate integration of information
Extract properties from unstructured objects
Transform information into a common object model
Combine information from several sources [

10. Related Work Contivo’s Analyst
Performs data transformation between applications
Oriented to business applications
Partly human-interactive, uses visual maps
Partly self-learning [

11. Challenges of Automated Integration
Standards
Multiple versions
Conflicting standards
Rapid standards development
Ontologies (one type of standard)
No universal ontology
Translations between ontologies can be very hard
Legacy Systems
Source code may be unavailable for integration
Legacy systems are poorly supported

12. Challenges of Automated Integration
Consider color. Color can be represented:
Red, Green, Blue
Cyan, Magenta, Yellow
Hue, Saturation, Brightness
Words, semantics, number of components match
Although, semantics of the components are not the same

13. Automated Testbeds Testbed – environment used to test software
Poorly studied problem
A number of projects exist
B2B Interoperability Testbed – tests interaction of business applications [
Z-Interop – testbed for vendors and consumers of Z39.50 products [

14. What will happen in the future?
Global ontologies might be constructed
Given complete logical relationships, map-making may be used for integration
Map-making may be partially automated
Automated model recreation from legacy software

15. Conclusions A lot of research to be done
Currently, automated integration is performed for primitive examples
It is difficult to envision whether automation of software integration process will be performed for general case

16. Thank you
Donald Libes
Lisa Fronczek
and all of you!

17. Any questions?