1. Microsoft and BPM: A Perspective David Chappell Chappell & Associates www.davidchappell.com Copyright © 2006 David Chappell

2. Defining Business Process Management (BPM) A business view of BPM: –Viewing a business as a set of processes that can be explicitly defined, optimized, and managed A technical view of BPM: –Development using software designed for creating, executing, and monitoring process logic

3. The Technologies of BPM Workflow –System and human Graphical tools –For business process modeling and design Integration technologies –Such as adapters and data transformation Business rules engines Business activity monitoring

4. What’s a BPMS? An Aside Several small firms have sold BPM Suites/Systems (BPMSs) for many years –None have an especially large customer base –But their offerings have largely defined the BPMS category As the big vendors enter this area, the definition of “BPMS” is changing –It’s hard to find a definition that everybody agrees on

5. Microsoft’s BPM Offerings BizTalk Server 2006 Windows Workflow Foundation Windows SharePoint Services, version 3 The 2007 Microsoft Office system –Especially Office SharePoint Server 2007

6. Defining BizTalk Server 2006 BizTalk Server 2006 is a Windows-based business process and integration server It’s the product’s fourth release –It’s built on the.NET Framework 2.0

7. BizTalk Server 2006 Illustrating Its Components Orchestration Business Rules Engine Business Activity Monitoring (BAM) Health and Activity Tracking Visual Studio 2005 Orchestration Designer Other Software Web ServicesOthersWebSphere MQMSMQFile... Adapters Data Transformation Accelerators HL7SWIFTOthers...

8. BizTalk Server 2006 The Orchestration Designer

9. Perspective Tool Audiences Many BPM products provide tools aimed at business users –Such as business analysts The BizTalk Orchestration Designer targets developers –Microsoft also provides a Visio-hosted design tool, but it’s not widely used –Would developers rather write code? So far, Microsoft has chosen not to focus on business users as creators of BizTalk orchestrations

10. BizTalk Server 2006 Business Activity Monitoring Allows information workers to monitor in- process orchestrations Can be accessed through: –Office applications (e.g., Excel) –Other clients

11. Perspective Process Modeling and Simulation Many people view this as part of BPM –Although it can be useful even for manual processes Microsoft doesn’t offer products in this area –Although several Microsoft partners offer modeling and simulation tools –Those tools include: ITP Process’s Process Modeler for Microsoft Visio AgilePoint’s Envision (based on Visio) Simul8

12. Defining Windows Workflow Foundation Windows Workflow Foundation (WF) is a framework for building workflow-based Windows applications –It’s targeted at developers, not information workers or business analysts WF is part of the.NET Framework 3.0 The goal is to provide a common workflow framework for Windows applications –Including a unified foundation for both system and human workflow

13. WF What’s a Workflow? A WF workflow is a set of activities Each activity is actually a class –It can be reused in multiple workflows Activities can be provided by: –Microsoft –Anybody else Activities Workflow

14. WF The Role of the WF Runtime Engine WF Runtime Engine 1) Execute first activity 2) Execute second activity 3) Execute next activity...

15. Host Process WF Illustrating Its Components WF Runtime Engine Other Activities Base Activity Library (BAL) Activities WorkflowRuntime Services Visual Studio 2005 WF Workflow Designer

16. WF Example BAL Activities IfElse While Sequence Parallel Code Listen Delay FaultHandler Compensate CallExternalMethod HandleExternalEvent InvokeWorkflow InvokeWebService Terminate

17. Perspective Microsoft’s Support for BPEL WF will provide a BPEL Activity Library –It implements BPEL 1.1 –Workflows built with this library can be imported from or exported to BPEL BizTalk Server 2006 also can import and export BPEL definitions –BPEL addresses system workflow, not human workflow Microsoft doesn’t display as much BPEL enthusiasm as some other vendors –Despite being one of the language’s creators

18. WF Creating Workflows WF provides two built-in workflow types: –Sequential –State machine WF provides options for defining workflows: –Graphical: the Workflow Designer –Code: C#, Visual Basic, or another.NET language

19. WF The WF Workflow Designer

20. BizTalk Server Engine Web ServicesOthersWebSphere MQ Other Software MSMQFile... Adapters Messaging and Transformation The Future of BizTalk Server Visual Studio WF Workflows WF Designer Existing BizTalk 2006 Orchestrations

21. Perspective WF or BizTalk Server? WF: –The right choice for workflow-driven applications –Especially useful for long-running processes BizTalk Server: –The right choice for problems such as: Enterprise application integration (EAI) Business-to-business (B2B) integration –EDI, etc. Business activity monitoring –Provides hosting, management, and scalability

22. Perspective How Easy to Use is WF? Graphical designers can make things look easy –Yet creating a WF workflow from scratch isn’t simple –Writing activities that work with an existing workflow is relatively straightforward, however For some problems, using WF can be significantly simpler than not using WF –Since it provides support for persisting state, compensation, and more

23. WF Specifying Business Rules Conditions, e.g., on an IfElse or While activity –Rules can be embedded in the workflow The Conditioned Activity Group (CAG) activity –Allows creating rules-driven workflow logic The Policy activity –Provides access to a straightforward rules engine

24. Perspective BizTalk Server BRE or WF Rules? BizTalk Server 2006 Business Rules Engine (BRE): –Available only with BizTalk Server –Includes graphical tools, e.g., the Business Rules Composer WF rules: –A standard part of Windows –Includes simple graphical tools –The foundation for the future, says Microsoft

25. Defining Windows SharePoint Services Windows SharePoint Services (WSS) is a standard part of Windows Server 2003 –WSS version 3 hosts the WF runtime engine Office SharePoint Server, part of the 2007 Microsoft Office system, adds more workflow capabilities –All of which are built on WF and WSS version 3

26. Windows Server 2003 Windows SharePoint Services Site 1Site 2… Web Browser Internet Information Services Site N Microsoft Office Document Library 1 List 1 Item A Item B Item C... List N Item A Item B Item C... Document Library N... SQL Server WSS Illustrating Its Components

27. List Item A Item B Item C... Document Library Windows Server 2003 Windows SharePoint Services Site 1Site 2…Site N SQL Server WF Runtime Engine Internet Information Services Workflow Instances Associations Workflow Templates WSS Illustrating WF Workflows

28. WSS Interacting with Workflows A WSS-hosted workflow places tasks on a user’s task list –A user can access this list via a web browser or Outlook 2007 WSS defines several WF activities, including: –CreateTask : adds a task to a task list –OnTaskChanged : informs the workflow that a task has been modified

29. Windows SharePoint Services Site Workflow Templates Document Library Workflow Initiator Workflow Participants Task List Approve... 4) Add task to task list 1) Select document and association Workflow Instance 2) Create workflow instance 3) Customize and start workflow instance 5) Check task list 6) Complete task An Example WSS Workflow

30. WSS Starting a Workflow

31. WSS Completing a Task

32. WSS Creating Workflows Developers: WF Workflow Designer Information workers: Office SharePoint Designer –Allows defining workflows by specifying conditions and actions for each step –Users can now add application logic to WSS sites

33. WSS Illustrating Office SharePoint Designer

34. Perspective Using WSS and BizTalk Server 2006 Together Microsoft provides a BizTalk Server 2006 adapter for Windows SharePoint Services A BizTalk Server system workflow still remains distinct from a WSS human workflow, with: –Separate execution engines –Separate design tools Some would argue that this misses the point of BPM

35. What Office SharePoint Server 2007 Adds The ability to interact with workflows directly from Office applications using InfoPath workflow forms –WSS alone mostly supports interacting with workflows through a browser A group of customizable pre-defined workflows –Approval, Collect Feedback, etc. A range of content-management capabilities –Such as document templates and broad search capabilities

36. Office SharePoint Server Starting a Workflow in Word 2007

37. Office SharePoint Server Completing a Task in Outlook 2007

38. - BizTalk Server data mapping, adapters, etc.Integration technologies - System workflow: BizTalk Server Orchestration Designer - Human workflow: WF Workflow Designer and Office SharePoint Designer 2007 Graphical tools for defining processes Microsoft and BPM: Summary SolutionProblem - BizTalk Server BAMBusiness activity monitoring Supporting human workflow - WF-based workflows in Windows SharePoint Services 3.0 and Office SharePoint Server 2007 - BizTalk Server orchestrationsSupporting system workflow - BizTalk Server BRE - WF rules Business rules engine

39. For Further Reading Understanding BizTalk Server 2006 –http://download.microsoft.com/documents/ australia/windowsserversystem/biztalk2006/ Understanding_BTS06.pdf Introducing Microsoft Windows Workflow Foundation –http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/default.asp? url=/library/en-us/dnlong/html/wfintro.asp Understanding Workflow in Windows SharePoint Services and the 2007 Microsoft Office System –http://download.microsoft.com/download/1/A/B/1AB1AC 93-13A4-4001-A757-A340A211A06F/ Understanding%20WF%20in%20WSS%20and%20Offic e%202007%20v1.doc

40. About the Speaker David Chappell is Principal of Chappell & Associates in San Francisco, California. Through his speaking, writing, and consulting, he helps IT professionals understand, use, and make better decisions about enterprise software. David has been the keynote speaker for dozens of conferences and events in the U.S., Europe, Asia, and Latin America. His popular seminars have been attended by tens of thousands of developers, architects, and decision makers in forty countries. David’s books have been published in ten languages and used in courses at MIT, ETH Zurich, and many other universities. He is Series Editor for Addison-Wesley’s award-winning Independent Technology Guides, and he has been a regular columnist for several publications. In his consulting practice, David has helped clients such as Hewlett- Packard, IBM, Microsoft, Stanford University, and Target Corporation adopt new technologies, market new products, train their sales staffs, and create business plans. David’s comments have appeared in The New York Times, CNN.com, and various other publications. Earlier in his career, he wrote software for supercomputers, chaired a U.S. national standardization working group, and played keyboards with the Peabody-award-winning Children’s Radio Theater. David holds a B.S. in Economics and an M.S. in Computer Science, both from the University of Wisconsin-Madison.