JBoss ESB 4.4 GA

Services Guide

JBESB-SG-8/6/08














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Software Version

JBoss ESB 4.4 GA

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Contents

Table of Contents

Contents iii


About This Guide 5

What This Guide Contains 5

Audience 5

Prerequisites 5

Organization 5

Documentation Conventions 5

Additional Documentation 7

Contacting Us 7

What is the Registry? 9

Introduction 9

Why do I need it ? 9

How do I use it ? 9

Registry Vs Repository 10

SOA components 10

UDDI 11

The Registry and JBossESB 11

Configuring the Registry 12

Introduction 12

The components involved 13

The Registry Implementation Class 13

Using JAXR 14

Using Scout and jUDDI 14

Chapter 3 16

Registry Configuration Examples 16

Introduction 16

Embedded 16

RMI using the juddi.war or jbossesb.sar 17

RMI using your own JNDI Registration of the RMI Service 18

2.4 SOAP 20

UDDI Browser 23

Introduction 23

UB setup 23

Chapter 4 24

Registry Troubleshooting 24

Scout and jUDDI pitfalls 24

More Information 24

What is a Rule
Service? 25

Introduction 25

Rule Services using Drools 26

Introduction 26

Rule Set Creation 26

Rule Service Consumers 27

Configuration 28

Object Paths 32

Deployment and Packaging 32

What is Content-Based
Routing? 34

Introduction 34

Simple example 34

Content Based Routing using Drools 36

Introduction 36

Three different routing action classes 36

org.jboss.soa.esb.actions.ContentBasedRouter 36

org.jboss.soa.esb.actions.ContentBasedWireTap 36

org.jboss.soa.esb.actions.MessageFilter. 37

Rule Set Creation 37

XPath Domain Specific Language 37

XPath and namespaces 38

Configuration 38

Object Paths 40

Stateful Rules 41

RuleAgent 41

RuleAgent and Business Rule Management System 42

Executing Business Rules 42

Changing RuleService implementations 42

Deployment and Packaging 42

Content Based Routing using Smooks 44

Introduction 44

Message Transformation 46

Overview 46

Smooks 46

Samples & Tutorials 46

XSL Transformations 48

jBPM Integration 49

Introduction 49

Integration Configuration 49

jBPM configuration 51

Creation and Deployment of a Process Definition 52

JBossESB to jBPM 53

Exception Handling JBossESB to jBPM 55

jBPM to JBossESB 55

EsbNotifier 55

EsbActionHandler 57

Exception Handling jBPM -> JBossESB 58

Scenario 1. Time-out 58

Scenario 2. Exception Transition 59

Scenario 3. Exception Decision 59

Service Orchestration 61

Introduction 61

Orchestrating Web Services 61

Orchestration Diagram 61

Process Deployment and Instantiation 66

Conclusion 68

The Message Store 69

Introduction 69

Message Store interface 69

Transactions 70

Configuring the Message Store 70

References 74

Index 75




About This Guide

What This Guide Contains

The Services Guide contains important information on changes to JBoss ESB 4.4 GA since the last release and information on any outstanding issues.

Audience

This guide is most relevant to engineers who are responsible for administering JBoss ESB 4.4 GA installations.

Prerequisites

None.

Organization

This guide contains the following chapters:

Documentation Conventions

The following conventions are used in this guide:

Convention

Description

Italic

In paragraph text, italic identifies the titles of documents that are being referenced. When used in conjunction with the Code text described below, italics identify a variable that should be replaced by the user with an actual value.

Bold

Emphasizes items of particular importance.

Code

Text that represents programming code.

Function | Function

A path to a function or dialog box within an interface. For example, “Select File | Open.” indicates that you should select the Open function from the File menu.

( ) and |

Parentheses enclose optional items in command syntax. The vertical bar separates syntax items in a list of choices. For example, any of the following three items can be entered in this syntax:

persistPolicy (Never | OnTimer | OnUpdate | NoMoreOftenThan)

Note:



Caution:

A note highlights important supplemental information.

A caution highlights procedures or information that is necessary to avoid damage to equipment, damage to software, loss of data, or invalid test results.

Table 1 Formatting Conventions

Additional Documentation

In addition to this guide, the following guides are available in the JBoss ESB 4.4 GA documentation set:

  1. JBoss ESB 4.4 GA Trailblazer Guide: Provides guidance for using the trailblazer example.

  2. JBoss ESB 4.4 GA Getting Started Guide: Provides a quick start reference to configuring and using the ESB.

  3. JBoss ESB 4.4 GA Programmers Guide: How to use JBossESB.

  4. JBoss ESB 4.4 GA Release Notes: Information on the differences between this release and previous releases.

  5. JBoss ESB 4.4 GA Administration Guide: How to manage the ESB.

Contacting Us

Questions or comments about JBoss ESB 4.4 GA should be directed to our support team.



Chapter 1

What is the Registry?

Introduction

In the context of SOA, a registry provides applications and businesses a central point to store information about their services. It is expected to provide the same level of information and the same breadth of services to its clients as that of a conventional market place. Ideally a registry should also facilitate the automated discovery and execution of e-commerce transactions and enabling a dynamic environment for business transactions. Therefore, a registry is more than an “e-business directory”. It is an inherent component of the SOA infrastructure.

Why do I need it ?

It is not difficult to discover, manage and interface with business partners on a small scale, using manual or ad hoc techniques. However, this approach does not scale as the number of services, the frequency of interactions, the physical distributed nature of the environment, increases. A registry solution based on agreed upon standards provides a common way to publish and discover services. It offers a central place where you query whether a partner has a service that is compatible with in-house technologies or to find a list of companies that support shipping services on the other side of the globe.

Service registries are central to most service oriented architectures and at runtime act as a contact point to correlate service requests to concrete behaviors. A service registry has meta-data entries for all artifacts within the SOA that are used at both runtime and design time. Items inside a service registry may include service description artifacts (e.g., WSDL), Service Policy descriptions, various XML schema used by services, artifacts representing different versions of services, governance and security artifacts (e.g., certificates, audit trails), etc. During the design phase, business process designers may use the registry to link together calls to several services to create a workflow or business process.

  1. The registry may be replicated or federated to improve performance and reliability. It need not be a single point of failure.

How do I use it ?

From a business analyst’s perspective, it is similar to an Internet search engine for business processes. From a developers perspective, they use the registry to publish services and query the registry to discover services matching various criteria.

Registry Vs Repository

A registry allows for the registration of services, discovery of metadata and classification of entities into predefined categories. Unlike a respository, it does not have the ability to store business process definitions or WSDL or any other documents that are required for trading agreements. A registry is essentially a catalogue of items, whereas a repository maintaines those items.

SOA components

As the W3C puts it: An SOA is a specific type of distributed system in which the agents are "services" (http://www.w3.org/TR/2003/WD-ws-arch-20030808/#id2617708).

The key components of a Service Oriented Architecture are the messages that are exchanged, agents that act as service requesters and service providers, and shared transport mechanisms that allow the flow of messages. A description of a service that exists within an SOA is essentially just a description of the message exchange patter between itself and its users. Within an SOA there are thus three critical roles: requester, provider, and broker.




UDDI

The Universal Description, Discovery and Integration registry is a directory service for Web Services. It enables service discovery through queries to the UDDI registry at design time or at run time. It also allows providers to publish descriptions of their services to the registry. The registry typically contains a URL that locates the WSDL document for the web services and contact information for the service provider. Within UDDI information is classified into the following categories.

The Registry and JBossESB

The registry plays a central role within JBossESB. It is used to store endpoint references (EPRs) for the services deployed within the ESB. It may be updated dynamically when services first start-up, or statically by an external administrator.

As with all environments within which registries reside, it is not possible for the registry to determine the liveness of the entities its data represents, e.g., if an EPR is registered with the registry then there can be no guarantee that the EPR is valid (it may be malformed) or it may represent a services that is no longer active. At present JBossESB does not perform life-cycle monitoring of the services that are deployed within it. As such, if services fail or move elsewhere, their EPRs that may reside within the registry will remain until they are explicitly updated or removed by an administrator. Therefore, if you get warnings or errors related to EPRs obtained from the registry, you should consider removing any out-of-date items.



Chapter 2

Configuring the Registry

Introduction

The JBossESB Registry architecture allows for many ways to configure the ESB to use either a Registry or Repository. By default we use a JAXR implementation (Scout) and a UDDI (jUDDI), in an embedded way.

The following properties can be used to configure the JBossESB Registry. In the jbossesb-properties.xml there is section called 'registry':


<properties name="registry">
	<property name="org.jboss.soa.esb.registry.implementationClass" 				value="org.jboss.internal.soa.esb.services.registry.JAXRRegistryImpl"/>

	<property name="org.jboss.soa.esb.registry.factoryClass" 					value="org.apache.ws.scout.registry.ConnectionFactoryImpl"/>

    	<property name="org.jboss.soa.esb.registry.queryManagerURI" 				value="org.apache.juddi.registry.local.InquiryService#inquire"/>

    	<property name="org.jboss.soa.esb.registry.lifeCycleManagerURI" 				value="org.apache.juddi.registry.local.PublishService#publish"/>
	
    	<property name="org.jboss.soa.esb.registry.user" 	value="jbossesb"/>
    	<property name="org.jboss.soa.esb.registry.password"	value="password"/>
    	
    	<property name="org.jboss.soa.esb.scout.proxy.transportClass" 				value="org.apache.ws.scout.transport.LocalTransport"/>
        <!-- specify the interceptors, in order -->
        <property name="org.jboss.soa.esb.registry.interceptors"
                value="org.jboss.internal.soa.esb.services.registry.InVMRegistryInterceptor, org.jboss.internal.soa.esb.services.registry.CachingRegistryInterceptor"/>
        <!-- The following properties modify the cache interceptor behaviour -->
        <property name="org.jboss.soa.esb.registry.cache.maxSize" value="100"/>
        <property name="org.jboss.soa.esb.registry.cache.validityPeriod" value="600000"/>
</properties>

Property

Description

org.jboss.soa.esb.registry.implementationClass

A class that implements the jbossesb Registry interface. We have provided one implementation (JAXRRegistry interface).

org.jboss.soa.esb.registry.factoryClass

The class name of the JAXR ConnectionFactory implementation.

org.jboss.soa.esb.registry.queryManagerURI

The URI used by JAXR to query.

org.jboss.soa.esb.registry.lifeCycleManagerURI

The URI used by JAXR to edit.

org.jboss.soa.esb.registry.user

The user used for edits.

org.jboss.soa.esb.registry.password

The password to go along with the user.

org.jboss.soa.esb.scout.proxy.transportClass

The name of the class used by scout to do the transport from scout to the UDDI.

org.jboss.soa.esb.registry.interceptors



The list of interceptors that are applied to the configured registry.  The codebase currently provides two interceptors, one for handling InVM registration and a second for applying a cache over the registry.

The default interceptor list consists solely of the InVM interceptor.

org.jboss.soa.esb.registry.cache.maxSize

The maximum number of server entries allowed in the cache.  If this value is exceeded then entries will be evicted on a LRU basis.  The default value is 100 entries.

org.jboss.soa.esb.registry.cache.validityPeriod

The validity period of the caching interceptor.  This is specified in milliseconds and defaults to 600000 (ten minutes).  If this value is zero (or less) then there is no expiry specified on the cache.


      The components involved


The registry can be configured in many ways. Figure 1 shows a blue print of all the registry components. From the top down we can see that the JBossESB funnels all interaction with the registry through the Registry Interface. By default it then calls into a JAXR implementation of this interface. The JAXR API needs an implementation, which by default is Scout. The Scout JAXR implementation calls into a jUDDI registry. However there are many other configuration options.

Figure 1. Blue print of the Registry component architecture.

The Registry Implementation Class

Property: org.jboss.soa.esb.registry.implementationClass

By default we use the JAXR API. The JAXR API is a convenient API since it allows us to connect any kind of XML based registry or repository. However, if for example you want to use Systinet's Java API you can do that by writing your own SystinetRegistryImplentation class and referencing it in this property.

Using JAXR

Propery: org.jboss.soa.esb.registry.factoryClass

If you decided to use JAXR then you will have to pick which JAXR implementation to use. This property is used to configure that class. By default we use Scout and therefore it is set to the scout factory 'org.apache.ws.scout.registry.ConnectionFactoryImpl'. The next step is to tell the JAXR implementation the location of the registry or repository for querying and updating, which is done by setting the org.jboss.soa.esb.registry.queryManagerURI, and org.jboss.soa.esb.registry.lifeCycleManagerURI respectively, along with the username (org.jboss.soa.esb.registry.user) and password (org.jboss.soa.esb.registry.password) for the UDDI.

Using Scout and jUDDI

Property: org.jboss.soa.esb.scout.proxy.transportClass

When using Scout and jUDDI there is an additional parameter that one can set. This is the transport class that should be used for communication between Scout and jUDDI. Thus far there are 4 implementations of this class which are based on SOAP, SAAJ, RMI and Local (embedded java). Note that when you change the transport, you will also have to change the query and lifecycle URIs. For example:


SOAP
queryManagerURI	http://localhost:8080/juddi/inquiry
lifeCycleManagerURI	http://localhost:8080/juddi/publish
transportClass		org.apache.ws.scout.transport.AxisTransport

RMI
queryManagerURI 	jnp://localhost:1099/InquiryService?org.apache.juddi.registry.rmi.Inquiry#inquire
lifeCycleManagerURI 	jnp://localhost:1099/PublishService?org.apache.juddi.registry.rmi.Publish#publish
transportClass		org.apache.ws.scout.transport.RMITransport

Local
queryManagerURI	org.apache.juddi.registry.local.InquiryService#inquire
lifeCycleManagerURI	org.apache.juddi.registry.local.PublishService#publish
transportClass		org.apache.ws.scout.transport.LocalTransport


For jUDDI we have two requirements that need to be fulfilled:

  1. access to the jUDDI database. You will need to create a schema in your database, and add the jbossesb publisher. The product/install/jUDDI-registry directory contains db create scripts for you favorite database.

  2. esb.juddi.xml. The configuration of jUDDI itself. If you do not use a datasource you need to take special care to set the following properties:

	<entry key=”juddi.isUseDataSource”>false</entry>
	<entry key=”juddi.jdbcDriver”>com.mysql.jdbc.Driver</entry>
	<entry key=”juddi.jdbcUrl”>jdbc:mysql://localhost/juddi</entry>
	<entry key=”juddi.jdbcUsername”>juddi</entry>
	<entry key=”juddi.jdbcPassword”>juddi</entry>

if you do use a datasource you need something like

	<entry key=”juddi.isUseDataSource”>true</entry>
	<entry key=”juddi.dataSource”>java:comp/env/jdbc/juddiDB</entry>

The database can be automatically created if the user you have created has enough rights to create tables. Next make sure the isCreateDatabase flag is set to true, and that the sqlFiles parameter settings point to the database you are using. The jUDDI create scripts are located in the juddi.jar and jUDDI supports daffodildb, db2, derby, firebird, hsqldb, informix, jdatastore, mysql, oracle, postgresql, sybase (can be used for ms-sqlserver) and totalxml.

      <!-- <entry key=”juddi.tablePrefix”>JUDDI_</entry> -->
	<entry key=”juddi.isCreateDatabase”>true</entry>
	<entry key=”juddi.databaseExistsSql”>select * from ${prefix}BUSINESS_ENTITY
	</entry>
	<entry key=”juddi.sqlFiles”>
		juddi-sql/mysql/create_database.sql,
               juddi sql/mysql/insert_publishers.sql
	</entry>



Chapter 3

Registry Configuration Examples

Introduction

As mentioned before, by default the JBossESB is configured to use the JAXR API using Scout as its implementation and jUDDI as the registry. Here are some examples of how you can deploy this combo.

Embedded

All ESB components (with components we really mean JVMs in this case) can embed the registry and they all can connect to the same database (or different once if that makes sense).




Figure 2. Embedded jUDDI.

Properties example:

<properties name="registry">
	<property name="org.jboss.soa.esb.registry.implementationClass" 				value="org.jboss.internal.soa.esb.services.registry.JAXRRegistryImpl"/>

	<property name="org.jboss.soa.esb.registry.factoryClass" 					value="org.apache.ws.scout.registry.ConnectionFactoryImpl"/>

    	<property name="org.jboss.soa.esb.registry.queryManagerURI" 				value="org.apache.juddi.registry.local.InquiryService#inquire"/>

    	<property name="org.jboss.soa.esb.registry.lifeCycleManagerURI" 				value="org.apache.juddi.registry.local.PublishService#publish"/>

    	<property name="org.jboss.soa.esb.registry.user" value="jbossesb"/>
    	<property name="org.jboss.soa.esb.registry.password" value="password"/>
    	
    	<property name="org.jboss.soa.esb.scout.proxy.transportClass" 				value="org.apache.ws.scout.transport.LocalTransport"/>
</properties>

RMI using the juddi.war or jbossesb.sar

Deploy a version of the jUDDI that brings up an RMI service. The JBossESB comes with a juddi.war in the product/install/jUDDI-registry directory. This war brings up the regular webservices but also an RMI service. Along with the juddi.war you need to deploy a datasource which points to your jUDDI database. An example file is supplied for MySQL.

  1. The jbossesb.sar also registers a RMI service. So you would only need to deploy the juddi.war if you need webservice access






Figure 3. RMI using the juddi.war

Properties example:

<properties name="registry">
	<property name="org.jboss.soa.esb.registry.implementationClass" 				value="org.jboss.internal.soa.esb.services.registry.JAXRRegistryImpl"/>

	<property name="org.jboss.soa.esb.registry.factoryClass" 					value="org.apache.ws.scout.registry.ConnectionFactoryImpl"/>

    	<property name="org.jboss.soa.esb.registry.queryManagerURI" 					value="jnp://localhost:1099/InquiryService?org.apache.juddi.registry.rmi.Inquiry#inquire"/>

    	<property name="org.jboss.soa.esb.registry.lifeCycleManagerURI" 				value="jnp://localhost:1099/PublishService?org.apache.juddi.registry.rmi.Publish#publish"/>
	
    	<property name="org.jboss.soa.esb.registry.user" value="jbossesb"/>
    	<property name="org.jboss.soa.esb.registry.password" value="password"/>
    	
    	<property name="org.jboss.soa.esb.scout.proxy.transportClass" 				value="org.apache.ws.scout.transport.RMITransport"/>
</properties>


The juddi.war is configured to bring up a RMI Service, which is triggered by the following setting in the web.xml


<!--  uncomment if you want to enable making calls in juddi with rmi  -->
  <servlet>
  	<servlet-name>RegisterServicesWithJNDI</servlet-name>
  	<servlet-class>org.apache.juddi.registry.rmi.RegistrationService</servlet-class>
  	<load-on-startup>1</load-on-startup>
  </servlet>


Make sure to include, for example, the following JNDI settings in your juddi.properties:


# JNDI settings (used by RMITransport)
java.naming.factory.initial=org.jnp.interfaces.NamingContextFactory
java.naming.provider.url=jnp://localhost:1099
java.naming.factory.url.pkgs=org.jboss.naming


  1. The RMI clients need to have the scout-client.jar in their classpath.

RMI using your own JNDI Registration of the RMI Service

If you don't want to deploy the juddi.war you can setup one of the ESB components that runs in the the same JVM as jUDDI to register the RMI service. While the other applications need to be configured to use RMI.



Figure 4. RMI using your own JNDI registration

Properties example: For application 1 you need the Local settings:

<properties name="registry">
	<property name="org.jboss.soa.esb.registry.implementationClass" 				value="org.jboss.internal.soa.esb.services.registry.JAXRRegistryImpl"/>

	<property name="org.jboss.soa.esb.registry.factoryClass" 					value="org.apache.ws.scout.registry.ConnectionFactoryImpl"/>

    	<property name="org.jboss.soa.esb.registry.queryManagerURI" 				value="org.apache.juddi.registry.local.InquiryService#inquire"/>

    	<property name="org.jboss.soa.esb.registry.lifeCycleManagerURI" 				value="org.apache.juddi.registry.local.PublishService#publish"/>

    	<property name="org.jboss.soa.esb.registry.user" value="jbossesb"/>
    	<property name="org.jboss.soa.esb.registry.password" value="password"/>
    	
    	<property name="org.jboss.soa.esb.scout.proxy.transportClass" 				value="org.apache.ws.scout.transport.LocalTransport"/>
</properties>


while for application2 you need the RMI settings:


<properties name="registry">
	<property name="org.jboss.soa.esb.registry.implementationClass" 				value="org.jboss.internal.soa.esb.services.registry.JAXRRegistryImpl"/>

	<property name="org.jboss.soa.esb.registry.factoryClass" 					value="org.apache.ws.scout.registry.ConnectionFactoryImpl"/>

    	<property name="org.jboss.soa.esb.registry.queryManagerURI" 				value="jnp://localhost:1099/InquiryService?org.apache.juddi.registry.rmi.Inquiry#inquire"/>

    	<property name="org.jboss.soa.esb.registry.lifeCycleManagerURI" 				value="jnp://localhost:1099/PublishService?org.apache.juddi.registry.rmi.Publish#publish"/>
	
    	<property name="org.jboss.soa.esb.registry.user" value="jbossesb"/>
    	<property name="org.jboss.soa.esb.registry.password" value="password"/>
    	
    	<property name="org.jboss.soa.esb.scout.proxy.transportClass" 				value="org.apache.ws.scout.transport.RMITransport"/>
</properties>

Where the hostname of the queryManagerURI and lifeCycleManagerURI need to point to the hostname on which jUDDI is running (which would be where application1 is running). Obviously application1 needs to have access to a naming service. To do the registration process you need to do something like:


//Getting the JNDI setting from the config
String factoryInitial = Config.getStringProperty(
Properties env = new Properties();
env.setProperty(RegistryEngine.PROPNAME_JAVA_NAMING_FACTORY_INITIAL,factoryInitial);
env.setProperty(RegistryEngine.PROPNAME_JAVA_NAMING_PROVIDER_URL, providerURL);
env.setProperty(RegistryEngine.PROPNAME_JAVA_NAMING_FACTORY_URL_PKGS, factoryURLPkgs); 

InitialContext context = new InitialContext(env);
Inquiry inquiry = new InquiryService();
log.info("Setting " + INQUIRY_SERVICE + ", " + inquiry.getClass().getName());
mInquery = inquiry;
context.bind(INQUIRY_SERVICE, inquiry);
Publish publish = new PublishService();
log.info("Setting " + PUBLISH_SERVICE + ", " + publish.getClass().getName());
mPublish = publish;
context.bind(PUBLISH_SERVICE, publish);

2.4 SOAP

Finally, you can make the communication between Scout and jUDDI SOAP based. Again you need to deploy the juddi.war and configure the datasource. You probably want to shutdown the RMI service by commenting out the RegisterServicesWithJNDI servlet in the web.xml.




Figure 5. SOAP.

Properties example:

<properties name="registry">
	<property name="org.jboss.soa.esb.registry.implementationClass" 				value="org.jboss.internal.soa.esb.services.registry.JAXRRegistryImpl"/>

	<property name="org.jboss.soa.esb.registry.factoryClass" 					value="org.apache.ws.scout.registry.ConnectionFactoryImpl"/>

    	<property name="org.jboss.soa.esb.registry.queryManagerURI" 				value="http://localhost:8080/juddi/inquiry"/>

    	<property name="org.jboss.soa.esb.registry.lifeCycleManagerURI" 				value="http://localhost:8080/juddi/publish"/>	

    	<property name="org.jboss.soa.esb.registry.user" value="jbossesb"/>
    	<property name="org.jboss.soa.esb.registry.password" value="password"/>
    	
    	<property name="org.jboss.soa.esb.scout.proxy.transportClass" 				value="org.apache.ws.scout.transport.AxisTransport"/>
</properties>


  1. JBossAS 4.2 ships with older versions of Scout and jUDDI. It is recommended to remove the juddi.sar to prevent versioning issues.





Chapter 3

UDDI Browser

Introduction

We are looking for a good web based console for jUDDI. In the meantime you can browse the jUDDI registry using the uddibrowser. The uddibrowser 'ub' can be downloaded from http://www.uddibrowser.org. Before configuring the ub make sure the juddi.war is deployed to the jbossesb.sar, to enable WS communication to jUDDI.


UB setup

The ub is a standalone Java application. Start the ub and select Edit > UDDI Registries, and add an entry called jUDDI



Figure 6. Add a connection.

with settings



Figure 7. jUDDI connection settings


Click on 'connect' and select View > Find More > Find All Businesses




Figure 8. View all Businesses.


and in the left hand side you should see the Red Hat/JBossESB organization. You can navigate into the individual services and their ServiceBindings.



Figure 9. View Services and ServiceBindings.


Each ServiceBinding contains an EPR in its AccessPoint.


Some features of the uddibrowser may not work, but it should give enough functionality to maintain jUDDI. As mentioned before we are looking for a good web based console for jUDDI.

Chapter 4

Registry Troubleshooting

Scout and jUDDI pitfalls

More Information



Chapter 4

What is a Rule
Service?

Introduction

The JBoss ESB Rule Service support allows you to deploy rules created in JBoss Drools as services on the ESB. This is beneficial, because it means you don't have to develop as much client code to integrate rules into your application environment, and rules can be accessed as part of a action chain or orchestarted business process. To understand these types of services, you should first learn about JBoss Drools.



Rule Services are supported by the BusinessRuleProcessor action class and the DroolsRuleService, which implements the RuleService interface. While it is possible to use rule engines other than JBoss Drool, only JBoss Drools is supported out the the box. The BusinessRuleProcessor supports rules loaded from the classpath that are defined in .drl files, .dsl and dslr files (domain specific language support), and .xls (decision table support) files. These are primarily for testing, prototypes, and very simple rule services. There is no way to specify multiple rule files in the jboss-esb.xml file, so complex rule services need to use the Drools RuleAgent. The RuleService uses the RuleAgent to access rule packages from the Drools BRMS or local file system. These rule packages can contain thousands of rules, created through the Drools BRMS business rule editor, imported DRL files, rules written in a Domain Specific Language, and rules from Decision Tables. Use of the Drools RuleAgent is the recommended approach for production systems.



The BusinessRuleProcessor action supports both Drools stateless and stateful execution models. Most rule services will be stateless. That is, a message will be sent to the rule service that includes all the facts to be inserted into the rule engine in the message body, the rules will execute, and update either the message and / or the facts. Stateful execution takes place over time, with several messages being sent to the rule service, the rules being executed each time, the message and / or facts being updated each time, and a final message that tells the rule service to dispose of the statefull session working memory of the rule engine. There are limitations in this configuration, namely that there can only be a single (stateful) rule service in the message flow. This may change in the future, when there are better ways to identify a stateful conversation over the ESB.



Chapter 5

Rule Services using Drools

Introduction

The Rule Service support in the JBossESB uses JBossRules/Drools as its rule engine. JBossESB integrates with Drools through

When a message gets send to the BusinessRuleProcessor, a certain rule set will execute over the objects in the message, and update those objects and / or the message.



Rule Set Creation

A rule set can be created using the Red Hat Developer Studio which includes a plug-in for JBoss Drools, or with Eclispe 3.3 and the plugin installed (see Drools download site for the plugin). Since the message is added as a global, you need to add jbossesb-rosetta.jar to your Drools project.

You can also write your rules using Drools BRMS business rule editor. When using the Drools BRMS, it is not necessary to add the ESB Message class to the imports, as long as jbossesb-rosetta.jar is somewhere on the classpath of the BRMS web application.

For a detailed discussion on rule creation and the Drools language itself please see the Drools documention.

For the most part, rules can be written without regard to their deployment on the ESB as a service. There are a few caveats however:

1) All rules deployed as a rule service must define the ESBMessage as a global, i.e.,

#declare any global variables here

global org.jboss.soa.esb.message.Message;

The rationale for this is that most rule services will want to update the message as a way of communicating results to other services in the flow, so the BusinessRuleProcessor / DroolsRuleService will always set the message as a global.

2) The BusinessRuleProcessor / DroolsRuleService does not provide a means to set globals in the jboss-esb.xml and have them set in working memory. This would have made for additional configuration support in the jboss-esb.xml, and could be supported in the future. For now, if additional globals (other than the ESBMessage) need to be set, they can be done in higher salience rule. E.g.,

rule "Set a global"

salience 100

when

then

drools.getWorkingMemory().setGlobal("foo",new Foo());

end

3) The ESBRuleService does not provide a means to start a RuleFlow from the rule service. This also would have made for additional configuration support in the jboss-esb.xml, and could be supported in the future. For now, if a RuleFlow needs to be started, this can be done in higher salience rule. E.g.,

rule "Start a ruleflow"

salience 100

when

then

drools.startProcess("processId");

end



Rule Service Consumers

The consumer of a rule service has little to worry about. In a rule service environment there is no need for the consumer to worry about creating rulebases, creating working memories, inserting facts, or firing the rules. Instead the consumer just has to worry about adding facts to the message, and possibly some properties to the message.

In some cases the client is ESB aware, and will add the objects to the message directly:

MessageFactory factory = MessageFactory.getInstance();

message = factory.getMessage(MessageType.JAVA_SERIALIZED);

order = new Order();

order.setOrderId(0);

order.setQuantity(20);

order.setUnitPrice(new Float("20.0"));

message.getBody().add("Order", order);

In other cases the data may be in an XML message, and a transformation service will be added to the message flow to transform the XML to POJOs before the rule service is invoked.

Using stateful rule execution requires a few properties to be added the messages. For the first message,

message.getProperties().setProperty("dispose", false);

message.getProperties().setProperty("continue", false); // this is the default

For all the subsequest messages but the final message,

message.getProperties().setProperty("dispose", false);

message.getProperties().setProperty("continue", true);

For the final message,

message.getProperties().setProperty("dispose", true); // this is the default

message.getProperties().setProperty("continue", true);

These can be added directly by an ESB aware client. A non-ESB aware client would have to communicate the position of the message (first, ongoing, last) in the data, and an action class would need to be added to the pipeline to add the properties to the ESB message (see quickstarts/business_ruleservice_stateful for an example of this type of service).





Configuration

Configuration of a rule service is in the jboss-esb action element for the service. Several configuration parameters are required or optional

The action class and name is required:

<action class="org.jboss.soa.esb.actions.BusinessRulesProcessor" name="OrderDiscountRuleService">

This configures the action class and its name. The name is user defined.

One of the following is also required

<property name="ruleSet" value="drl/OrderDiscount.drl" />

for specifying a drl file, or

<property name="ruleSet" value="dsl/approval.dslr" />

<property name="ruleLanguage" value="dsl/acme.dsl" />



for specifying a dsl and dslr (domain specific language) files , or

<property name="decisionTable" value="PolicyPricing.xls" />

for specifying a decisionTable on the classpath, or

<property name="ruleAgentProperties" value="brmsdeployedrules.properties" />

for specifying a properties file on the classpath that tells the rule agent how to find the rule package. This could specify a url or a local file system.

Several example configurations follow:

Example 1: Rules are in a drl, execution is stateless.

<action

class="org.jboss.soa.esb.actions.BusinessRulesProcessor" name="OrderDiscountRuleService"

<property name="ruleSet"

value="drl/OrderDiscount.drl" />

<property name="ruleReload" value="true" />

<property name="object-paths">

<object-path esb="body.Order" />

</property>

</action>

Example 2: Rules are in a drl, execution is stateful.

In this scenario the client may send multiple messages over time to the rule service. For example, the first message may contain a customer object, and the next several messages contain orders for that customer. Each time a message is received, the rules will be fired. On the final message, the client can add a property to the message to tell the rule service to dispose of the working memory.

<action class="org.jboss.soa.esb.actions.BusinessRulesProcessor"

name="OrderDiscountMultipleRuleServiceStateful">

<property name="ruleSet"

value="drl/OrderDiscountOnMultipleOrders.drl" />

<property name="ruleReload" value="false" />

<property name="stateful" value="true" >

<property name="object-paths">

<object-path esb="body.Customer" />

<object-path esb="body.Order" />

</property>

</action>



Example 3: Rules are in a Domain Specific Language, execution is stateless.

<action class="org.jboss.soa.esb.actions.BusinessRulesProcessor" name="PolicyApprovalRuleService"

<property name="ruleSet" value="dsl/approval.dslr" />

<property name="ruleLanguage" value="dsl/acme.dsl" />

<property name="ruleReload" value="true" />

<property name="object-paths">

<object-path esb="body.Driver" />

<object-path esb="body.Policy" />

</property>

</action>



Example 4: Rules are in a DecisionTable, execution is stateless.

<action class="org.jboss.soa.esb.actions.BusinessRulesProcessor" name="PolicyPricingRuleService"

<property name="decisionTable"

value="decisionTable/PolicyPricing.xls" />

<property name="ruleReload" value="true" />

<property name="object-paths">

<object-path esb="body.Driver" />

<object-path esb="body.Policy" />

</property>

</action>

Example 5: Rules are in the BRMS, execution is stateless.

<action class="org.jboss.soa.esb.actions.BusinessRulesProcessor" name="RuleAgentPolicyService"

<property name="ruleAgentProperties"

value="ruleAgent/brmsdeployedrules.properties" />

<property name="object-paths">

<object-path esb="body.Driver" />

<object-path esb="body.Policy" />

</property>

</action>

The action attributes to the action tag are show in Table 1. The attributes specify which action is to be used and which name this action is to be given.



Attribute

Description

Class

Action class, :

org.jboss.soa.esb.actions.BusinessRulesProcessor

Name

Custom action name


Table 1. BusinessRuleProcessor action configuration attributes.

The action properties are shown in Table 2. The properties specify the set of rules (ruleSet) to be used in this action.


Property

Description

ruleSet

Optional reference to a file containing the Drools ruleSet. The set of rules that is used to evaluate the content. Only 1 ruleSet can be given for each rule service instance.

ruleLanguage

Optional reference to a file containing the definition of a Domain Specific Language to be used for evaluating the rule set. If this is used, the file in ruleSet should be a dslr file.

ruleReload

Optional property which can be to true to enable 'hot' redeployment of rule sets. Note that this feature will cause some overhead on the rules processing. Note that rules will also reload if the .esb archive in which they live is redeployed.

decisionTable

Optional reference to a file containing the definition of a spreadsheet containing rules.

ruleAgentProperties

Optional reference to a properties file containing the location (URL or file path) to the compiled rule package(s). Note there is no need to specify ruleReload with a ruleAgent, since this is controlled through the properties file.

stateful

Optional property which can be to true to specify that the rule service will receive multiple messages over time that will add fact to the rule engine working memory and re-execute the rules.



object-paths

Optional property to pass Message objects into Drools WorkingMemory.

Table 2. BusinessRuleProcessor action configuration properties.

Object Paths

Note that JBossRules treats objects as shallow objects to achieve highly optimized performance, so what if you want to evaluate an object deeper in the object tree? An the optional 'object-paths' property can be used, which results in the extraction of objects from the message, using an “ESB Message Object Path”. MVEL is used to extract the object and the path used should follow the syntax:

location.objectname.[beanname].[beanname]...

where,

location : one of {body, header, properties, attachment}

objectname: name of the object name, attachments can be named or numbered, so for attachments this can be a number too.

beannames: optionally you traverse a bean graph by specifying bean names



examples :

properties.Order, gets the property object named "Order"

attachment.1, gets the first attachment Object

attachment.FirstAttachment, gets the attachment named 'FirstAttachment'

attachment.1.Order, gets getOrder() return object on the attached Object.

body.Order1.lineitem, obtains the object named "Order1" from the body of the message. Next it will call getLineitem() on this object. More elements can be added to the query to traverse the bean graph.

It is important to remember that you have to add java import statements on the objects you import into your rule set.

Finally, the Object Mapper can flatten out entire collections. For example a collectoin Orders will be unrolled, and each order object inserted into working memory.



Deployment and Packaging

It is recommended that you package up your code into units of functionality, using .esb packages. The idea is to package up your routing rules alongside the rule services that use the rule sets. Figure 3 shows a layout of the business_rules_service quickstart to demonstrate a typical package.

.Quickstart_business_rules_service.esb

|   jbm-queue-service.xml
|   MyBusinessRules.drl
|   MyBusinessRulesDiscount.drl
|   MyRoutingRules.drl
|   smooks-res.xml
|   
+---META-INF
|       deployment.xml
|       jboss-esb.xml
|       MANIFEST.MF
|       
\---org
    \---jboss
        \---soa
            \---esb
		\---dvdstore
			|   Customer.class
  			|   OrderHeader.class
			|   OrderItem.class
                \---samples
                    \---quickstart
                        \---businessrules
                            |   ReviewMessage.class
                            \---test
                                  SendJMSMessage.class

Figure 3. Typical .esb archive which uses Drools.

Finally make sure to deploy and reference the jbrules.esb in your deployment.xml.

        	<jbossesb-deployment>
          		<depends>jboss.esb:deployment=jbrules.esb</depends>
        	</jbossesb-deployment>

Chapter 6

What is Content-Based
Routing?

Introduction

Typically, information within the ESB is conveniently packaged, transferred, and stored in the form of a message. Messages are addressed to Endpoint References (services or clients), that identify the machine/process/object that will ultimately deal with the content of the message. However, what happens if the specified address is no longer valid? For example, the service has failed or been removed from service? It is also possible that the service no longer deals with messages of that particular type; in which case, presumably some other service still handles the original function, but how should the message be handled? What if other services besides the intended recipient are interested in the message's content? What if no destination is specified?

One possible solution to these problems is Content-Based Routing. Content-based routing seeks to route messages, not by a specified destination, but by the actual content of the message itself. In a typical application, a message is routed by opening it up and applying a set of rules to its content to determine the parties interested in its content.

The ESB can determine the destination of a given message based on the content of that message, freeing the sending application from having to know anything about where a message is going to end up.

Content-based routing and filtering networks are extremely flexible and very powerful. When built upon established technologies such as MOM (Message Oriented Middleware), JMS (Java Message Services), and XML (Extensible Markup Language) they are also reasonably easy to implement.

Simple example

Content-based routing systems are typically built around two types of entities: routers (of which there may be only one) and services (of which there is usually more than one). Services are the ultimate consumers of messages. How services publish their interest in specific types of messages with the routers is implementation dependent, but some mapping must exist between message type (or some aspect of the message content) and services in order for the router to direct the flow of incoming messages.

Routers, as their name suggests, route messages. They examine the content of the messages they receive, apply rules to that content, and forward the messages as the rules dictate.

In addition to routers and services, some systems may also include harvesters, which specialize in finding interesting information, packaging it up as a formatted message before sending it to a router. Harvesters mine many sources of information including mail transfer agent message stores, news servers, databases and other legacy systems.

The diagram below illustrates a typical CBR architecture using an ESB. At the heart of the system, represented by the cloud, is the ESB. Messages are sent from the client into the ESB, which directs them to the Router. This is then responsible for sending the messages to their ultimate destination (or destinations, as shown in this example).















Chapter 7

Content Based Routing using Drools

Introduction

The Content Based Router (CBR) in the JBossESB uses JBossRules/Drools as its evaluation engine. JBossESB integrates with Drools through three different routing action classes,

When a message gets send to the CBR, a certain rule set will evaluate the message content and return a set of Service destinations. We discuss how a target rule set can be targeted, how the message content is evaluated and what is done with the destination results.



Three different routing action classes

JBossESB ships with three slightly different routing action classes. Each of these action classes implements an Enterprise Integration Pattern. For more information of the Enterprise Integration Pattern you can check the JBossESB Wiki. The following actions are supported:

org.jboss.soa.esb.actions.ContentBasedRouter

Implements the Content Based Routing pattern. It routes a message to one or more destination services based on the message content and the rule set it is evaluating it against. The CBR throws an exception when no destinations are matched for a given rule set/message combination. This action will terminate any further pipeline processing, so it should be the last action of your pipeline.

org.jboss.soa.esb.actions.ContentBasedWireTap

Implements the WireTap pattern. The WireTap is an Enterprise Integration Pattern (EIP) where a copy of the message is send to a control channel. The CBR-WT is identical in functionality to the ContentBasedRouter, however it does not terminate the pipeline which makes it suitable to be used as a WireTap.

org.jboss.soa.esb.actions.MessageFilter.

Implements the Message-Filter pattern. The Message Filter pattern represents the case where messages can simply be dropped if certain content requirements are not met. The CBR-MF is identical in functionality to the ContentBasedRouter, but it does not throw an exception if the rule set does not match any destinations. In this case the message is simply filter out.

Rule Set Creation

A rule set can be created using the JBossIDE or Red Hat Developer Studio which includes a plug-in for JBossRules. Figure 1 shows a screen shot of the plug-in. For a detailed discussion on rule creation and the Drools language itself please see the Drools documention. To turn a regular ruleSet into a Countent Based Routing RuleSet you must be evaluating an EsbMessage and the rule match should result in a List of Strings containing the service destination names. To do this you need to make sure you remember two things:

The message will be asserted into the working memory of the rules engine. Figure 2 shows an example where the MessageType is used to determine to which destination the Message is going to be send. This particular ruleSet is shipped in the JBossESBRules.drl file and the rule checks if the type is XML or Serializable.



XPath Domain Specific Language

For XML-based messages it is convenient to do XPath based evaluation. To support this we ship a “Domain Specific Language” implementation which allows us to use XPath expressions in the rule file. defined in the XPathLanguage.dsl. To use it you need to reference it in your ruleSet with:

expander XPathLanguage.dsl


Currently the XPath Language makes sure the message is of the type JBOSS_XML and it defines

  1. xpathMatch “<element>”: yields true if an element by this name is matched.

  2. xpathEquals “<element>”, “<value>”: yields true if the element is found and it's value equals the value.

  3. xpathGreaterThan “<element>”, “<value>”: yields true if the element is found and it's value is greater than the value.

  4. xpathLowerThan “<element>”, “<value>”: yields true if the element is found and it's value is lower then the value.

XPath and namespaces

To use namespaces with XPath, one needs to specify which namespace prefixes are to be used in the XPath expression. The namespace prefixes are specified as a comma separated list like this: “prefix=uri,prefix=uri”. This can be accomplished for all the above types of XPath expressions:

  1. xpathMatch expr “<expression>” use namespaces “<namepaces>”

  2. xpathEquals expr “<expression>”, “<value>” use namespaces “<namspaces>”

  3. xpathGreaterThan “<expression>”, “<value>” use namespaces “<namspaces>”

  4. xpathLowerThan expr “<expression>, “<value> use namespaces “<namespaces>

Notice that the namespace aware statements differ in that they need the extra “expr” in front of the XPath expression. This is do avoid colliding with the non XPath aware statements in the dsl file.

Also note that the prefixes do not have to match those used in the xml to be evaluated, it only matters that the URI is the same.

The XPathLanguage.dsl is defined in a file called XPathLanguage.dsl, and can be customized if needed, or you can define your own DSL altogether. The Quickstart called fun_cbr demonstrates this use of XPath.



Configuration

Now that we have seen all the individual pieces how does it all tie together? It basically all comes down to configuration at this point, which is all done in your jboss-esb.xml. Figure 1 shows a service configuration fragment. In this fragment the service is listening on a JMS queue.

Each EsbMessage is passed on to in this case the ContentBasedRouter action class which is loaded with a certain rule set. It sets the EsbMessage into Working Memory, fires the rules, obtains the list of destinations and routes copies of the EsbMessage to these services. It uses the rule set JbossESBRules.drl, which matches two destinations, name 'xml-destination' and 'serialized-destination'. These names are mapped to real service names in the 'route-to' section.


<service

        	category="MessageRouting" 
        	name="YourServiceName" 
        	description="CBR Service">
        	<listeners>        
                  <jms-listener name="CBR-Listener"
                            busidref="QueueA" maxThreads="1">             
	           </jms-listener>
               </listeners>
		<actions> 
		     <action class="org.jboss.soa.esb.actions.ContentBasedRouter" 				     name="YourActionName">
                    	<property name="ruleSet" value="JBossESBRules.drl"/>
                    	<property name="ruleReload" value="true"/>
                    	<property name="destinations">
                           <route-to destination-name="xml-destination" 
				    service-category="category01" 
			           service-name="jbossesbtest1" /> 
                           <route-to destination-name="serialized-destination" 				           service-category="category02" 
				    service-name="jbossesbtest2" /> 
                    	</property> 
                    	<property name="object-paths">
				<object-path esb="body.test1" /> 
				<object-path esb="body.test2" /> 
		     	</property>
                    </action>
		</actions>
            </service>

Figure 2. Example Content Based Routing Service configuration.

The action attributes to the action tag are show in Table 1. The attributes specify which action is to be used and which name this action is to be given.



Attribute

Description

Class

Action class, one of :

org.jboss.soa.esb.actions.ContentBasedRouter

org.jboss.soa.esb.actions.ContentBasedWireTap

org.jboss.soa.esb.actions.MessageFilter

Name

Custom action name


Table 1. CBR action configuration attributes.

The action properties are shown in Table 2. The properties specify the set of rules (ruleSet) to be used in this action.


Property

Description

ruleSet

Name of the filename containing the Drools ruleSet. The set of rules that is used to evaluate the content. Only 1 ruleSet can be given for each CBR instance.

ruleLanguage

Optional reference to a file containing the definition of a Domain Specific Language to be used for evaluating the rule set.

ruleAgentProperties

This property points to a rule agent properties file located on the classpath. The properties file can contain a property that points to precompiled rules packages on the file system, in a directory, or identified by an URL for integration with the BRMS. See the “RuleAgent” section below for more information.

ruleReload

Optional property which can be to true to enable 'hot' redeployment of rule sets. Note that this feature will cause some overhead on the rules processing. Note that rules will also reload if the .esb archive in which they live is redeployed.

stateful

Optional property which tells the RuleService to use a stateful session where facts will be remembered between invokations. See the “Stateful Rules” section for more information about stateful rules.

destinations

A set of route-to properties each containing the logical name of the destination along with the Service category and name as referenced in the registry. The logical name is the name which should be used in the rule set.

object-paths

Optional property to pass Message objects into Drools WorkingMemory.

Table 2. CBR action configuration properties.

Object Paths

Note that JBossRules treats objects as shallow objects to achieve highly optimized performance, so what if you want to evaluate an object deeper in the object tree? An optional 'object-paths' property can be used, which results in the extraction of objects from the message, using an “ESB Message Object Path”. MVEL is used to extract the object and the path used should follow the syntax:

location.objectname.[beanname].[beanname]...

where,

location : one of {body, header, properties, attachment}

objectname: name of the object name, attachments can be named or numbered, so for attachments this can be a number too.

beannames: optionally you traverse a bean graph by specifying bean names



examples :

properties.Order, gets the property object named "Order"

attachment.1, gets the first attachment Object

attachment.FirstAttachment, gets the attachment named 'FirstAttachment'

attachment.1.Order, gets getOrder() return object on the attached Object.

body.Order1.lineitem, obtains the object named "Order1" from the body of the message. Next it will call getLineitem() on this object. More elements can be added to the query to traverse the bean graph.

It is important to remember that you have to add java import statements on the objects you import into your rule set. Finally, the Object Mapper cannot flatten out entire collections, so if you need to do that you have to perform a (Smooks-) transformation on the message first, to unroll the collection.



Stateful Rules

Using stateful sessions means that facts will be remembered across invocations. When stateful is set to true the working memory will not be disposed.

Stateful rule services must be told via messge properties when to continue with a current stateful session and when to dispose of it. To signal that you want to continue an existing stateful session two message properties must be set :

		message.getProperties().setProperty(“dispose”, false);
		message.getProperties().setProperty(“continue”, true);

When you invoke the rules for the last time you must set “dispose” to true so that the working memory is disposed:

		message.getProperties().setProperty(“dispose”, true);
		message.getProperties().setProperty(“continue”, true);

For more details about the RuleService please see RuleService chapter.

For an example of using stateful rules take a look at the business_ruleservice_stateful quickstart.



RuleAgent

By using the rule agent property you can use precompiled rules packages that can be located on the local file system, in a local directory, or point to an URL. For information about the configuration options that exist for the properties file please refer to section 9.4.4.1. The Rule Agent of the Drools manual.

For more details about the RuleService please see RuleService chapter.

For an example of using a rule agent take a look at the business_ruleservice_ruleAgent quickstart.



RuleAgent and Business Rule Management System

By using the rule agent property you can effectively integrate your service with a Business Rule Management System (BRMS). This can be accomplished by specifying a URL in the rule agent properties file. For information about the how to configure the URL and the other properties please refer to section 9.4.4.1. The Rule Agent of the Drools manual.

For more details about the RuleService please see RuleService chapter.

For information about the how to install and configure the BRMS please refer to the chapter Chapter 9 of the Drools manual.

 

Executing Business Rules

Related to rule execution for routing is the rule execution to simply modifying data in the message according to business rules. An example Quickstart called business_rule_service demonstrates this use case. This quickstart uses the action class

org.jboss.soa.esb.actions.BusinessRulesProcessor

The functionality of the Business Rule Processor (BRP) is identical to the Content Based Router, but it does not do any routing, instead it returns the modified EsbMessage for further action pipeline processing. You may mix business and routing rules in one rule set if you wish to do so, but routing will only occur if you use one of the three routing action classes mentioned earlier.

Changing RuleService implementations

If you would like to use a different RuleService then the default one that is shipped with JBossESB, then this is possible by specifying the class you would like to use in the action configuration:

		<property name="ruleServiceImplClass" 						value="org.com.YourRuleService" />

The requirement is that your rule service implements the interface: org.jboss.soa.esb.services.rules.RuleService.



Deployment and Packaging

It is recommended that you package up your code into units of functionality, using .esb packages. The idea is to package up your routing rules alongside the rule services that use the rule sets. Figure 3 shows a layout of the simple_cbr quickstart to demonstrate a typical package.

simple_cbr.esb

|   jbm-queue-service.xml
|   SimpleCBRRules-XPath.drl
|   SimpleCBRRules.drl
|   
+---META-INF
|       deployment.xml
|       jboss-esb.xml
|       MANIFEST.MF
|       
\---org
    \---jboss
        \---soa
            \---esb
                \---samples
                    \---quickstart
                        \---simplecbr
                            |   MyJMSListenerAction.class
                            |   ReturnJMSMessage.class
                            |   RouteExpressShipping.class
                            |   RouteNormalShipping.class
                            |   
                            \---test
                                    ReceiveJMSMessage$1.class
                                    ReceiveJMSMessage.class
                                    SendJMSMessage.class

Figure 3. Typical .esb archive which uses Drools.

Finally make sure to deploy and reference the jbrules.esb in your deployment.xml.

        	<jbossesb-deployment>
          		<depends>jboss.esb:deployment=jbrules.esb</depends>
        	</jbossesb-deployment>

Chapter 8

Content Based Routing using Smooks

Introduction

The SmooksAction can be used for splitting HUGE messages into split fragments and performing Content-Based Routing on these split fragments.

An example of this might be a huge order message with thousands/millions of order items per message. You might need to split the order up by order item and route each order item split fragment to one or more destinations based on the fragment content. This example can be illustrated as follows:


The above illustration shows how we would like to perform the by-order-item splitting operation and route the split messages to file. The split messages contain a full XML document with data merged from the order header and the order item in question i.e. not just a dumb split. In this illustration, we simply route all the message fragments to file, but with the Smooks Action, we can also route the fragment messages to JMS and to a Database and in different formats (EDI, populated Java Objects, etc).

The Smooks configuration for the above example would look as follows.






Resource configurations #1 and #2 are there to bind data from the source message into Java Object in the Smooks bean context. In this case, we're just binding the data into HashMaps. The Map being populated in configuration #2 is recreated and repopulated for every order item as the message is being filtered. The populated Java Objects (from resources #1 and #2) are use to populate a FreeMarker template (resource #4), which gets applied on every order item, with the result of the templating operation being output to a FileResourceStream (resource #3). The FileResourceStream (resource #3) also gets applied on every order item, managing the file output for the split messages.

This functionality is available in JBoss ESB 4.4 GA as a Technical Preview and we would greatly appreciate your feedback. What the above does not show is how to perform the content based routing using <condition> elements on the resources. It also doesn't demonstrate how to route fragments to to message aware endpoints. We will be adding a quickstart dedicated to demoing these features of the ESB. Check the User Forum for details.

Chapter 9

Message Transformation

    Overview

JBoss ESB supports message data transformation through a number of mechanisms:

    Smooks

Message Transformation on JBossESB is supported by the SmooksAction component. This is an ESB Action component that allows the Smooks Data Transformation/Processing Framework to be plugged into an ESB Action Processing Pipeline.


A wide range of source (XML, CSV, EDI, Java etc) and target (XML, Java, CSV, EDI etc) data formats are supported by the SmooksAction component. A wide range of Transformation Technologies are also supported, all within a single framework. See the Message Action Guide for more details.


      Samples & Tutorials


  1. A number of Transformation Quickstart samples accompany the JBossESB distribution. Check out the "transform_*" Quickstarts1.

  2. A number of tutorials are available online on the Smooks website. Any of these samples can be easily ported to JBossESB.


    XSL Transformations

Following sections illustrate how to create Smooks Resource.

Introduction

In this release of JBossESB, XSL Transformations are supported through Smooks. In later releases we may support XSLT natively. Support for XSLT can be provided by creating a custom org.jboss.soa.esb.actions.ActionProcessor implementation.

Chapter 10

jBPM Integration

Introduction

JBoss jBPM is a powerful workflow and BPM (Business Process Management) engine. It enables the creation of business processes that coordinate between people, applications and services. With its modular architecture, JBoss jBPM combines easy development of workflow applications with a flexible and scalable process engine. The JBoss jBPM process designer graphically represents the business process steps to facilitate a strong link between the business analyst and the technical developer. This document assumes that you are familiar with jBPM. If you are not you should read the jBPM documentation [TB-JBPM-USER] first. JBossESB integrates the jBPM so that it can be used for two purposes:

  1. Service Orchestration: ESB services can be orchestrated using jBPM. You can create a jBPM process definition which makes calls into ESB services.

  2. Human Task Management : jBPM allows you to incorporate human task management integrated with machine based services.


Integration Configuration

The jbpm.esb deployment that ships with the ESB includes the full jBPM runtime and the jBPM console. The runtime and the console share a common jBPM database. The ESB DatabaseInitializer mbean creates this database on startup. The configuration for this mbean is found in the file jbpm.esb/jbpm-service.xml.



<classpath codebase="deploy" archives="jbpm.esb"/>

<classpath codebase="deploy/jbossesb.sar/lib" archives="jbossesb-rosetta.jar"/>

<mbean code=

"org.jboss.internal.soa.esb.dependencies.DatabaseInitializer"

name="jboss.esb:service=JBPMDatabaseInitializer">

<attribute name="Datasource">java:/JbpmDS</attribute>

<attribute name="ExistsSql">

select * from JBPM_ID_USER</attribute>

<attribute name="SqlFiles">

jbpm-sql/jbpm.jpdl.hsqldb.sql,jbpm-sql/import.sql

</attribute>

<depends>

jboss.jca:service=DataSourceBinding,name=JbpmDS

</depends>

</mbean>

<mbean code=

"org.jboss.soa.esb.services.jbpm.configuration.JbpmService"

name="jboss.esb:service=JbpmService">

</mbean>


The first Mbean configuration element contains the configuration for the DatabaseInitializer. By default the attributes are configured as follows:

The DatabaseInitializer mbean is configured in jbpm-service.xml to wait for the JbpmDS to be deployed, before deploying itself. The second mbean “JbpmService” ties the lifecycle of the jBPM job executor to the jbpm.esb lifecycle - it starts a job executor instance on startup and stops it on shutdown. The JbpmDS datasource is defined in the jbpm-ds.xml and by default it uses a HSQL database. In production you will want change to a production strength database. All jbpm.esb deployments should share the same database instance so that the various ESB nodes have access to the same processes definitions and instances.

The jBPM console is a web application accessible at http://localhost:8080/jbpm-console when you start the server. The login screen is shown in Fig. 1.



Figure 1. The jBPM Console

Please check the jBPM documentation [TB-JBPM-USER] to change the security settings for this application, which will involve change some settings in the conf/login-config.xml. The console can be used for deploying and monitoring jBPM processes, but is can also be used for human task management. For the different users a customized task list will be shown and they can work on these tasks. The quickstart bpm_orchestration4 [JBESB-QS] demonstrates this feature.

The jbpm.esb/META-INF directory contains the deployment.xml and the jboss-esb.xml. The deployment.xml specifies the resources this esb archive depends on:

<jbossesb-deployment>

<depends>jboss.esb:deployment=jbossesb.esb</depends>

<depends>jboss.jca:service=DataSourceBinding,name=JbpmDS</depends>

</jbossesb-deployment>

which are the jbossesb.esb and the JbpmDS datasource. This information is used to determine the deployment order.

The jboss-esb.xml deploys one internal service called JBpmCallbackService”:

<services>

<service category="JBossESB-Internal"

name="JBpmCallbackService"

description="Service which makes Callbacks into jBPM">

<listeners>

<jms-listener name="JMS-DCQListener"

busidref="jBPMCallbackBus"

maxThreads="1"

/>

</listeners>

<actions mep="OneWay">

<action name="action" class="

org.jboss.soa.esb.services.jbpm.actions.JBpmCallback"/>

</actions>

</service>

</services>

This service listens to the jBPMCallbackBus, which by default is a JMS Queue on either a JBossMQ (jbmq-queue-service.xml) or a JbossMessaging (jbm-queue-service.xml) messaging provider. Make sure only one of these files gets deployed in your jbpm.esb archive. If you want to use your own provider simple modify the provider section in the jboss-esb.xml to reference your JMS provider.

<providers>

<!-- change the following element to jms-jca-provider to

enable transactional context -->

<jms-provider name="CallbackQueue-JMS-Provider"

connection-factory="ConnectionFactory">

<jms-bus busid="jBPMCallbackBus">

<jms-message-filter

dest-type="QUEUE"

dest-name="queue/CallbackQueue"

/>

</jms-bus>

</jms-provider>

</providers>

For more details on what the JbpmCallbackService does, please see the “jBPM to ESB” section later on in this chapter.



jBPM configuration

The configuration of jBPM itself is managed by three files, the jbpm.cfg.xml and the hibernate.cfg.xml and the jbpm.mail.templates.xml.

By default the jbpm.cfg.xml is set to use the JTA transacion manager, as defined in the section:

<service name="persistence">

<factory>

<bean class="

org.jbpm.persistence.jta.JtaDbPersistenceServiceFactory">

<field name="isTransactionEnabled"><false/></field>

<field name="isCurrentSessionEnabled"><true/></field>

<!--field name="sessionFactoryJndiName">

<string value="java:/myHibSessFactJndiName" />

</field-->

</bean>

</factory>

</service>

Other settings are left to the default jBPM settings.

The hibernate.cfg.xml is also slightly modified to use the JTA transaction manager

<!-- JTA transaction properties (begin) ===

==== JTA transaction properties (end) -->

<property name="hibernate.transaction.factory_class">

org.hibernate.transaction.JTATransactionFactory</property>

<property name="hibernate.transaction.manager_lookup_class">

org.hibernate.transaction.JBossTransactionManagerLookup</property>

Hibernate is not used to create the database schema, instead we use our own DatabaseInitiazer mbean, as mentioned in the previous section.

The jbpm.mail.templates.xml is left empty by default. For each more details on each of these configuration files please see the jBPM documentation.

Note that the configuration files that usually ship with the jbpm-console.war have been removed so that all configuration is centralized in the configuration files in the root of the jbpm.esb archive.



Creation and Deployment of a Process Definition

To create a Process Definition we recommend using the eclipse based jBPM Process Designer Plugin [KA-JBPM-GPD]. You can either download and install it to eclipse yourself, or use JBoss Developer Studio. Figure 2 shows the graphical editor.


Figure 2. jBPM Grapical Editor

The graphical editor allows you to create a process definition visually. Nodes and transitions between nodes can be added, modified or removed. The process definition saves as an XML document which can be stored on a file system and deployed to a jBPM instance (database). Each time you deploy the process instance jBPM will version it and will keep the older copies. This allows processes that are in flight to complete using the process instance they were started on. New process instances will use the latest version of the process definition.

To deploy a process definition the server needs to be up and running. Only then can you go to the 'Deployment' tab in the graphical designer to deploy a process archive (par). Figure 3 shows the “Deployment” tab view.



Figure 3. The Deployment View

In some cases it would suffice to deploy just the processdefinition.xml, but in most cases you will be deploying other type of artifacts as well, such as task forms. It is also possible to deploy Java classes in a par, which means that they end up in the database where they will be stored and versioned. However it is strongly discouraged to do this in the ESB environment as you will risk running into class loading issues. Instead we recommend deploying your classes in the lib directory of the server. You can deploy a process definition

Figure 4. Someone with administrative privileges can deploy new process definition.

JBossESB to jBPM

JBossESB can make calls into jBPM using the BpmProcessor action. This action uses the jBPM command API to make calls into jBPM. The following jBPM commands have been implemented:

The configuration for this action in the jboss-esb.xml looks like

<action name="create_new_process_instance"

class="org.jboss.soa.esb.services.jbpm.actions.BpmProcessor">

<property name="command" value="StartProcessInstanceCommand" />

<property name="process-definition-name"

value="processDefinition2"/>

<property name="actor" value="FrankSinatra"/>

<property name="esbToBpmVars">

<!-- esb-name maps to getBody().get("eVar1") -->

<mapping esb="eVar1" bpm="counter" default="45" />

<mapping esb="BODY_CONTENT" bpm="theBody" />

</property>

</action>





There are two required action attributes:

Furthermore one can configure the following configuration properties:

Finally some variables can be set on the body of the EsbMessage:

Exception Handling JBossESB to jBPM

For ESB calls into jBPM an exception of the type JbpmException can be thrown from the jBPM Command API. This exception is not handled by the integration and we let it propagate into the ESB Action Pipeline code. The action pipeline will log the error, send the message to the DeadLetterService (DLS), and send the an error message to the faultTo EPR, if a faultTo EPR is set on the message.



jBPM to JBossESB

The JBossESB to jBPM maybe interesting but the other way around is probably far more interesting jBPM to JBossESB communication provides us with the capability to use jBPM for service orchestration. Service Orchestration itself will be discussed in more detail in the next chapter and here we're focusing on the details of the integration first. The integration implements two jBPM action handler classes. The classes are “EsbActionHandler” and “EsbNotifier”. The EsbActionHandler is a request-reply type action, which drops a message on a Service and then waits for a response while the EsbNotifier only drops a message on a Service and continues its processing. The interaction with JBossESB is asynchronous in nature and does not block the process instance while the Service executes. First we'll discuss the EsbNotifier as it implements a subset of the configuration of EsbActionHandler class.

EsbNotifier

The EsbNotifier action should be attached to an outgoing transition. This way the jBPM processing can move along while the request to the ESB service is processed in the background. In the jBPM processdefinition.xml we would need attach the EsbNotifier to the outgoing transition. For example the configuration for a “Ship It” node could look like:

<node name="ShipIt">

<transition name="ProcessingComplete" to="end">

<action name="ShipItAction" class=

"org.jboss.soa.esb.services.jbpm.actionhandlers.EsbNotifier">

<esbCategoryName>BPM_Orchestration4</esbCategoryName>

<esbServiceName>ShippingService</esbServiceName>

<bpmToEsbVars>

<mapping bpm="entireCustomerAsObject" esb="customer" />

<mapping bpm="entireOrderAsObject" esb="orderHeader" />

<mapping bpm="entireOrderAsXML" esb="entireOrderAsXML" />

</bpmToEsbVars>

</action>

</transition>

</node>

The following attributes can be specified:

The following subelements can be specified:

and one can reference jBPM context variable names directly.

When working on variable mapping configuration it is recommended to turn on debug level logging.



EsbActionHandler

The EsbActionHandler is designed to work as a reply-response type call into JBossESB. The EsbActionHandler should be attached to the node. When this node is entered this action will be called. The EsbActionHandler executes and leaves the node waiting for a transition signal. The signal can come from any other thread of execution, but under normal processing the signal will be send by the JBossESB callback Service. An example configuration for the EsbActionHandler could look like:

<node name="Intake Order">

<action name="esbAction" class=

"org.jboss.soa.esb.services.jbpm.actionhandlers.EsbActionHandler">

<esbCategoryName>BPM_Orchestration4</esbCategoryName>

<esbServiceName>IntakeService</esbServiceName>

<bpmToEsbVars>

<mapping bpm="entireOrderAsXML" esb="BODY_CONTENT" />

</bpmToEsbVars>

<esbToBpmVars>

<mapping esb="body.entireOrderAsXML" bpm="entireOrderAsXML" />

<mapping esb="body.orderHeader" bpm="entireOrderAsObject" />

<mapping esb="body.customer" bpm="entireCustomerAsObject" />

<mapping esb="body.order_orderId" bpm="order_orderid" />

</esbToBpmVars>

</action>

<transition name="" to="Review Order"></transition>

</node>

The configuration for the EsbActionHandler action extends the EsbNotifier configuration. The extensions are the following subelements:

Optionally you may want to specify a timeout value for this action. For this you can use a jBPM native Timer on the node. If for example you only want to wait 10 seconds for the Service to complete you could add

<timer name='timeout' duedate='10 seconds' transition='time-out'/>

to the node element. Now if no signal is received within 10 seconds of entering this node, the transition called “time-out” is taken.



Exception Handling jBPM -> JBossESB


There are two types of scenarios where exceptions can arise.


To illustrate the type of error handling that is now possible using standard jBPM features we will discuss some scenarios illustrated in Figure 5.

Scenario 1. Time-out


When using the EsbActionHandler action and the node is waiting for a callback, it maybe that you want to limit how long you want to wait for. For this scenario you can add a timer to the node. This is how Service1 is setup in Figure 5. The timer can be set to a certain due date. In this case it is set to 10 seconds. The process definition configuration would look like

<node name="Service1">

<action class=

"org.jboss.soa.esb.services.jbpm.actionhandlers.EsbActionHandler">

<esbCategoryName>MockCategory</esbCategoryName>

<esbServiceName>MockService</esbServiceName>

</action>

<timer name='timeout' duedate='10 seconds'

transition='time-out-transition'/>

<transition name="ok" to="Service2"></transition>

<transition name="time-out-transition" to="ExceptionHandling"/>

</node>

Node “Service1” has 2 outgoing transitions. The first one is called “ok” while the second one is called “time-out-transition”. Under normal processing the call back would signal the default transition, which is the “ok” transition since it is defined first. However if the execution of the service takes more then 10 seconds the timer will fire. The transition attribute of the timer is set to “time-out-transition”,so this transition will be taken on time-out. In Figure 5 this means that the processing ends up in the “ExceptionHandling” node in which one can perform compensating work.



Figure 5. Three exception handling scenarios: time-out, exception-transition and exception-decision.

Scenario 2. Exception Transition

To handle exception that may occur during processing of the Service, one can define an exceptionTransition. When doing so the faultTo EPR is set on the message such that the ESB will make a callback to this node, signaling it with the exceptionTransition. Service2 has two outgoing transitions. Transition “ok” will be taken under normal processing, while the “exception” transition will be taken when the Service processing throws an exception. The definition of Service2 looks like

<node name="Service2">

<action class=

"org.jboss.soa.esb.services.jbpm.actionhandlers.EsbActionHandler">

<esbCategoryName>MockCategory</esbCategoryName>

<esbServiceName>MockService</esbServiceName>

<exceptionTransition>exception</exceptionTransition>

</action>

<transition name="ok" to="Service3"></transition>

<transition name="exception" to="ExceptionHandling"/>

</node>

where in the action, the exceptionTransition is set to “exception”. In this scenario the process also ends in the “ExceptionHandling” node.



Scenario 3. Exception Decision

Scenario 3 is illustrated in the configuration of Service3 and the “exceptionDecision” node that follows it. The idea is that processing of Service3 completes normally and the default transition out of node Service3 is taken. However, somewhere during the Service execution an errorCode was set, and the “exceptionDecision” node checks if a variable called “errorCode” was set. The configuration would look like

<node name="Service3">

<action class=

"org.jboss.soa.esb.services.jbpm.actionhandlers.EsbActionHandler">

<esbCategoryName>MockCategory</esbCategoryName>

<esbServiceName>MockService</esbServiceName>

<esbToBpmVars>

<mapping esb="SomeExceptionCode" bpm="errorCode"/>

</esbToBpmVars>

</action>

<transition name="ok" to="exceptionDecision"></transition>

</node>

<decision name="exceptionDecision">

<transition name="ok" to="end"></transition>

<transition name="exceptionCondition" to="ExceptionHandling">

<condition>#{ errorCode!=void }</condition>

</transition>

</decision>

where the esbToBpmVars mapping element extracts the errorCode called “Some-ExceptionCode” from the EsbMessage body and sets in the jBPM context, if this “SomeExceptionCode” is set that is. In the next node “exceptionDecision” the “ok” transition is taken under normal processing, but if a variable called “errorCode” is found in the jBPM context, the “exceptionCondition” transition is taken. This is using the decision node feature of jBPM where transition can nest a condition. Here we check for the existence of the “errorCode” variable using the condition

<condition>#{ errorCode!=void }</condition>

For more details on conditional transitions please see the jBPM documentation [TB-JBPM-USER].

Chapter 11

Service Orchestration

Introduction

Service Orchestration is the arrangement of business processes. Traditionally BPEL is used to execute SOAP based WebServices. In the Guide 'Service Orchestration' you can obtain more details on how to use ActiveBPEL with JBossESB [TF-BPEL]. If you want to orchestrate JBossESB regardless of their end point type, then it makes more sense to use jBPM. This chapter explains how to use the integration discussed earlier to do Service Orchestration using jBPM.

Orchestrating Web Services

JBossESB provides WS-BPEL support via its Web Service components. For details on these components and how to configure and use them, see the Message Action Guide.

JBoss and JBossESB also have a special support agreement with ActiveEndpoints for their award wining ActiveBPEL WS-BPEL Engine. In support of this, JBossESB ships with a Quickstart dedicated to demonstrating how JBossESB and ActiveBPEL can collaborate effectively to provide a WS-BPEL based orchestration layer on top of a set of Services that don't expose Webservice Interfaces (the “webservice_bpel” Quickstart). JBossESB provides the Webservice Integration and ActiveBPEL provides the Process Orchestration. A number of flash based walk-thrus of this Quickstart are also available online.

  1. ActiveEndpoints WS-BPEL engine does not run on versions of JBossAS since 4.0.5. However, it can be deployed and run successfully on Tomcat as our examples illustrate.



Orchestration Diagram

A key component of Service Orchestration is to use a flow-chart like design tool to design and deploy processes. The jBPM IDE can be used for just this. Figure 6 shows an example of such a flow-chart, which represents a simplified order process. This example is taken from the bpm_orchestration4 quick start [JBESB-QS] which ships with JBossESB.


Figure 6. “Order Process” Service Orchestration using jBPM

In the “Order Process” Diagram three of the nodes are JBossESB Services, the “Intake Order”, “Calculate Discount” and the “Ship It” nodes. For these nodes the regular “Node” type was used, which is why these are labeled with “<<Node>>”. Each of these nodes have the EsbActionHandler attached to the node itself. This means that the jBPM node will send a request to the Service and then it will remain in a wait state, waiting for the ESB to call back into the node with the response of the Service. The response of the service can then be used within jBPM context. For example when the Service of the “Intake Order” responds, the response is then used to populate the “Review Order” form. The “Review Order” node is a “Task Node”. Task Nodes are designed for human interaction. In this case someone is required to review the order before the Order Process can process.

To create the diagram in Figure 6, select File > New > Other, and from the Selection wizard select “JBoss jBPM “Process Definition” as shown in Figure 7. The wizard will direct you to save the process definition. From an organizational point of view it is recommended use one directory per process definition, as you will typically end up with multiple files per process design.



Figure 7. Select new JBoss jBPM Process Definition

After creating a new process definition. You can drag and drop any item from menu, shown in Figure 8, into the process design view. You can switch between the design and source modes if needed to check the XML elements that are being added, or to add XML fragments that are needed for the integration. Recently a new type of node was created by Koen Aers called “ESB Service" [KA-BLOG]. Currently this works with the old jBPM integration, from before this document was written. Some small updates will be needed to make it work with the current implementation. So please check Koen's blog for any updates on this.



Figure 8. jBPM IDE menu palette.

Before building the “Order Process” diagram of Figure 6, we'd need to create and test the three Services. These services are 'ordinary' ESB services and are defined in the jboss-esb.xml. Check the jboss-esb.xml of the bpm_orchestration4 quick start [JBESB-QS] if you want details on them, but they only thing of importance to the Service Orchestration are the Services names and categories as shown in the following jboss-esb.xml fragment:

<services>

<service category="BPM_orchestration4_Starter_Service"

name="Starter_Service"

description="BPM Orchestration Sample 4: Use this service to start a process instance">

....

</service>

<service category="BPM_Orchestration4" name="IntakeService"

description="IntakeService: transforms, massages, calculates priority">

....

</service>

<service category="BPM_Orchestration4" name="DiscountService"

description="DiscountService">

</service>

<service category="BPM_Orchestration4" name="ShippingService"

description="ShippingService">

....

</service>


</services>

These Service can be referenced using the EsbActionHandler or EsbNotifier Action Handlers as discussed in Chapter 1. The EsbActionHandler is used when jBPM expects a response, while the EsbNotifier can be used if no response back to jBPM is needed.

Now that the ESB services are known we drag the “Start” state node into the design view. A new process instance will start a process at this node. Next we drag in a “Node” (or “ESB Service “if available). Name this Node “Intake Order”. We can connect the Start and the Intake Order Node by selecting “Transition” from the menu and by subsequently clicking on the Start and Intake Order Node. You should now see an arrow connecting these two nodes, pointing to the Intake Order Node.

Next we need to add the Service and Category names to the Intake Node. Select the “Source” view. The “Intake Order Node should look like

<node name="Intake Order">

<transition name="" to="Review Order"></transition>

</node>

and we add the EsbHandlerAction class reference and the subelement configuration for the Service Category and Name, BPM_Orchestration4 and“IntakeService” respectively

<node name="Intake Order">

<action name="esbAction" class="

org.jboss.soa.esb.services.jbpm.actionhandlers.EsbActionHandler">

<esbCategoryName>BPM_Orchestration4</esbCategoryName>

<esbServiceName>IntakeService</esbServiceName>

<!-- async call of IntakeService -->

</action>

<transition name="" to="Review Order"></transition>

</node>

Next we want to send the some jBPM context variables along with the Service call. In this example we have a variable named “entireOrderAsXML” which we want to set in the default position on the EsbMessage body. For this to happen we add

<bpmToEsbVars>

<mapping bpm="entireOrderAsXML" esb="BODY_CONTENT" /> </bpmToEsbVars>

which will cause the XML content of the variable “entireOrderAsXML” to end up in the body of the EsbMessage, so the IntakeService will have access to it, and the Service can work on it, by letting it flow through each action in the Action Pipeline. When the last action is reached it the replyTo is checked and the EsbMessage is send to the JBpmCallBack Service, which will make a call back into jBPM signaling the “Intake Order” node to transition to the next node (“Review Order”). This time we will want to send some variables from the EsbMessage to jBPM. Note that you can send entire objects as long both contexts can load the object's class. For the mapping back to jBPM we add an “esbToEsbVars” element. Putting it all together we end up with:

<node name="Intake Order">

<action name="esbAction" class=

"org.jboss.soa.esb.services.jbpm.actionhandlers.EsbActionHandler">

<esbCategoryName>BPM_Orchestration4</esbCategoryName>

<esbServiceName>IntakeService</esbServiceName>

<bpmToEsbVars>

<mapping bpm="entireOrderAsXML" esb="BODY_CONTENT" /> </bpmToEsbVars>

<esbToBpmVars>

<mapping esb="body.entireOrderAsXML" bpm="entireOrderAsXML"/>

<mapping esb="body.orderHeader" bpm="entireOrderAsObject" />

<mapping esb="body.customer" bpm="entireCustomerAsObject" /> <mapping esb="body.order_orderId" bpm="order_orderid" />

<mapping esb="body.order_totalAmount" bpm="order_totalamount" /> <mapping esb="body.order_orderPriority" bpm="order_priority" />

<mapping esb="body.customer_firstName" bpm="customer_firstName" />

<mapping esb="body.customer_lastName" bpm="customer_lastName" />

<mapping esb="body.customer_status" bpm="customer_status" />

</esbToBpmVars>

</action>

<transition name="" to="Review Order"></transition>

</node>

So after this Service returns we have the following variables in the jBPM context for this process: entireOrderAsXML, entireOrderAsObject, entireCustomerAsObject, and for demo purposes we also added some flattened variables: order_orderid, order_totalAmount, order_priority, customer_firstName, customer_lastName and customer_status.



Figure 9. The Order process reached the “Review Order” node

In our Order process we require a human to review the order. We therefore add a “Task Node” and add the task “Order Review”, which needs to be performed by someone with actor_id “user”. The XML-fragment looks like

<task-node name="Review Order">

<task name="Order Review">

<assignment actor-id="user"></assignment>

<controller>

<variable name="customer_firstName" access="read,write,required"></variable>

<variable name="customer_lastName" access="read,write,required">

<variable name="customer_status" access="read"></variable>

<variable name="order_totalamount" access="read"></variable>

<variable name="order_priority" access="read"></variable>

<variable name="order_orderid" access="read"></variable>

<variable name="order_discount" access="read"></variable>

<variable name="entireOrderAsXML" access="read"></variable>

</controller>

</task>

<transition name="" to="Calculate Discount"></transition>

</task-node>

In order to display these variables in a form in the jbpm-console we need to create an xhtml dataform (see the Review_Order.xhtml file in the bpm_orchestration4 quick start [JBESB-QS] and tie this for this TaskNode using the forms.xml file:

<forms>

<form task="Order Review" form="Review_Order.xhtml"/>

<form task="Discount Review" form="Review_Order.xhtml"/>

</forms>

Note that in this case the same form is used in two task nodes. The variables are referenced in the Review Order form like

<jbpm:datacell>

<f:facet name="header">

<h:outputText value="customer_firstName"/>

</f:facet>

<h:inputText value="#{var['customer_firstName']}" />

</jbpm:datacell>

which references the variables set in the jBPM context.

When the process reaches the “Review Node”, as shown in Figure 9. When the 'user' user logs into the jbpm-console the user can click on 'Tasks” to see a list of tasks, as shown in Figure 10. The user can 'examine' the task by clicking on it and the user will be presented with a form as shown in Figure 11. The user can update some of the values and click “Save and Close” to let the process move to the next Node.



Figure 10. The task list for user 'user'


Figure 11. The “Order Review” form.

The next node is the “Calculate Discount” node. This is an ESB Service node again and the configuration looks like

<node name="Calculate Discount">

<action name="esbAction" class="

org.jboss.soa.esb.services.jbpm.actionhandlers.EsbActionHandler">

<esbCategoryName>BPM_Orchestration4</esbCategoryName>

<esbServiceName>DiscountService</esbServiceName>

<bpmToEsbVars>

<mapping bpm="entireCustomerAsObject" esb="customer" />

<mapping bpm="entireOrderAsObject" esb="orderHeader" />

<mapping bpm="entireOrderAsXML" esb="BODY_CONTENT" />

</bpmToEsbVars>

<esbToBpmVars>

<mapping esb="order"

bpm="entireOrderAsObject" />

<mapping esb="body.order_orderDiscount" bpm="order_discount" />

</esbToBpmVars>

</action>

<transition name="" to="Review Discount"></transition>

</node>

The Service receives the customer and orderHeader objects as well as the entireOrderAsXML, and computes a discount. The response maps the body.order_orderDiscount value onto a jBPM context variable called “order_-discount”, and the process is signaled to move to the “Review Discount” task node.



Figure 12. The Discount Review form

The user is asked to review the discount, which is set to 8.5. On “Save and Close” the process moves to the “Ship It” node, which again is an ESB Service. If you don't want the Order process to wait for the Ship It Service to be finished you can use the EsbNotifier action handler and attach it to the outgoing transition:

<node name="ShipIt">

<transition name="ProcessingComplete" to="end">

<action name="ShipItAction" class=

"org.jboss.soa.esb.services.jbpm.actionhandlers.EsbNotifier">

<esbCategoryName>BPM_Orchestration4</esbCategoryName>

<esbServiceName>ShippingService</esbServiceName>

<bpmToEsbVars>

<mapping bpm="entireCustomerAsObject" esb="customer" />

<mapping bpm="entireOrderAsObject" esb="orderHeader" />

<mapping bpm="entireOrderAsXML" esb="entireOrderAsXML" />

</bpmToEsbVars>

</action>

</transition>

</node>

After notifying the ShippingService the Order process moves to the 'end' state and terminates. The ShippingService itself may still be finishing up. In bpm_orchestration4 [JBESB-QS] it uses drools to determine whether this order should be shipped 'normal' or 'express'.



Process Deployment and Instantiation

In the previous paragraph we create the process definition and we quietly assumed we had an instance of it to explain the process flow. But now that we have created the processdefinition.xml, we can deploy it to jBPM using the IDE, ant or the jbpm-console (as explained in Chapter 1). In this example we use the IDE and deployed the files: Review_Order.xhtml, forms.xml, gpd.xml, processdefinition.xml and the processimage.jpg. On deployment the IDE creates a par achive and deploys this to the jBPM database. We do not recommend deploying Java code in par archives as it may cause class loading issues. Instead we recommend deploying classes in jar or esb archives.



Figure 13. Deployment of the “Order Process”

When the process definition is deployed a new process instance can be created. It is interesting to note that we can use the 'StartProcessInstanceCommand” which allows us to create a process instance with some initial values already set. Take a look at

<service category="BPM_orchestration4_Starter_Service"

name="Starter_Service"

description="BPM Orchestration Sample 4: Use this service to start a process instance">

<listeners>

....

</listeners>

<actions>

<action name="setup_key" class=

"org.jboss.soa.esb.actions.scripting.GroovyActionProcessor">

<property name="script"

value="/scripts/setup_key.groovy" />

</action>

<action name="start_a_new_order_process" class=

"org.jboss.soa.esb.services.jbpm.actions.BpmProcessor">

<property name="command"

value="StartProcessInstanceCommand" />

<property name="process-definition-name"

value="bpm4_ESBOrderProcess" />

<property name="key" value="body.businessKey" />

<property name="esbToBpmVars">

<mapping esb="BODY_CONTENT" bpm="entireOrderAsXML" />

</property>

</action>

</actions>

</service>

where new process instance is invoked and using some groovy script, and the jBPM key is set to the value of 'OrderId' from an incoming order XML, and the same XML is subsequently put in jBPM context using the esbToBpmVars mapping. In the bpm_orchestration4 quickstart [JBESB-QS] the XML came from the Seam DVD Store and the “SampleOrder.xml” looks like

<Order orderId="2" orderDate="Wed Nov 15 13:45:28 EST 2006" statusCode="0" netAmount="59.97" totalAmount="64.92" tax="4.95">

<Customer userName="user1" firstName="Rex" lastName="Myers" state="SD"/>

<OrderLines>

<OrderLine position="1" quantity="1">

<Product productId="364" title="Superman Returns"

price="29.98"/>

</OrderLine>

<OrderLine position="2" quantity="1">

<Product productId="299" title="Pulp Fiction" price="29.99"/>

</OrderLine>

</OrderLines>

</Order>


Note that both ESB as well as jBPM deployments are hot. An extra feature of jBPM is that process deployments are versioned. Newly created process instances will use the latest version while existing process instances will finish using the process deployment on which they where started.



Conclusion

We have demonstrated how jBPM can be used to orchestrate Services as well as do Human Task Management. Note that you are free to use any jBPM feature. For instance look at the quick start bpm_orchestration2 [JBESB-QS] how to use the jBPM fork and join concepts.

Chapter 12

The Message Store

Introduction

The message store mechanism in JBossESB is designed with audit tracking purposes in mind. As with other ESB services, it is a pluggable service, which allows for you, the developer to plug in your own persistence mechanism should you have special needs. The implementation supplied with JBossESB is a database persistence mechanism. If you require say, a file persistence mechanism, then it’s just a matter of you writing your own service to do this, and override the default behaviour with a configuration change.



One thing to point out with the Message Store – this is a base implementation. We will be working with the community and partners to drive the feature functionality set of the message store to support advanced audit and management requirements. This is meant to be a starting point.



  1. In JBossESB 4.2 the Message Store is also used for storing messages that need to be redelivered in the event of failures. See the Programmers Guide around the ServiceInvoker for further details.

Message Store interface

The org.jboss.soa.esb.services.persistence.MessageStore interface is defined as follows:



public interface MessageStore

{

public MessageURIGenerator getMessageURIGenerator();

public URI addMessage (Message message, String classification) throws MessageStoreException;

public Message getMessage (URI uid) throws MessageStoreException;

public void setUndelivered(URI uid) throws MessageStoreException;

public void setDelivered(URI uid) throws MessageStoreException;

public Map<URI, Message> getUndeliveredMessages(String classification) throws MessageStoreException;

public Map<URI, Message> getAllMessages(String classification) throws MessageStoreException;

public Message getMessage (URI uid, String classification) throws MessageStoreException;

public int removeMessage (URI uid, String classification) throws MessageStoreException;

}

The MessageStore is responsible for reading and writing Messages upon request. Each Message must be uniquely identified within the context of the store and each MessageStore implementation uses a URI to accomplish this identification. This URI is used as the “key” for that message in the database.



  1. MessageStore implementations may use different formats for their URIs.

Messages can be stored within the store based upon classification using addMessage. If the classification is not defined then it is up to the implementation of the MessageStore how it will store the Message. Furthermore, the classification is only a hint: implementations are free to ignore this field if necessary.

  1. It is implementation dependent as to whether or not the MessageStore imposes any kind of concurrency control on individual Messages. As such, you should use the removeMessage operation with care.

Because the current MessageStore interface is designed to support both audit trail and redelivery scenarios, you should not use the setUndelivered/setDelivered and associated operations unless they are applicable!

The default implementation of the MessageStore is provided by the org.jboss.internal.soa.esb.persistence.format.db.DBMessageStoreImpl class. The methods in this implementation make the required DB connections (using a pooled Database Manager DBConnectionManager).



To override the MessageStore implementation you should look at the MessageActionGuide and the MessagePersister Action.

Transactions

The Message Store interface does not currently support transactions. As such, any use of the store within the scope of a global transaction will not be coordinated within the scope of any global transaction, i.e., each message store update or read will be done as a separate, independent, transaction. Future versions of the Message Store will provide for control over whether or not specific interactions should be conducted within the scope of any enclosing transactional context.

Configuring the Message Store

To configure your Message Store, you can change and override the default service implementation through the following settings found in the jbossesb-properties.xml:



<properties name="dbstore">

<!-- connection manager type -->

<property name="org.jboss.soa.esb.persistence.db.conn.manager" value="org.jboss.internal.soa.esb.persistence.manager.StandaloneConnectionManager"/>

<!-- property name="org.jboss.soa.esb.persistence.db.conn.manager" value="org.jboss.internal.soa.esb.persistence.manager.J2eeConnectionManager"/ -->

<!-- this property is only used if using the j2ee connection manager -->

<property name="org.jboss.soa.esb.persistence.db.datasource.name" value="java:/JBossesbDS"/>

<!-- standalone connection pooling settings -->

<!-- mysql

<property name="org.jboss.soa.esb.persistence.db.connection.url" value="jdbc:mysql://localhost/jbossesb"/>

<property name="org.jboss.soa.esb.persistence.db.jdbc.driver" value="com.mysql.jdbc.Driver"/>

<property name="org.jboss.soa.esb.persistence.db.user" value="kstam"/>

-->

<!-- postgres

<property name="org.jboss.soa.esb.persistence.db.connection.url" value="jdbc:postgresql://localhost/jbossesb"/>

<property name="org.jboss.soa.esb.persistence.db.jdbc.driver" value="org.postgresql.Driver"/>

<property name="org.jboss.soa.esb.persistence.db.user" value="postgres"/>

<property name="org.jboss.soa.esb.persistence.db.pwd" value="postgres"/>

-->

<!-- hsqldb -->

<property name="org.jboss.soa.esb.persistence.db.connection.url" value="jdbc:hsqldb:hsql://localhost:9001/jbossesb"/>

<property name="org.jboss.soa.esb.persistence.db.jdbc.driver" value="org.hsqldb.jdbcDriver"/>

<property name="org.jboss.soa.esb.persistence.db.user" value="sa"/>

<property name="org.jboss.soa.esb.persistence.db.pwd" value=""/>

<property name="org.jboss.soa.esb.persistence.db.pool.initial.size" value="2"/>

<property name="org.jboss.soa.esb.persistence.db.pool.min.size" value="2"/>

<property name="org.jboss.soa.esb.persistence.db.pool.max.size" value="5"/>

<!--table managed by pool to test for valid connections - created by pool automatically -->

<property name="org.jboss.soa.esb.persistence.db.pool.test.table" value="pooltest"/>

<property name="org.jboss.soa.esb.persistence.db.pool.timeout.millis" value="5000"/>

</properties>

The section in the property file called “dbstore” has all the settings required by the database implementation of the message store. The standard settings, like URL, db user, password, pool sizes can all be modified here.



The scripts for the required database schema, are again, very simple. They can be found under lib/jbossesb.esb/message-store-sql/<db_type>/create_database.sql of your JBossESB installation. 

The structure of the table can be seen from the sample SQL:



CREATE TABLE message

(

uuid varchar(128) NOT NULL,

type varchar(128) NOT NULL,

message text(4000) NOT NULL,

delivered varchar(10) NOT NULL,

classification varchar(10),

PRIMARY KEY (`uuid`)

);

the uuid column is used to store a unique key for this message, in the format of a standard URI. A key for a message would look like:


urn:jboss:esb:message:UID: + UUID.randomUUID()


This logic uses the new UUID random number generator in jdk 1.5.

the type will be the type of the stored message. JBossESB ships with JBOSS_XML and JAVA_SERIALIZED currently.



The “message” column will contain the actual message content.

The supplied database message store implementation works by invoking a connection manager to your configured database. Supplied with Jboss ESB is a standalone connection manager, and another for using a JNDI datasource.

To configure the database connection manager, you need to provide the connection manager implementation in the jbossesb-properties.xml. The properties that you would need to change are:

<!-- connection manager type -->
<property name="org.jboss.soa.esb.persistence.db.conn.manager" value="org.jboss.internal.soa.esb.persistence.format.db.StandaloneConnectionManager"/>
<!-- property name="org.jboss.soa.esb.persistence.db.conn.manager" value="org.jboss.soa.esb.persistence.manager.J2eeConnectionManager"/ -->
<!-- this property is only used if using the j2ee connection manager -->
<property name="org.jboss.soa.esb.persistence.db.datasource.name" value="java:/JBossesbDS"/>

The two supplied connection managers for managing the database pool are

org.jboss.soa.esb.persistence.manager.J2eeConnectionManager org.jboss.soa.esb.persistence.manager.StandaloneConnectionManager

The Standalone manager uses C3PO to manage the connection pooling logic, and the J2eeConnectionManager uses a datasource to manage it's connection pool. This is intended for use when deploying your ESB endpoints inside a container such as Jboss AS or Tomcat, etc. You can plug in your own connection pool manager by implementing the interface:

org.jboss.internal.soa.esb.persistence.manager.ConnectionManager

Once you have implemented this interface, you update the properties file with your new class, and the connection manager factory will now use your implementation.
























References




    [JBESB-QS], JBossESB QuickStarts, http://anonsvn.jboss.org/repos/labs/labs/jbossesb/tags/JBESB_4_4_GA/product/samples/quickstarts

    [KA-BLOG] ESB Service Node, Koen Aers,

    http://koentsje.blogspot.com/2008/01/esb-service-node-in-jbpm-jpdl-gpd-312.html

    [KA-JBPM-GPD], JBoss jBPM Graphical Process Designer, Koen Aers,

    http://docs.jboss.com/jbpm/v3/gpd/

    [TB-JBPM-USER] jBPM User Documentation, Tom Baaijens

    http://docs.jboss.com/jbpm/v3/userguide/

    [TF-BPEL], Service Orchestration using ActiveBPEL, Tom Fennely,

    http://anonsvn.jboss.org/repos/labs/labs/jbossesb/tags/JBESB_4_4_GA/product/docs/ServicesGuide.pdf



Index

ActiveBPEL 56

actor 48

BpmProcessor 47

bpmToEsbVars 50

CancelProcessInstanceCommand 47

conditional transitions 55

create a Process Definition 43

database 39

DatabaseInitializer 40

deploy a process definition 46

Deployment of a Process Definition 43

design tool 56

EsbActionHandler 49, 51

esbCategoryName 50

EsbNotifier 49

esbServiceName 50

esbToBpmVars 48, 51

Exception Decision 54

Exception Handling 49, 52

Exception Transition 54

exceptionTransition 51

flow-chart 56

globalProcessScope 50

hibernate.cfg.xml 43

Human Task Management 39

JBoss Developer Studio 43

jboss-esb.xml 47

jBPM configuration 43

jBPM console 40

jbpm-ds.xml 40

jbpm.cfg.xml 43

jbpm.esb 39

jbpm.mail.templates.xml 43

jBPMCallbackBus 42

JBpmCallbackService 42

JbpmDS datasource 40

jbpmProcessInstId 49

JTA transacion manager 43

key 48

mapping 48

NewProcessInstanceCommand 47

Orchestration Diagram 56

Process Designer Plugin 43

process-definition-id 48

process-scope 50

processdefinition 48

processdefinition.xml 45, 49

replyTo 60

security settings 42

Service Orchestration 39, 56

StartProcessInstanceCommand 47

Time-out 52

timeout 51

Timer 51

transition-name 48

WebServices 56



1Note that some of the ESB Quickstarts are still using the older “SmooksTransformer” action class. The SmooksAction is a more flexible and easier to use alternative to the SmooksTransformer. The SmooksTransformer will be deprecated in a future release (and removed later again).

JBESB-SG-8/6/08