Overview

This section provides an overview of the BPEL Console. The console provides the ability to view:

• The process definitions deployed to the BPEL engine

• The process instances executing in the BPEL engine

• The execution history of a process

• The history instances query

Installation

The easiest way to install the BPEL console is to download the SwitchYard installer and then run :

ant install-bpel-console

You will then be prompted for the location of your EAP installation, and the Installer will place the necessary WAR files in EAP.HOME/standalone/deployments.  

Alternatively, you can just simply copy the switchyard-bpel-console.war folder and switchyard-bpel-console-server.war from the Tools distribution into the EAP_HOME/standalone/deployments folder. Remember that you will need to add a marker file named "switchyard-bpel-console.war.dodeploy" in the deployments folder as well to trigger the deployment.

Logging in

The BPEL console can be located using the URL: http://localhost:8080/bpel-console.

The first screen that is presented is the login screen:

The default username is admin with password admin.

The Access Control mechanism used by the admin console is configured in the $deployFolder/bpel-console/bpel-identity.sar/META-INF/jboss-service.xml. The JAAS login module is initially set to use a property file based access mechanism, but can be replaced to use any appropriate alternative implementation.

The users for the default mechanism are configured in the property file $deployFolder/bpel-console/bpel-identity.sar/bpel-users.properties. The entries in this file represent username=password.

The user roles for the default mechanism are configured in the property file $deployFolder/bpel-console/bpel-identity.sar/bpel-roles.properties. The entries in this file represent username=role. The only role of interest currently is administrator.

Deployed Process Definitions

Once logged in, the 'Manage Instances' tab shows the currently deployed BPEL processes and their versions.

Process Instances

When a process definition is selected (Open), the list of active process instances for that process definition (and version) will be displayed in the bottom panel.

Process Versions

There is only one active version at a time. If you open a process definition the active version will be chosen by default. Sometimes you need to manage instances of a retired version (i.e. to terminate running instances). In that case the button More - Change Version allows you to select a different version of that process.

Execution History

The Execution History allows you to inspect the BPAF history data associated with a process. You can specify a timespan and whether or not you'd like to see failed/terminated instances included in the chart.

The chart has various keyboard bindings to browse through the displayed execution data:

<deploy xmlns="http://www.apache.org/ode/schemas/dd/2007/03"
	xmlns:bpl="http://www.jboss.org/bpel/examples"
	xmlns:intf="http://www.jboss.org/bpel/examples/wsdl">

	<process name="bpl:HelloGoodbye">
		<active>true</active>
        <process-events generate="all"/>
		<provide partnerLink="helloGoodbyePartnerLink">
			<service name="intf:HelloGoodbyeService" port="HelloGoodbyePort"/>
		</provide>
	</process>
</deploy> 

Instance Data and Execution Path

When a process instance is selected, its details will be displayed in the Execution Details panel. The Instance Data button will also become enabled, allowing further detail about the process to be displayed. Likewise the Execution Path button opens the related instance execution graph.

The View tab shows the instance execution graph, while the Source tab below shows all activity events

History Instance Query

Once a process instance is finished, could be 'COMPLETED', 'FAILD' or 'TERMINATED', you could search it through the History Query tab window as following:

You need to choose the Process Definition and the Process Status from the list box. You could also input the correlation key, start time and end time as criteria to search the history instances. Below is the search result.

On the History Instances List, when you double click a specific row, it will pop up a window that shows all of execution events that happened during this process instance execution.

Retiring and Reactivating Process Definitions

When a process definition is initially deployed (i.e. the first version of the process), it automatically becomes the active process definition. If that BPEL process definition is subsequently change and redeployed, then the previous version is retired, and the new version becomes the active version.

The only difference between an active and retired process definition is that a retired process definition can no longer create new process instances. However if there are current process instances associated with the retired process definition version, then these will continue to execute.

On some occasions, the administrator may wish to change which version of a process definition is considered the <emphasis>active</emphasis> version. Or they may simply want to retire the currently active process definition, so that no more process instances can be created, only allowing the already running process instances to continue until completed.

To change the status of a process definition, the administrator should select the Runtime tab from the lefthand panel, and then select the Deployments option. This will show the process definitions, their versions and their current status (active or retired).