BizTalk Server Interview Preparation Guide

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Biz Talk is a Business Process Management server from Microsoft. It is a message based integration tool. Biz Talk enables large enterprises to automate and integrate the business processes. This process is done by using adapters those are tailored for communicating among various software systems in an enterprise. It provides functions like Business Process Modeling, Business-to-Business communication, Message broker, EAI, Process automation. Biz Talk enables enterprises for integrating and managing business processes by exchanging various documents such as PO (Purchase Order), Invoices within and across boundaries of enterprises. MS Visual Studio supports development for Biz Talk server.

☆ Receive Port:
Listens for messages.
☆ Adapters:
Information interchange with external systems
☆ Pipeline, dis-assembler and sub-components:
Normalizing the schema's (wire message in its native format) of the internal messages using XML as the common language.
☆ Message-box:
Internal XML messages are published here and then are further consumed by Subscribers.
☆ Subscribers (Send Port and Orchestration components):
Subscribe to internal messages per metadata or message context properties.
☆ Biz-talk Orchestration Engine:
Processing the internal messages, re-publishing them to Message-box to be consumed by other subscribers.
☆ Send Port:
Consumes the internal XML messages, converts them to a wire messages through the associated pipeline and sub-component Assembler.
☆ Adapter:
Conveys the wire message to the target system.

Sending messages from one orchestration to another is done by using Direct Binding technique. It is also being used for sending messages directly into the message box. It is used in publish and subscribe system in BizTalk for sending messages among orchestrations.

A pipe line is used to write Distinguished Fields in the message context when a message is received on a port. Dis-assembler pipeline component such as XML and flat file disassemble does the job of writing the message context by the pipeline. In addition to it, custom pipeline component could also be performing it.

1) By using content based routing, files can be transferred.
2) By creating receive port and send port. If send port is configuring, provide the condition as BTS.
3) Receiveportname= <receive_portname created>

Information worker can set parameters for an orchestration that implements a business process, which a business analyst may not be able to create.
Developer creating an orchestration can define parameters for an orchestration to enable information workers configure it. An information worker sets those parameters using the TPM service by specifying their values in the partner's agreement.

Information workers Manage trading partner relationships within organizations. Business Activity Services include a Trading Partner Management (TPM) component to allow them do those. TPM database stores information about trading relationships. Information workers can create and modify agreements with trading partners who use BizTalk Server.

BizTalk is a product while Web Services are a standard.
BizTalk Server is a Microsoft product whereas Web Services have been developed by many organizations including Microsoft, IBM, etc.
BizTalk Server application has been built to enable the internal business processes of organizations, operate with ease. Web Services are small applications published using UDDI to enable all the people find them.
Web services are that they are platform neutral. BizTalk can leverage Web services.

Message routing is a method of passing through BizTalk without being processed.
Content routing is a method of passing of the message which is based on certain field value of the schema.

Content-based routing provides flexibility for users who want to route messages based on envelope properties or on receive port configuration properties. Routing can be performed based on information contained in the envelope of the document or even configuration information from the receive location.
A BizTalk Server business process involves receiving, processing, and sending messages. Some messages do not require intensive processing in an orchestration. They can benefit from a simpler and more efficient solution called Content-based routing.

BizTalk server detects the potential for certain race conditions, which are ensured that all correlated messages are received by the same orchestration instance. The potentiality of these race conditions is detected by BizTalk server. These messages are treated as a 'convoy'. A convoy set is a group of correlation sets. All such subsequent messages which match the general subscription are evaluated against the convoy set, and the matched convoys are routed to an existing port.

Rules engine is provided as component of a business rules management system, which provides the abilities such as define, register, classify and manage all rules, verifies consistency of rules definitions, defining relationships among rules and relates them to IT applications which are effected by one or more rules.

Following is the list of events (Persistence Points) that call the persistence operation:
☆ Orchestration Instance is suspended or finished
☆ System shutdowns in a controlled manner
☆ Engine determines it wants to dehydrate
☆ Atomic or long running transactional scope ends
☆ At debugging breakpoints
☆ Execution of other orchestrations through the Start Orchestration shape
☆ At the Send shape (but not atomic)

The process of saving your running orchestration state at certain point is called persistence.
Orchestration engine persist a running instance which is based on the design of orchestration.
There are few events or stages, which triggers the persistence operation called persistence points.

A rules engine is a software system, which is used for executing one or more business rules in a dynamic production environment. The rules might be from legal regulation, company policies or any other resources.

The promotion of Prompted Fields/Properties is done in the message context by a pipeline called receive pipeline at the time when a message is received on a port. This task is performed by dis-assembler pipeline component (XML or a flat file dis-assembler). In addition to it, custom pipeline component could also be performing it.

Purpose of deriving up-to-date metrics and key performance indicators from the BAM databases, Business Integration tools are used. The forecasting of process trends by uses and monitoring processes in real time scenarios is done by using BI tools. Users get alerts for situations which need their intervention for preventing undesirable outcome for encouraging beneficial results, a mechanism is provided by BAM.

Business data and process milestones are captured by Business Activity Monitoring(BAM), which is a module in BizTalk . Business decisions makers are allowed by BAM for gaining insight for their in-flight process.

☆ Right-click Messages in the Orchestration View tab to create a new message, you have four choices for the Message Type property.
☆ Expand Multi-part Message Types and then choose Create New Multi-part Message Type.
☆ Name your multi-part message type then expand it so you can see its Message-part_1 member (Biz-talk suggested name)
☆ Set the Message Body Part property to True so that it acts just like a regular message.

☆ Before jumping in to do as the error message suggests, let's think for a moment about what that entails.
☆ Inspect every Receive and Send shape to determine if it uses a Message variable that's associated with the schema you want to change.
☆ Its not a good practice to create a single orchestration with so many Receive/Send shapes.
☆ Delete Port connections, once you find all the Receive/Send shapes.
☆ Change the Message variable so that the Message Type property is set to the new schema and then re-associate the Message variable with each Receive/Send shape.
☆ Find all the Port Types that are associated with the Ports you disconnected from Receive/Send shapes and reset their Operation's Message Type properties.
☆ Use a Multi-Part Message Type to wrap the underlying schema. It's flexible and saves time in the long run.

Messages in BizTalk are data, and each message must be of a selected message type. E-mail, Documents, Info-path forms, large binary files, SQL records, flat files, and anything XML can be processed as messages. BizTalk is all about messages and message-oriented programming. The most common message type in Biz-talk is a schema.

BizTalk enables companies to integrate and manage business processes by exchanging business documents between business applications within or across organizational boundaries.

BizTalk Server 2000 is based on the BizTalk Framework. It provides the infrastructure and tools to enable B2B eCommerce and process integration.

BizTalk provides costs savings when used in internal IT projects and can be used in externally focused solutions too.

The BizTalk Framework is an open framework for B2B exchange, It is implemented across all major platforms and most major B2B products.