Overview of SeeBeyond for the BizTalk professional

The SeeBeyond e*Gate integrator is the core of the platform. The e*Gate Integrator enables the flow of information by providing connectivity to applications and datastores across a network. You can loosely think of them as a BizTalk 2006 Application than encompasses all the different artifacts. e*Gate is based on a distributed architecture with an open design that deploys load balancing options. e*Gate processes events according to user-defined business logic and integrates business processes between applications, ensuring end-to-end data flow into back-office systems.

The record structures of messages (called Events in SeeBeyond) that are transferred to and fro are called an "Object Type Definition" (OTD). OTDs are created from source types and can represent any record type, e.g. XML, BAPI, Flat File, Relational row, WSDL, etc. You can think of them as the canonical type definition used by the platform - or schemas in the BizTalk World. The OTD is a Java class. It does all the marshalling/unmarshalling to these various formats.

e*Way are key components of an e*Gate and provide application connectivity and data processing such as business collaborations, transformation logic, and publish/subscribe. They comprise of an executable and a configuration file. You can think of e*Ways as a combination of adapters and ports and their binding information. e*Way connections are analogous to BizTalk ports.

e*Ways have “External Slice” components which is analogous to the communications adapter and the “Work Slice” which can be thought of as an application adapter and some business logic.

Both BizTalk and SeeBeyond support wide accepted standards like XML, XSD, WDSL, SOAP, BPEL4WS and are geared towards messaging and loosely coupled integration. While the integration goals are the same, SeeBeyond has taken a different architectural approach than BizTalk. For example, SeeBeyond does not have a central MessageBox where all messages are delivered and which acts as the subscription engine (although it does have smaller and more numerous Intelligent Queues). SeeBeyond does not insist on XML conversion of Flat File messages (through a pre-processing disassembler).

SeeBeyond eBusiness Integration Suite

The SeeBeyond eBusiness Integration Suite includes the following components and sub-components:

· e*Gate Integrator:

· e*Way Intelligent Adapters

· IQ Intelligent Queues

· Business Object Brokers (BOBs)

· e*Insight Business Process Manager

· e*Xchange Partner Manager

· eSecurity Manager

· e*Index Global Identifier

A one to one comparison of artifacts will probably of much greater help:

Technical Parallels between SeeBeyond and Biztalk

Having discussed migration approaches, we want to highlight another challenge/dilemma that can come in the way of getting a quick start on the migration effort. The challenge is ability of a BizTalk trained team to be able to quickly understand the parallels between SeeBeyond and BizTalk.

Given this challenge and dilemma, we decided to dedicate a section to discussing these parallels and draw some analogies between the concepts, features, technologies and artifacts of the BizTalk and SeeBeyond platforms.

The best way to learn is by example. For the BizTalk architect or developer attempting a migration project - the first look into the SeeBeyond world is confusing and ambiguous – because the familiar concepts and artifacts they are familiar with in BizTalk are missing or fused with another feature. For some there are simply no parallels at all. There is little or no documentation available in this area on the internet and one has to rely on assistance from experts.

Please note that many parallels are mostly loose analogies to help the BizTalk developer gain a newcomer’s familiarity with SeeBeyond. Since the architecture of both platforms is different, drawing parallels between both is a hazardous task, fraught with shoe-horning and over-simplification. We have attempted it nevertheless - on the grounds of giving the migration team a first look / toehold into the world of SeeBeyond and dispel some of the fog surrounding it. Caution is advised against literal interpretation of these parallels – and no technical implementation based on it is recommended. A deeper and more thorough understanding of SeeBeyond Technical Architecture and concepts is advised before the migration project is undertaken.

In order to do the parallels justice, it is perhaps advisable to discuss what are the key components that make up the SeeBeyond suite and how they tie together