With "Dublin" on the horizon as the future distributed application server role for Windows, does it make sense for Microsoft to call this new role "Windows BizTalk Services"?  This would in many ways mimic the Windows SharePoint Services/Microsoft Office SharePoint Server paradigm.  The only problem in the short term is that BizTalk Server 2009 has just been released and looks nothing like Dublin.

The ideal set of products would first include Windows BizTalk Services, which includes all of the lightweight building blocks for creating basic distributed applications.  It could even provide some level of message and workflow persistence with SQL Server 2008 Express Edition.  The second product would be the premium BizTalk Server, which takes the "WBS" foundation and provides many Enterprise capabilities on top of it.  But, and this is a HUGE but, the premium server would have to build on top of WBS.  They can't just take the existing version and claim that it's the premium version of Dublin.  There has to be real symmetry between the two versions and a way to migrate from the basic services to the premium services.

Is this just a dream of mine or could MS actually do it???

Over the last six months, my Chief Architect Jesus Rodriguez and myself spent our spare time writing a  new whitepaper that focuses on the more advanced  aspects of BizTalk's Business Activity Monitoring.  The end result is over 80 pages of exciting details all about BAM!  This paper is available for download and online in the MSDN Library.

The paper goes beyond the basic of BAM and explores its architecture and extensibility model. It also details the intricacies of the WCF, WF and BizTalk Server BAM infrastructures and programming models. Additionally, we've dedicated an entire section to the Business Intelligence (BI) aspects of BAM and its integration with technologies such as SharePoint Server, PerformancePoint Server, Analysis Services and Reporting Services. Finally, we explore some techniques for building a BAM RESTful API using WCF 3.5 and the Atom Publishing Protocol to expose some of the BAM capabilities as resources accessible through a simple HTTP/Atom interface. I credit Jesus and Jon Flanders for this idea.

Finally, a big thank-you to Ofer Askhenazi whose support and patience made this paper possible.  We'd also like to thank our technical reviewers Marcel Fernee, Stephen Kaufman, Jonathan Moons, Allan Naim, Paolo Salvatori, Mr. BAM Andy Shen and Brian Loesgen, and of course Tellago's very own - Elizabeth Redding.

Jesus and I also developed a series of hands-on-labs based on the examples in this whitepaper.  Stay tuned for more information on when and where you can access them!

OK, so I haven't been the best blogger.  You know how it goes - you start working on a project and it consumes all your time.  Then you start on another project, then another, and so on.  The good news is that I was doing some very interesting work and have lots to share here.  To give you an idea of what's to come, here are some of the topics I've been working on:

• BizTalk, MOSS, WCF, and WF - all together in a series of Hands-on-Labs soon to be available from Microsoft
• BAM For Developers - a series of hands on labs covering BizTalk's Business Activity Monitoring, from defining activity models and capturing data with BizTalk, WCF, and WF, to accessing and analyzing the data with a host of products like SQL Server Reporting Services, PerformancePoint, and MOSS.  Finally, there is a lab on building a RESTful API that exposes some of the BAM capabilities as resources accessible through a simple HTTP/Atom interface.  These labs will also soon be available from Microsoft.  These labs were based on the new whitepaper - BAM for Developers.  See my post regarding it's availability!
• BizTalk Adapter Pack and the WCF LOB Adapter SDK - I've been building a comprehensive LOB demo for my old team.  It utilizes the SAP and new Oracle e-Business Suite adapter, demonstrating the use of these adapters in several different scenarios.

Those first two Hands-on-Lab series are also making an appearance as instructor-led-labs in Microsoft's TechReady this February.  Hopefully they'll make it to TechEd later this year!

Anyways, hopefully I will keep-up with this blog and share those interesting, undocumented, frustrating nuggets of information one runs across when trying to make all these different Microsoft technologies work together.

Happy New Year!

On Wednesday, July 23rd, we (Tellago) will be hosting a briefng on Service Oriented Architecture at the Microsoft offices in Downers Grove, IL.  At this briefing I will discuss the challenges surrounding SOA adoption, reducing the complexity of SOA deployments, and how SOA can transform the productivity of your business.  We will also discuss where Microsoft products fit within a SOA implementation.  If you're in or around Chicago, you should check out this event!  For more details - https://www.clicktoattend.com/invitation.aspx?code=129830.

Tomorrow morning I will be presenting an MSDN Webcast titled "Bringing Enterprise Data to Life with SharePoint Server and Windows Communication Foundation."  The focus of this Webcast will be utilizing WCF-based application adapters from within Microsoft Office SharePoint Server (MOSS).  However, these concepts are not isolated to WCF-based adapters; they can be applied to any WCF binding.  I will show a great set of demos that explore WCF integration with the Business Data Catalog, custom Web Parts, and SharePoint Workflows.

Update - you can view a replay of the Webcast here:  https://www.livemeeting.com/cc/mseventsbmo/view?id=1032381674&role=attend&pw=490ED6C8.

We're less than a week away from TechEd US, and I finally have a blog up!  This year TechEd will be very exciting for me - my first ever event speaking as a non-Microsoftie.  This is a big change for me...  I have to get accustomed to referring to Microsoft as "they" instead of "we".

Even while working on the outside they seem to give me a ton of stuff to do - I have one breakout session and two TLCs:

Tuesday, June 3rd, @ 10:30AM - SOA03-TLC - Read World Business Activity Monitoring

This is not your ordinary BAM session!  We (Jesus Rodriguez and I) will be showing some cool demos on how to use BAM, which include some of the little-to-non-documented aspects of BAM.  The demos will show the combination of BAM and other technologies such as MOSS, WCF, SQL Server Analysis Services, etc.  Jesus is very excited about these demos, which says a lot!

Wednesday, June 4th @ 8:30AM - SOA09-TLC - Building Line-of-Business Adapters based on WCF

This was a last minute addition to my schedule, but why not?  I've spent a little time building an adapter to J.D. Edwards EnterpriseOne using the WCF LOB Adapter SDK.  I plan to walk you through the steps I took while building this adapter and show you some of the working code (within reason, of course )

Wednesday, June 4th @ 4:30PM - SOA304 - Integrating Business Applications with Windows Communication Foundation

This topic is my bread-and-butter - Integration to LOBs.  In the past my sessions have focused on BizTalk Adapters.  Not this year!  This breakout will focus on the WCF developer and how they can integrate to business applications.  We will discuss the challenges of application integration and how WCF can be used to overcome those challenges.  We will have demos showing real-world patterns for leveraging WCF to interact with business applications.

And of course, part of the deal is that I spend a lot of time in the TLC area.  When I'm not speaking you will probably find me in the BizTalk TLC between Tuesday and Thursday.  Stop and say hi!