Transaction in BizTalk Server 2004 Orchestrations

BizTalk 2004 supports long-running and atomic transactions within Orchestrations.   The model has changed a bit from earlier versions, and atomic transactions are no longer based on DTC transactions by default.   This article explains some of the features of transactions, and also speculates about the exact behaviour of 'batched' atomic transactions - a subject that is currently very opaque due to a lack of documentation.