Real-Time Visibility Through Technology

PDC – 2009 is almost here!!!

2009-11-16T07:14:24Z

PDC – Professional Developers conference is the premier Microsoft conference focusing on developer community. We show off our upcoming technologies and releases at this conference. It is going to be a big week for BizTalk Server too. We have multiple sessions and we will be rolling out BizTalk Server roadmap as part of the event.

Following are sessions to look out for if you want to know more about BizTalk Server…

Session title: Microsoft BizTalk Server Futures and Roadmap

Speaker: Balasubramanian Sriram in 502A on Tuesday at 3:00 PM

Abstract: Learn how BizTalk Server 2009 lets you focus on writing the code to do the hardcore business logic and let BizTalk take care of moving the data. Hear how your development skills with Windows Communication Foundation (WCF), and Windows Workflow Foundation (WF) work seamlessly with the powerful integration platform of BizTalk. Find out how BizTalk aligns with the Microsoft application server in the longer term.

Session title: Connecting Applications with the Microsoft BizTalk Enterprise Service Bus

Speakers: Syed Rasheed, Dmitri Ossipov in 515B on Tuesday at 4:30 PM

Abstract: See how the BizTalk Enterprise Service Bus (ESB) enables you to build services that can be quickly located and connected, whether they live behind the firewall or in the cloud, without creating a brittle point-to-point link. Learn how to dramatically improve the service lifecycle of development, testing, and deployment by using the powerful messaging, routing, and transformation capabilities of the BizTalk ESB in your solution today, and get a glimpse of future plans for BizTalk service bus/pub-sub pattern.

Chalk Talk Title: BizTalk and StreamInsight: A Better Together Story (Session 3 – Theatre Chalk Talk on Tuesday at 1:00 pm)

Speaker: Mark Simms

Abstract: SQL Server 2008 R2 introduces Stream Insight, providing a powerful platform for developing and deploying complex event processing (CEP) applications. Come and learn how Stream Insight can be used to enable new capabilities in BizTalk for providing real-time monitoring and analytics for infrastructure and business events at scale.

Lab: Introduction to BizTalk Server 2009 Demo: Process Automation Solution with SharePoint & WF (lab code: SRV001)
Lab: Introduction to the BizTalk ESB Toolkit: Providing Service Integration Agility (lab code: SRV002)

Last but not least stop by the BizTalk demo booth in the Microsoft Products Pavilion if you want to chat with members of the BizTalk product team and other BizTalk experts. We will be presenting cool demos and would love to talk to you.

You can also meet us at the “Ask the Experts” session on Wednesday 5:30 – 7:00 PM.

See you next week at PDC!!!

Germany Visit: tech-ed Europe 2009

2009-11-16T07:03:54Z

This week I was in Germany of tech-ed Europe 2009. I reached Berlin on 9th Morning and headed straight to Messe, Berlin location of the event. It was fun to travel through Berlin city. I love train networks in Europe. :)

I could not sleep much on Sunday night due to jet lag. Monday morning I delivered a session on Integration and Interop along with couple of my colleagues. After the event we headed to enjoy the celebrations at Berlin city center on 20th anniversary of fall of Berlin wall. Was awesome event. Got back at midnight.

Had to deliver another session on BizTalk Server 2009 on Tuesday early morning hence worked on my deck and demo most of the night. Again could not sleep much. Tuesday was really hectic with my session from 9-10:15 and couple of press briefings on SQL Server later in the afternoon.

Wednesday, I had to visit a customer in Karlsruhe which is 2 hours from Frankfurt or 1 hour from Stuttgart. I took morning 6am flight to Frankfurt, met with Richard(SSP for App Plat in Germany) and headed to customers office. Had a great 3-4 hour meeting on integrations especially how they could leverage BizTalk Server. Had beer with Richard at Stuttgart airport and got back to Berlin at 10pm.

By Thursday I was completely exhausted. :( Again could not sleep much at night got some emails done and spoke to my wife at 5:00am. Then I crashed and when I got up it was 2:00am and cleaning crew was banging my door. :) Got up headed to do booth duty at the show. Went out for dinner with all the colleagues to a great Italian Restaurant. :)

I did not sleep whole night on Thursday and headed back to US on Friday. :) Now time to pack-up and go to LA for PDC. We are announcing BizTalk Server roadmap next week at PDC. Stay tuned.

Some Pictures:

Arizona Department of Health Services ups quality and security with BizTalk Server

2009-08-23T02:37:23Z

Some Great quotes from the case study:

“Using PHEDEX, built on the Microsoft Application Platform, saved us the $2 million that it likely would have cost to create a data exchange in-house and establish individual partner connections.” Paula Mattingly Acting Chief Information Officer, Arizona Department of Health Services

“The combination of BizTalk Server and SQL Server provided the most highly integrated solution but also the most flexible from a development standpoint.” Paula Mattingly
Acting Chief Information Officer, Arizona Department of Health Services

“Microsoft turned BizTalk Server 2006 R2 into an enterprise-class messaging platform that separates security, validation, and other aspects of integration…. This enables multiple development groups to focus on separate parts of a business problem.” Dan Desmond
President and Chief Executive Officer, The Simi Group

The Arizona Department of Health Services (ADHS) provides a range of health services to the citizens of Arizona. When the federal government required that all state health departments facilitate interoperable information exchange between public health partners, ADHS adopted the Partner Healthcare Electronic Data EXchange (PHEDEX), a data integration solution powered by Microsoft® BizTalk® Server 2006 R2, from The Simi Group. With its new solution, ADHS was able to quickly comply with federal regulations, eliminate paper from its lab reporting process, increase the quality of data reported, and increase public safety. By eliminating manual data entry, ADHS staff members are more productive and efficient, and can focus on quality data analysis. The department saved an estimated U.S.$2 million and years of development time by acquiring a commercial solution instead of building its own.

Microsoft Case Studies: Arizona Department of Health Services

Microsoft BizTalk RFID 2009 Operations Guide is now available!!!

2009-07-31T01:34:04Z

We launched BizTalk RFID 2009 operations guide. It is a great document if you are thinking of deploying BizTalk RFID in your environment.

Welcome to the first edition of the Microsoft® BizTalk® Server RFID Operations Guide. We created this guide to be a valuable resource for anyone involved in the implementation and administration of a BizTalk Server RFID solution.

To download a copy of this guide in .chm or .docx form, go to http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=158724.

Which Versions of BizTalk Server RFID Does the Guide Cover?

This guide is primarily for the BizTalk Server RFID product that is released as part of Microsoft BizTalk Server 2009. Even though most of the guidance applies to BizTalk Server RFID that was released as part of BizTalk Server 2006 R2, the guide uses the new platform changes wherever applicable.

What’s in It?

This document applies to the operational readiness phase in the solution life cycle management of the project. The operational readiness phase precedes deployment to production. It consists of a set of tasks for ensuring a stable operating environment. It is targeted toward system administrators responsible for BizTalk Server RFID (server computers and RFID devices), DBAs responsible for the SQL servers used by BizTalk Server RFID, and developers involved with maintaining the infrastructure and solution. This document assumes that the BizTalk Server RFID solution has already been validated in a Pilot stage and is prepared for deployment to production.

Key portions of this guide are new; however, a considerable portion consists of documentation taken from BizTalk Server RFID Help, white papers, Knowledge Base articles, and other sources. It has been reviewed and evaluated by experts from the community of BizTalk Server IT professionals and members of the product development team, whom we gratefully acknowledge at the end of this topic. We believe that the information presented here will help BizTalk Server RFID users solve—and above all, avoid—many of the common problems that can occur while deploying and maintaining a BizTalk Server RFID installation.

Interesting! Where Do I Start?

We organized the guide according to the functional aspects of planning, deploying, and managing a BizTalk Server RFID installation. You can therefore read it according to these functional aspects. If you are performing the following tasks, you can start with the related sections:

Evaluating operational readiness. If you are focused on assessing and evaluating the operational readiness of a BizTalk Server RFID deployment, then start by reading the Operations Checklists section.

Becoming operationally ready. To ensure that your BizTalk Server RFID infrastructure and applications become operationally ready, refer to the Planning the Environment for BizTalk Server RFID section.

Managing the operational environment. Most of the topics in this operations guide assist you in managing and maintaining an operational BizTalk Server RFID environment. You will find best practices, key concepts, and procedures for maintaining an operational environment in Managing BizTalk Server RFID and Monitoring BizTalk Server RFID.

Author: Rama Ramani (Microsoft)

Editor: Mary Browning (Microsoft)

Contributors

Mark Simms (Microsoft)

Rohan Makhija (Microsoft)

Ravi Vankamamidi (S3Edge)

Clint Tennill (Xterprise)

Damir Dobric, Andreas Erben (daenet)

Mick Badran (Breeze, BizTalk Server MVP)

Reviewers

Petr Kratochvil (Microsoft)

Ewan Fairweather (Microsoft)

Quoc Bui (Microsoft)

Douglas Trimble (The Boeing Company)

Robert Auston (Vail Resorts Management Company)

Luke Rennells (Bank of America N.A.)

Microsoft BizTalk Server 2009 RFID Operations Guide

Microsoft announces new BizTalk Server 2009 SKUs for partners

2009-07-13T23:00:00Z

Today at Microsoft’s Worldwide Partner Conference, we announced availability for BizTalk Server 2009 Enterprise Runtime, BizTalk Server 2009 Standard Runtime Edition, and BizTalk Server 2009 RFID.

We recently launched BizTalk Server 2009, which is currently helping more than 8500 customers worldwide to integrate business applications and partners and to automate and simplify processes, and the customer base continues to grow

We offer multiple editions of BizTalk Server to enable any size company to leverage the product capabilities.

BizTalk Server 2009 Enterprise Runtime Edition: Every application needs to integrate with other applications in customer environments and solution companies do not want to reengineer and build an integration server from scratch. BizTalk Server 2009 Enterprise Runtime edition provides all integration capabilities with high availability features and all the adapters to systems like SAP, Oracle E-Business Suite and Mainframe systems. Enterprise Runtime is a special edition for partners designed to be used in support of their ISV application, as part of a unified solution. BizTalk Server 2009 Enterprise Runtime includes all capabilities, adapters and accelerations and supports scale out/failover, multi-server configuration with multiple message boxes.

BizTalk Server 2009 Standard Runtime Edition: BizTalk Server 2009 Standard Runtime Edition is a great option for partners who need low cost option and do not need high availability. Standard Runtime includes all the capabilities of BizTalk Server along with all adapters to embed inside ISV application. Standard Runtime allows partners to deliver 1 BizTalk application and connect to 1 external application. Goal of Standard Runtime is to provide integration capability at a very low price for ISV partners.

BizTalk Server 2009 RFID Edition: RFID is being used to transform business processes by companies across industry verticals. Microsoft first delivered RFID platform as part of BizTalk Server 2006 R2. Now in its 6^th version, BizTalk Server 2009 has made major enhancements to this platform including application platform for mobile RFID devices and support for industry standards like EPCIS, LLRP, and TDT/TDS. Microsoft also received EPCIS certification from GS1 EPCGlobal for BizTalk Server 2009. BizTalk RFID 2009 is a dedicated SKU for partners and customers interested in RFID deployments. It provides capabilities like high availability, plug and play devices; enterprise manageability with System center and SDK for partners and customers to build RFID enabled solutions etc.

More information on all BizTalk Server editions is available at http://www.microsoft.com/biztalk/en/us/editions.aspx.

Biztalk/Sharepoint/... - Unoffical Launch of the BizTalk 2009 Light and Easy WebCast Series

2009-07-09T18:31:00Z

Mick is doing an amazing stuff with pulling together webcasts for BizTalk Server 2009. :) Check out his blog for more details.

Hi folks, been a little quiet on the blogging front lately as myself and other BizTalk Industry exerts have been busy creating a Series of Webcasts focused on BizTalk 2009 features.

I came up with this idea 3 months ago and we’re finally almost through the other side – all the guys gave up their own spare time to share their field expertise and knowledge.

The line is great! comprising of MVPs and field experts whom have got runs on the board.

I hope you enjoy the series, there’s a couple that are still to come, but we can’t hold it back any further.

You can see them all here - http://cloudtv.cloudapp.net/Default.aspx?category=BizTalk (Alan Smith has been very kind to offer hosting) – NOTE: not all the webcasts here are part of the Series, most are :) (I’m working on getting a sub-category)

Mick's Breeze Blogs - Biztalk/Sharepoint/... - Unoffical Launch of the BizTalk 2009 Light and Easy WebCast Series

Vail Resorts Case study launched!!!

2009-06-27T01:57:40Z

This is a great BizTalk RFID case study in hospitality. :)

Resort Streamlines Skier Check-In, Improves Data Collection with RF Technology

Enhancing the guest experience is central to the corporate mission at Vail Resorts, but ski lift pass authentication for season pass holders was often a time-consuming process due to passes being worn under layers of winter clothing. In addition, the company had little visibility into the skiing patterns of its guests. Vail Resorts switched to season passes embedded with radio frequency (RF) tags that can be scanned through a skier’s jacket, streamlining the pass-holder authentication process. The company also placed RF scanners on upper-mountain lifts to capture lift access data that helps sharpen targeted marketing. The solution uses Microsoft® BizTalk® Server RFID and SQL Server® 2005 to handle authentication transactions, SQL Server 2005 Reporting Services for data analysis, and Windows® Communication Foundation for point-to-point data exchange.

Microsoft Case Studies: Vail Resorts

Microsoft Dynamics NAV and RFID

2009-06-25T22:55:57Z

Many of you have asked me about Dynamics Nav and RFID story. Following blog post by Naveen is a great one to get started.

Now it was left for us to how to provide a solution in a timely manner that our partners and customers could benefit from. To begin with we chose Microsoft BizTalk RFID technology that provides a device independent platform for integrating various RFID scanners, printers and solutions. This technology platform coupled with power of Dynamics NAV gave us ample opportunity to build a showcase implementation.

Microsoft Dynamics NAV and RFID - Microsoft Dynamics NAV Team

American Apparel Video from Avery Dennison

2009-06-25T20:33:34Z

American Apparel is one of our customers using BizTalk RFID. Xterprise (www.xterprise.com), Microsoft RFID partner of the year 2008, Microsoft Gold certified partner and leading software vendor in recent ABI research has provided their Retail Clarity software for this deployment. Please take a look at an awesome video created by Avery Dennison.

Sorry your browser does not support iframes, click here to view the full length video

Made to Stick

2009-06-15T08:23:06Z

Author: Chip & Dan Heath

This is an awesome book. I was looking for book on storytelling this is an ideal book on that.

Made to Stick focuses on telling your story/message in a way that it sticks with the audience. Author focuses on very common themes like Simplicity, Unexpectedness, Concreteness, Credibility, Emotions, Stories to make the stories stick.

Book also has some good punch line which are good. The one I liked and remembered was “Avoid burying the lead. Don’t start with something interesting but irrelevant in hopes of entertaining the audience. Instead, work to make the core message itself more interesting.”

Other Good quotes:

"And that's the great thing about the world of ideas --- any of us, with the right insight and the right message, can make an idea stick."
"Becoming an expert in something means that we become more and more fascinated by nuance and complexity."
"Abstraction is the luxury of the expert. If you've got to teach an idea to a room full of people, and you aren't certain what they know, concreteness is the only safe language."

It is really great book to read. I will try to take authors class if I get a chance it is that good. Enjoy.

Microsoft Releases BizTalk ESB Toolkit 2.0

2009-06-10T05:21:27Z

We recently launched BizTalk Server 2009 and today we are announcing BizTalk ESB Toolkit. Our customers have been asking us for ESB support in BizTalk Server for a while. Previously we had some guidance for customers on ESB but with today's release customers will get better supported tools for ESB implementation on BizTalk Server 2009.

The BizTalk ESB Toolkit 2.0 is a collection of tools and libraries that extend BizTalk Server 2009 capabilities of supporting a loosely coupled and dynamic messaging architecture. It functions as middleware that provides tools for rapid mediation between services and their consumers. Enabling maximum flexibility at run time, the BizTalk ESB Toolkit 2.0 simplifies loosely coupled composition of service endpoints and management of service interactions.

The BizTalk ESB Toolkit 2.0 provides key building blocks that are required for implementing a comprehensive SOI including:

Endpoint run-time discovery and virtualization. The service consumer does not need to be aware of the service provider location and endpoint details; a new or modified service provider can be added to the ESB, without interruptions to the service consumer.

Loosely coupled service composition. The service provider and service consumer do not need to be aware of service interaction style.

Dynamic message transformation and translation.The mapping definition between distinct message structure and semantics is resolved at run time.

Dynamic routing. Run-time content-based, itinerary-based, or context-based message routing.

Centralized exception management. Exception management framework, services, and infrastructure elements that make it possible to create, repair, resubmit, and compensate fault messages that service consumers or BizTalk components submit.

Quality of service. An asynchronous publish/subscribe engine resolves different levels of service availability and provides high availability, scalability, and message traceability for ESB implementations.

Protocol transformation. Providing the ability for service provider and service consumer to interact via different protocols including WS-* standards for Web Services. For example, a service provider can send an HTTP Web Service request, which will result in sending a message via Message Queuing.

Extensibility. Provides multiple extensibility points to extend functionality for endpoint discovery, message routing, and additional BizTalk Server adapters for run time and design time.

Note: BizTalk ESB Toolkit 2.0 only works with BizTalk Server 2009.

For more information about BizTalk ESB Toolkit 2.0, see BizTalk ESB Toolkit 2.0 on the Microsoft Web site.

BizTalk ESB Toolkit 2.0

Please let us know your thoughts and if you have any questions/concerns.

RFID Industry Business Conditions - May 2009 | RFID Monthly

2009-05-20T03:25:53Z

Nice Article.

Our conversations with industry players confirms our most recent survey work, which suggests improving pipelines, but difficulty converting into revenue. Even tried-and-true hardware, such as traditional bar code equipment, is experiencing meaningful delays as companies look to defer capital spending. We see most emphasis on software and services in the near-term to improve existing automated data capture equipment. We are aware of more innovative selling practices that seek to incorporate new solutions into operating budgets instead of capital budgets, which require a high approval threshold. This seems to illustrate why we are seeing leasing options becoming increasingly prevalent.

RFID Industry Business Conditions - May 2009 | RFID Monthly

Videos: TechTalk Recordings from TechED 2009 US

2009-05-19T01:40:08Z

Following are Tech Talk videos we recorded in this year at Tech-ED US

BizTalk Server

BizTalk RFID

BizTalk HIS

Unlock the Information Assets on the Mainframe through BizTalk Host Integration Server

TechEd 2009 is here!!!

2009-05-07T08:22:03Z

I will be speaking at TechED 2009 in LA next week. Let meet if you are going to be attending. :) Following are details of my session…

Title: Microsoft BizTalk Goes Mobile: Collecting Physical World Events from Mobile Devices

Abstract: Every day more high-performing companies connect their internal departments, their support networks, and their demand and supply chains. Reducing the cost and complexity of supply chain management, Microsoft and its large ecosystem of hardware and software partners are working to enable mass adoption of RFID, SOA, and B2B solutions by developing feature-rich, low cost end-to-end RFID solutions. These solutions empower people to gain productivity and business efficiencies. This session showcases real-world deployments and shows how BizTalk RFID can be used at edge of enterprise to capture physical world transactions and integrate these to existing enterprise applications using core EAI, B2B, and EDI capabilities of BizTalk Server.

Pro RFID in BizTalk Server 2009

2009-05-04T08:27:47Z

BizTalk RFID book has finally hit the market. This is a very well written book with all the details you need to know to write good RFID applications on top of BizTalk RFID platform. Actually it is written by 3 folks who really know the product really well. Venkatesh was Architect of BizTalk RFID and is CEO of S3Edge. Mark Simms is Field Program Manager for BizTalk RFID.

I highly recommend the book to anyone who is interested in building RFID applications.

Real-Time Visibility Through Technology

PDC – 2009 is almost here!!!

Session title: Microsoft BizTalk Server Futures and Roadmap

Germany Visit: tech-ed Europe 2009

Arizona Department of Health Services ups quality and security with BizTalk Server

Microsoft BizTalk RFID 2009 Operations Guide is now available!!!

Microsoft announces new BizTalk Server 2009 SKUs for partners

Biztalk/Sharepoint/... - Unoffical Launch of the BizTalk 2009 Light and Easy WebCast Series

Vail Resorts Case study launched!!!

Resort Streamlines Skier Check-In, Improves Data Collection with RF Technology

Microsoft Dynamics NAV and RFID

American Apparel Video from Avery Dennison

Made to Stick

Microsoft Releases BizTalk ESB Toolkit 2.0

RFID Industry Business Conditions - May 2009 | RFID Monthly

Videos: TechTalk Recordings from TechED 2009 US

TechEd 2009 is here!!!

Pro RFID in BizTalk Server 2009