[Pub] JBPM meets ESB

The combination of a process engine and an Enterprise Service Bus (ESB) is one interesting aspect of modern service oriented architectures (SOA). Both, an ESB and process engines provide similar concepts and software architects often have problems to find the right solution. Therefor I and Bernd Rücker wrote an article in the German Java Magazin about it. To have a practical showcase the integration is shown with a small example using JBoss jBPM and two Open Source ESBs: JBoss ESB and Mule.

The easy showcase implements the following example: Some event is generated and saved as a file (This may be an order, some incident, an alert, whatever). This file is picked up by the ESB and a new jbpm process is started. The process contains a human task, where somebody has to review the data of the event and decides, if that event can be ignored (e.g. a false alert) or if it has to be handled. In the latter case, the event is sent to an existing case management system via Web Service (could be Lotus Notes or something like that). The case management systems sends a JMS message as soon as the case is closed. This message is again picked up by the ESB and the right process instance is triggered (called "signaled" in jBPM).

The article covers the following topics:

• The basic combination of a process engine and an ESB
• When makes it sense to combine a process engine with an ESB
• How does JBoss ESB integrate jbpm and which Event Handler the proces designer can use to call ESB services
• How does Mule integrate jbpm and which Event Handlers does Mule provide for the process designer
• Lessons Learned :)
  

To compare the ESB implementatations the show case was implemented with JBoss ESB available here and Mule, available here. Following the links, you will find a detailed description about the two implementation scenarios.