JSR 208: Java Business Integration

Java Business Integration JSR (JBI) extends J2EE and J2SE with business integration SPIs. These SPIs enable the creation of a Java business integration environment for specifications such as WSCI, BPEL4WS and the W3C Choreography Working Group.

The industry is currently on the path to define standards for business integration that form a new layer of standard metadata in the web services stack. While this work is not complete as yet, the general shape of this standard metadata can be seen in the WSCI and BPEL4WS proposals. The industry needs a standard in this space and we look to the recently chartered W3C Choreography Working Group to drive the convergence of these and other related efforts. The JBI SPIs will reflect the industry consensus that emerges from this work.

This JSR uses the following terms to further classify this standard business integration metadata. The term 'business protocol' is an umbrella term for the metadata used to describe the interaction between a set of business processes that implement the roles of partners within a larger service composition. The term 'abstract business process' is the metadata that describes how a business process, within a business protocol, choreographs its role in a service composition so that its partner processes understand how to interact with it. It should be noted that the term 'business process' in this context means any actor that participates in the business protocol. In finer grained situations, a 'business process' could be something as simple as a data transformation table or a few business rules.

JBI employs concepts similar to J2EE to extend application packaging and deployment functionality to include JBI Components. JBI Components are an open-ended class of components that are based on JBI abstract business process metadata. The JBI JSR itself does not define how developers code Components. Both standard and proprietary ways of coding Components may exist. A specific class of Component may provide rich business process functionality while another class of Component may provide a specialized integration function like a data transformation table or support a domain specific business rule encoding.

A JBI Application is composed of one or more JBI Components and service assemblies.

JBI divides the task of supporting JBI Components into three roles - the JBI Environment, the JBI Machine and the JBI Binding. The focus of the JBI JSR is the role of the Environment and its support for Machines and Bindings. It treats both Machines and Bindings as black boxes that interact with it via Environment SPIs.

The Environment defines a standard internal representation for business protocol messages based on standard business protocol metadata. This representation is an important element of the Environment SPI that links Environments, Machines and Bindings.

JBI Machines are responsible for supporting the lifecycle of a particular class of JBI Components. For instance, if a JSR defines a standard way of coding a Component, then the existence of a Machine supporting this Component model would allow the Environment to add support this Component model. Likewise, a vendor could produce a Machine that supports its proprietary Component model and this Machine could be deployed on the Environment. The Environment provides the base business protocol communication infrastructure that allows Components (through their Machines) to communicate with each other and with external services. The Environment also defines a standard Machine packaging model and a standard Machine deployment and instantiation lifecycle.

JBI Bindings are used by the Environment to communicate with external services via specific business protocol bindings. The role of a Binding is to implement a specific communications binding for the Environment's standard internal representation of business protocol messages. The Environment also defines a standard Binding packaging model and a standard Binding deployment and instantiation lifecycle.

http://www.jcp.org/en/jsr/detail?id=208