BizTalk Server and WCF Integration

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http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/bb973215.aspx

BizTalk Server and WCF Integration11 out of 11 rated this helpful

Atul Gupta (Infosys Technologies Ltd)

Amit Praful Shah (Infosys Technologies Ltd)

Jitendra Pal Thethi (Infosys Technologies Limited)

September 17, 2007

Summary

This article describes the different approaches available to expose and consume Windows Communication Framework

(WCF) services from BizTalk Server 2004 (BTS04) and BizTalk Server 2006 (BTS06).

Code samples for integration of a WCF service with BizTalk Server 2004 are available here and for integration with BizTalk

Server 2006 here

Contents

Introduction

Overview of WCF and BizTalk Server technologies

WCF

BizTalk Server

WCF Service Used as Reference

Accessing WCF Services from BizTalk Server

Exposing BizTalk Server Orchestrations as WCF Services

Issues andTroubleshooting

Conclusion

Introduction

With the November 2006 release of .NET Framework 3.0, the wait is finally over for software professionals. The core

components of this managed code programming model Windows Presentation Foundation (WPF), Windows

Communication Foundation (WCF) and Windows Workflow Foundation (WF) has revolutionized the way software isprogrammed.

This article focuses on the different options available for communication between WCF and BTS06. While much of the

discussion will also be applicable to BTS04, any discrepancies in implementation for BTS04 will be highlighted.

There is a WCF Adapter for BTS06 is available on the CodePlex Web site. An out-of-the-box adapter will be shipped with

BizTalk Server 2006 R2 which may be released by the end of September 2007. An overview of the R2 WCF Adapter's

capabilities is available at the following blog post. To try out the R2 WCF Adapter, download the BizTalk Server 2006 R2

Beta from the Microsoft Connectsite.

However, you may need to integrate existing BizTalk-based applications with WCF to do the same. In this article we prese

various options to achieve interoperability in cases where upgrading to BizTalk Server 2006 R2 is not possible. The articlemerely outlines the approaches and does not deal with them in an exhaustive manner. Nor does it provide a benchmark

compare the approaches. You need to evaluate and choose one among the suggested techniques after taking into accou

the needs of your application.

Note: If you are upgrading to BizTalk 2006 R2, then working with WCF Adapter will be ideal due to the ease of use,

deployment and management it offers.

Overview of WCF and BTS06 Technologies

Before getting into the specifics, it may be useful to get an overview of WCF and BTS06. If you are already familiar with th

technologies, you may skip the introductions and proceed to the section on 'WCF Service Used as Reference'.

Windows Communication Foundation
http://www.codeplex.com/WCFBizTalkhttp://-/?-http://-/?-http://-/?-http://-/?-http://-/?-http://-/?-http://-/?-https://connect.microsoft.com/http://blogs.msdn.com/biztalk_server_team_blog/archive/2006/07/28/680912.aspxhttp://www.codeplex.com/WCFBizTalkhttp://-/?-http://-/?-http://-/?-http://-/?-http://-/?-http://-/?-http://-/?-http://-/?-


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WCF is Microsoft's unified platform used for rapidly building secure, reliable and interoperable distributed applications.

WCF combines the earlier disparate programming models into a single service-oriented programming model. In the wor

before WCF, software developers had to pick from numerous technology choices in order to create and expose services

that could be consumed in a distributed environment. While developers chose web services for interoperability and

Microsoft Message Queuing (MSMQ) for reliable messaging, they used Enterprise Services for transaction management,

.NET Remoting for high performance systems and Web Service Enhancements (WSE) for secure messaging, resulting in t

same logic being duplicated when the component had to be exposed over multiple channels.

At a high level, every WCF service consists of the following three parts:

1. The Service Contractthat defines 'what' the service does and a service class that contains the implementation for th

service.

2. Configuration files consisting of bindings (the 'how' part) and endpoints (the 'where' part) that define the way client

access the WCF service. These configuration files are independent of implementation. The binding specifies how a

client communicates with the service in terms of transport and other attributes. The endpoint specifies the address

which this service is exposed to clients.

3. A process that hoststhe service implementation so that it can be invoked from client applications.

The following diagram depicts a WCF service being invoked by a client:

Figure 1: WCF Communication

Given below, are a sequence of steps that need to be followed for implementing and making a WCF service available for

consumption.

Defining the Contract

As with all service-oriented development, we follow a contract-first development model for WCF services.

Two types of contracts need to be specified:

1. Service contract: This contract defines the interface of the service, which is the set of operations that are implemen

and exposed by the service. The service contract uses a specific attribute viz [OperationContract]to define the

operations. The code snippet given below shows how the class and method definitions are decorated with attribu

to indicate the service contract. In the following example, the service contract (interface ICalculator) exposes two

operations Add and Subtract, each of which expects 2 ComplexNumber input parameters and return a

ComplexNumber as response.

2.


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[ServiceContract(Namespace="http://Microsoft.ServiceModel.Samples")]

public interface ICalculator

{

[OperationContract]

ComplexNumber Add(ComplexNumber n1, ComplexNumber n2);

[OperationContract]

ComplexNumber Subtract(ComplexNumber n1, ComplexNumber n2);

}

3. Data contract: Every service call will typically have a set of data elements that will be passed as input parameters a

a output that is returned from the call. The data contract helps in formalizing this data exchange. The data is typica

modeled as a class or struct and is given attributes that define the contract. The data contract controls the way the

request object, which is passed as a parameter to the service call, is serialized and hence controls the SOAP (Simp

Object Access Protocol) message format that flows on the wire.

An example of a data contract is given below. Note that the DataContract and DataMember attributes are used to decora

the class ComplexNumber, which is the data entity passed as input and output to the Add and Subtract operations in the

service contract defined above.

[DataContract(Namespace="http://Microsoft.ServiceModel.Samples")]

public class ComplexNumber

{

[DataMember]

public double Real;

[DataMember]

public double Imaginary;

}

Implementing the Contract

Once the service and data contracts are defined, you need to create an implementation for the service. This is done by firdefining the class that will implement the interface in the service contract. The actual business logic for the operations is

then included in the method implementations.

public class CalculatorService : ICalculator

{

public ComplexNumber Add(ComplexNumber n1, ComplexNumber n2)

{

return new ComplexNumber(n1.Real + n2.Real, n1.Imaginary + n2.Imaginary);

}

public ComplexNumber Subtract(ComplexNumber n1, ComplexNumber n2) {

return new ComplexNumber(n1.Real - n2.Real, n1.Imaginary - n2.Imaginary);

}

}

Configuring End Points

As mentioned earlier, the service is implemented independent of the transport or address over which the service is

eventually exposed. This is possible because in WCF, the transport and address details are specified as attributes in exter

configuration files.

To configure end points exposed by WCF services, it is mandatory to define the following details for each endpoint:


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Contract: The contract is the interface or the service contract that the service implements. In the sample shown bel

the endpoint is configured to expose the ICalculator service contract.

Binding: The binding specifies the protocol over which the service can be accessed along with attributes that defin

security, reliability and other requirements.

Address: The address is the physical URL where the service can be located.

The key advantage of this configurability is that though the service is implemented just once, it can be accessed over

multiple endpoints, each defining a unique combination of address and binding.

A sample configuration for end points is as follows:

Hosting the WCF Service

The final step is to host the service in a process. For this, there are multiple options Internet Information Services (IIS),

Windows Activation Services (WAS) and managed Windows service. A service may also be hosted in a managed Windows

application such as Windows Forms applications, console applications, etc.

The following links provide more details about.NET Framework 3.0 and WCF:

.NET Framework Home

http://msdn2.microsoft.com/netframework/default.aspxWindows Communication Foundation Home

http://msdn2.microsoft.com/en-us/netframework/aa663324.aspx

Windows Communication Foundation documentation on MSDN

http://msdn2.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms735119.aspx

BizTalk Server 2006

BizTalk Server is an integration product from Microsoft that enables enterprises to automate, deploy and monitor busine

processes. It offers Enterprise Application Integration (EAI), Business Process Management (BPM) and B2B integration

capabilities.

The BizTalk Server features can be categorized into two main areasmessaging and orchestration, which are described
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below.

The messaging engine deals with parsing, sending/receiving, translating, and routing of messages to and from

applications. It enables users to receive messages and route them into a business process or send out a message

from the process.

The orchestration engine deals with modeling and executing processes, and provides a tool to design and

implement business processes. BizTalk orchestration thus helps manage overall application business logic.

Messaging and orchestration are used together; with messaging providing the receipt and delivery capabilities that

orchestration rely on.

The diagram below shows the important components of BizTalk server:

Figure 2: BizTalk Server Architecture

Other important BizTalk server components include:

1. Business Rules Engine (BRE): The BRE allows one to create a set of business rules as policies and evaluate data ba

on these rules. With this, business rules are maintained outside of the business process, but can be invoked from

within the process. This makes the systems easier to configure and maintain.

2. Business Activity Monitoring (BAM): The BAM component makes it possible for the extraction of relevant informati

from business processes as they are executing and hence to monitor the processes in real time.

3. Business Activity Services (BAS): The BAS portal, along with some of the components in BizTalk, enables the

management of interactions with trading partners. It also helps integrate an enterprise's business processes with

those of the partners.

BizTalk allows you to create 'send' and 'receive' port gateways through which external applications can exchange messag

with BizTalk. The ports can be configured to use a set of transport protocols and application adapters that are shipped w

BizTalk Server. With these adapters, BizTalk can exchange messages over multiple channels such as files, MSMQ, HTTP

(Hypertext Transfer Protocol), SOAP, IBM MQ, etc. Application adapters, which can directly interact with packaged

applications like PeopleSoft, SAP, Oracle Apps, etc, are also available.

Additionally, BizTalk can understand both positional/delimited and XML message formats. It has a mapping engine that c

help transform messages from one format to another.

The flow of a message through BizTalk is shown in the diagram below:


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Figure 3: Message flow in BizTalk Server

Since BizTalk has HTTP and SOAP Adapters, it can interact with web-based applications, especially web services. The BizTa

Server interacts with services in the following two ways:

1. BizTalk process orchestrations can be exposed as Web services. In such a case, external clients can invoke the

orchestration by making SOAP/HTTP calls.

2. BizTalk can consume Web services by using the SOAP Adapter.

More information on BizTalk Server 2006 is available at the following URLs:

BizTalk Server 2006 Homehttp://www.microsoft.com/biztalk/default.mspx

BizTalk Server documentation on MSDN

http://msdn2.microsoft.com/en-us/library/aa155109.aspx

Understanding BizTalk Server 2006 by David Chappell

http://msdn2.microsoft.com/en-us/library/aa546748.aspx

The WCF Service Used as Reference

This article uses the following WCF service to explain BizTalk-WCF integration options:

[ServiceContract()]

public interface IWCFService{

[OperationContract]

int GetStockInfo(int prodID);

}

public class WCFService : IWCFService

{

public int GetStockInfo(int prodID)

{

// Get the current inventory level for the Product ID from the

// database

}
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}

In the above service, a Product ID is the input parameter expected by the GetStockInfo()method. The logic will query t

Product Table to retrieve current stock details for the Product ID. The return value is an integer indicating the current stoc

available.

BizTalk WCF Integration

Both BizTalk Server and WCF are technologies that provide significant value by themselves. However, a combination of th

two provides the broadest possible spectrum of connected system scenarios both brokered and un-brokered using

open standard protocols. BizTalk provides business process orchestration, message transformation and business activity

monitoring through designers and visual tools. WCF provides a unified framework for building secure, reliable and

transacted web services. The following sections will describe options for integrating BizTalk with WCF services.

1. Consuming a WCF Services from BizTalk:

a. Use the WCF Adapter. Currently in CTP, it will be released with BizTalk 2006 R2.

b. WCF service exposed over basicHttpBindingand consumed from orchestration.

c. WCF service exposed on wsHttpBindingendpoint. BizTalk communicates with the service using a WSE

Adapter in a secure and reliable mode.d. WCF Service endpoint on msmqIntegrationBinding.BizTalk consumes the service using an MSMQ Adapte

e. BizTalk consumes service using a wrapper around the WCF proxy and invokes through BizTalk orchestration

This mechanism is used when a transport adapter corresponding to a particular type of WCF binding in

BizTalk, e.g. netTCPBinding, is not available in BizTalk.

2. Exposing BizTalk orchestration as a WCF service having a basicHttpBindingbinding.

The following table shows the options for communication between BizTalk Server and a WCF service for various system-

provided WCF bindings. These options are mapped to the features of each binding and indicate whether they are retaine

or are no longer available on selecting a given option. Use the following table to select the option that satisfies all featur

required in your scenario:

Options for Communication

with BizTalk

Features of Bindings

Transport

Level

Security

Message

Level

Security

Session

Support

Transactions

Support

Correlation

and Duplex

Channel

BasicHttpBinding P V V V V

1 Orchestration using Send shapes bound

to endpoint on HTTP Adapter

P V V V V

2 Wrap WCF Proxy as a .NET assembly P V V V V

WsHttpBinding P P P P V

1 Orchestration using Send Shapes

bound to endpoint on WSE Adapter

P P V V V

2 Wrap WCF Proxy as a .NET assembly P V V V V

WsDualHttpBinding P P P P P


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1 Orchestration using Send shapes

bound to endpoint on WSE Adapter

P P V V V

2 Wrap WCF proxy as a .NET assembly P V V V V

NetTcpBinding P P P P P

1 Wrap service in a .NET proxy

assembly.

V P V V V

NetNamedPipesBinding P P P P P

1 Wrap Service in a .NET proxy

assembly.

V P V V V

NetMsmqBinding P P X P X

1 As MSMQ endpoint. Requires

additional transformation

P V V P V


assembly.

V P V V V

MsmqIntegrationBinding P V V V V

1 As MSMQ endpoint. Requires

additional transformation

P V V V V


assembly.

V V V V V

NetPeerTcpBinding P P V V P


assembly.

V P V V V

Table 1: Options for BizTalk WCF integration

The following business case sample may help you understand the working of BizTalk and WCF:

1. A user receives an invoice from a file receive location using the File Adapter.

2. BizTalk forwards this invoice to the WCF service to enquire about the stock availability based on the Prod ID

mentioned in the invoice.

3. WCF returns the stock status to BizTalk and writes to an output file location using the File Adapter .

Accessing WCF Services from BizTalk ServerWCF Service with BasicHttpBinding binding, consumed from BizTalk

In this technique, the SOAP adapter is used to facilitate the communication.BizTalk consumes the WCF service by making a w

reference to the WCF service exposed over basicHttpBinding. The basicProfileBindingconforms to WS-I Basic Profile

standards. The SOAP Send Adapter can be used to interface with such an endpoint.


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In order to consume a service that uses BasicHttpBinding:

1. Add a web reference to the WSDL at endpoint address.

2. This creates the necessary web port and the multipart messages that need to be exchanged between BizTalk and

WCF.

3. Transform source messages to request schema messages. Such messages can be sent from orchestrations.

The following is the detailed sequence of steps to be followed for consuming a WCF service exposed over the

BasicHttpBinding:

1. Create a new web site using the WCF service template as shown below:

2.

3.

4. Figure 4: Creating a new WCF Service project

5.

6. Define the service contract and the implementation as shown earlier. However, modify the bindings to use

basicHttpBindingas the WCF service template creates wsHttpBindingby default. Also set the

byPassProxyOnLocal=truefor the basicHttpBindingconfigurations in the web.config file that is created.

7. An important snippet of the web.config file for basicHttpBindingis as follows:

8.
http://-/?-


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9.

10. It defines the service contract of the WCF service and the binding information for basicHttpBinding. Refer to the

MSDN sitefor more information on basicHttpBinding.

11. Publish the WCF service onto a local IIS.

12. Create a new BizTalk project that will consume the WCF service set up using basicHttpBinding.

13. From the BizTalk project, add a web reference to the WCF service. This creates the web port and the request-

response message that BizTalk uses to consume the WCF service. This is shown in the figures below:

14.

15.

16. Figure 5: Adding a web reference to the WCF service

17.

18. The web port type and multipart messages are automatically created after addition of the web reference as seen

the orchestration view. Logical ports can now be added to the orchestration design surface. The WCF service can

invoked from the orchestration by passing the request message type to the port and subsequently receiving the

response.

19. Note: The steps remain the same when consuming the WCF service from BizTalk Server 2004 or BizTalk Server 200

WCF Service Exposed on WsHttpBindingEndpoint

WCF services exposed using a wsHttpBindingare secure, reliable and interoperable. These services implement WS-

Reliable messaging for reliability and WS-Security for message-level security. A WSE-enabled adapter is required to call

services exposed using wsHttpBinding. Microsoft has released a BTS04-compatible WSE 2.0 Adapter which can be used

for communication. However, currently, there is no BTS06-compatible adapter for WSE 3.0 available from Microsoft. One

can either write a custom adapter or use a third-party adapter like the one provided by TwoConnect.

Microsoft WSE 2.0 Adapter

The WSE 2.0 Adapter, available for BTS04, can be used for interfacing. The supported standards are WS-Security (user /

password token, Kerberos and X509) and WS-Reliability. More details are available on the MSDN web site.

BizTalk WSE 2.0 adapter Product Information.

The WSE 2.0 adapter can be downloaded from hereand the SP1 is available here.

A detailed walk through on using the WSE 2.0 adapter is available in this TechNet article.
http://www.microsoft.com/technet/prodtechnol/biztalk/biztalk2004/planning/walkwse.mspxhttp://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyId=0767C9A4-E4CE-49E0-B2B6-8D64E3545BDC&displaylang=enhttps://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyId=BA643360-E9DC-4FC5-8D60-8E6C5ECA7861&displaylang=enhttp://www.microsoft.com/biztalk/evaluation/adapter/adapters/wse/default.mspxhttp://msdn2.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms731361.aspx


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WSE 3.0 Adapter from TwoConnect

TwoConnect has published a WSE 3.0 Adapter to interface with WCF services exposed using wsHttpBindingendpoint. Yo

can find more details on the adapter at http://adapterworx.com/cs/products/wse3.0.aspx .

For connecting to WCF using the WSE 3.0 Adapter from TwoConnect, follow the steps given below:

1. Create and publish a WCF service according to the steps listed in the basicHttpBindingsection. An important

snippet from the web.config file is as follows:

2.

3.

4. Create a new BizTalk project. Run the WSE 3.0 Adapter Wizard against the WCF service URL. This helps create the

necessary schemas and port types required to interact with the WCF service. To run the WSE 3.0 Adapter, do the

following:

Right click BizTalk project andselect Add Generated Items> WSE Adapter.

Specify the wsdl to the WCF service created.

Select the service contract BizTalk uses to interact with the WCF service as shown in the figures below:

5.

6.

7. Figure 6: Referencing WSDL URL information in the Schema Generation Wizard

8.
http://adapterworx.com/cs/products/wse3.0.aspx


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9.

10. Figure 7: Specifying the web methods in the Schema Generation Wizard

11.

12. Assign appropriate message types to the multipart messages created by the WSE 3.0 Adapter Wizard. Also create

port type based on the one added by the wizard. You can consume the WCF service from an orchestration using t

ports created above.

WCF Service Endpoint on MsmqIntegrationBinding

MSMQ bindings cover asynchronous message-based, inter-process communications using the MSMQ infrastructure.

MSMQ provides the infrastructure to send messages across machines in a secure and reliable environment and in a

transactional scope. This messaging pattern helps build scalable applications as the number of blocked and wait threads

minimal.

The sample described in this section, works as follows:

1. BizTalk receives an invoice.

2. It submits the message using an MSMQ Adapter to the private MSMQ queue present on a remote system where t

WCF service is hosted.

3. The WCF service picks up the message from the MSMQ queue, finds out the stock status, updates the message, a

posts it back to the same queue.

4. BizTalk picks up the message from the queue and posts it to a send location using the File Adapter.

5. The WCF service is hosted inside a console application.

Steps

1. Define the service contract as shown below:

2.

[ServiceContract(Namespace = "http://Infosys.BiztTalkWCF.Samples")]

[ServiceKnownType(typeof(InvoiceType))]

public interface IOrderProcessor

{

// Specify One Way OperationContract set to true so MSMQ will not

// wait for a return value from the WCF service, and not

// correlated reply message is returned back by the WCF service.


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[OperationContract(IsOneWay = true, Action = "*")]

void SubmitInvoice(MsmqMessage msg);

}

3. Note the use of the ServiceKnownType attribute. This helps expose .NET Types to the service so that they can be

serialized and de-serialized when required. InvoiceType is a class with fields having one-to-one mapping. The sou

schema elements are present in the BizTalk message.

4. Also note that since the message is passed to the WCF service over MSMQ, the parameter type of SubmitInvoice

OperationContract will be of type MsmqMessage.

5. Define the class for ServiceKnownType i.e. InvoiceType. The class definition for InvoiceType is given below:

6.

[Serializable]

public class InvoiceType

{

public string InvNo;

public DateTime InvDate;

public int ProdID;

public int Qty;

public int Price; public int StockAvail;

public string Remarks;

}

7.

8. This class is marked with the Serializableattribute so that the objects of this type can be serialized and de-

serialized when required.

9. The service receives an input message from MSMQ and posts a response. Code for the WCF service is given belo

and is hosted inside a console application:

10.

public class OrderProcessorService : IOrderProcessor

{

//We have used a Transactional Queue hence done these settings

//for the OperationBehavior attribute

[OperationBehavior(TransactionScopeRequired = true,

TransactionAutoComplete = true)]

public void SubmitInvoice(MsmqMessage ordermsg)

{

InvoiceType invoice = (InvoiceType)ordermsg.Body;

int prodID = (Int32)invoice.ProdID; SqlConnection con = new SqlConnection("Data

Source=localhost;Initial Catalog=Northwind;Integrated

Security=SSPI")

SqlCommand command = new SqlCommand("SELECT * FROM Product WHERE Product.Prod

tID= prodID");

command.Connection = con;

con.Open();

SqlDataReader dr = command.ExecuteReader();

int val = 0;

while (dr.Read())

{

//Find matching product ID supplied with the Product ID in


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//the Product Table.

if (prodID == ((int)dr.GetValue(0)))

{

//Check the Stock with the ReOrder Level

if (((int)dr.GetValue(2)) >= ((int)dr.GetValue(3)))

{

val = dr.GetInt32(2);

}

}

}

dr.Close();

con.Close();

invoice.StockAvail = val;

ordermsg.Body = invoice;

SendResponse(ordermsg);

}

private void SendResponse(MsmqMessage msgtomsmq)

{

OrderResponseClient client = new

OrderResponseClient("OrderClient");

MsmqMessage msmqmsg = new

MsmqMessage(msgtomsmq.Body);

client.GetStockInfo(msmqmsg);

client.Close();

}

//Host the WCF service within this EXE console application.

public static void Main()

{

string queueName =

ConfigurationManager.AppSettings["orderQueueName"];

if (!MessageQueue.Exists(queueName))

MessageQueue.Create(queueName, true);

// Create a ServiceHost

using (ServiceHost serviceHost = new

ServiceHost(typeof(OrderProcessorService)))

{

serviceHost.Open();

Console.WriteLine("The service is ready.");

Console.WriteLine("Press to terminate service.");

Console.ReadLine();

}

}

}

11. Implement the interface and logic for sending the message from the WCF service to MSMQ as shown below. Note

that this custom client has to be created since there is no implicit service contract between WCF and MSMQ.

12.

[ServiceContractAttribute(Namespace=

"http://Infosys.BizTalkWCF.Samples")]

public interface IOrderProcessorResponse

{

[OperationContractAttribute(IsOneWay = true, Action = "*")]

void GetStockInfo(MsmqMessage msg);

}


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[GeneratedCodeAttribute("System.Runtime.Serialization", "3.0.0.0")]

[System.Runtime.Serialization.DataContractAttribute()]

public partial class OrderResponseClient:

ClientBase,IOrderProcessorResponse

{

public OrderResponseClient(){ }

public OrderResponseClient(string configurationName)

: base(configurationName){ }

public OrderResponseClient(System.ServiceModel.Channels.Binding

binding, System.ServiceModel.EndpointAddress address)

: base(binding, address) { }

public void GetStockInfo (MsmqMessage msg)

{

base.Channel.GetStockInfo(msg);

}

}

13. The following are the important sections of the app.config file for msmqIntegrationbinding :

a. Define an attribute in the appSettings for configuring the Queue name.

b.

c. The service definition for exposing an endpoint that uses msmqIntegrationBinding is as follows:

d.

e. On the client-side, the following client endpoint definition is required to consume the service:

14.

15. Create a private transactional queue named myqueue using the MSMQ manager

16. Create the Biztalk orchestration which will post and receive the message to and from MSMQ.


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Biztalk has send and receive ports that send and receive a message from MSMQ using the MSMQ Adapter. The port

binding is set to the "specify later" option. After deployment, set the properties of the send and receive ports for MS

bindings from the BizTalk Explorer as follows:

Figure 8: Configuring the MSMQ Send Adapter

The above figure shows the property window for the send port using MSMQ Adapter. Note that we have specified the

name of the destination queue and set the transactional property of the queue to true.


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Figure 9: Configuring the MSMQ Receive Adapter

The above figure shows the property window for the receive port using the MSMQ Adapter. The queue name has been

specified and the transactional property is set to true.

In case of BizTalk Server 2004, the MSMQ Adapter needs to be downloaded. The adapter can be downloaded from here

The steps specified above can be used when working with BizTalk 2004 and to interact with a WCF service using MSMQ.

WCF Service Endpoint on NetTCPBinding

NetTCPBindinguses the Transmission Control Protocol (TCP)channel to interact with the client and service. There is no

BizTalk adapter for TCP, hence the only option available while using the netTCP-bound endpoint is to employ the proxy

pattern discussed below.

NetTCPBindingsupports a duplex channel of communication the service calls on the client interface to return the

response without the client needing to listen explicitly.

Transactions

In order to execute a sequence of process steps as a transaction, the expression shapes should be in atomic transaction

scope. Any exceptions occurring on the service call would show up as scope exception, which will also abort the ambient

transaction.

Security

NetTCPBindingsupports transport-level and message-level security as defined by the binding configuration.
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Interoperability

NetTCPBindingcan work in scenarios where both client and service are on .NET. The working of this sample for consumi

WCF service exposed over a NetTCPBinding is as follows:

Detailed steps

1. Define and implement the service contract as shown earlier.

2. Create a console application to host the WCF service.

3. Generate a proxy class using svcutil.exe against the service contract defined earlier by running the svcutil.exe tool

shown below. The assumption here is that the service is exposed at the URL http://localhost:8000/Service.svc. The

URL should be replaced with the actual address of the service.

4. svcutil.exe http://localhost:8000/Service.svc?wsdl

5. Next step is to run the svcutil.exe against the WSDL and XSD files generated as a result of the command mentione

above.

6. svcutil.exe *.wsdl *.xsd

7. A proxy class and configuration file will generated.

8. Add the generated app.config and proxy class to the Windows class library project and build the class library

project.

9. Create a BizTalk project which will contain the orchestration process. The sample code referenced in this article

contains the actual orchestration.

10. Add a reference to the class library we created from the BizTalk project. Declare an instance of the proxy class , wh

is present in the reference dialog box.

11. Invoke the WCF service from within the expression shape in the orchestration:

12.

nettcpClient = new WCFServiceClient();

intResult = nettcpClient.GetStockInfo(MsgInvRequest.Details.ProdID);

13. Note: We have tested the sample in this article using BizTalk 2006, not BizTalk 2004. While the steps for both are th

same, working with WCF on a BizTalk Server 2004 machine will require installation of the .NET framework 3.0. This

because a reference has to be added to a project that contains code generated using WCF.

14. The following is the important section of the app.config for netTCPBinding:

15. Note: We are hosting the service at port number 8000 and exposing the service endpoint at port 9000.

16.


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contract="IMetadataExchange" />

17.

18. Note: In the following code snippet, we are specifying the transport-level security and the credential type:

19.

The app.config is as follows:

In this approach explained above, we have a reference to the WCF proxy inside BizTalk. We are invoking the WCF-expose

service using the Expression shape.

The recommended approach is to send the message from BizTalk in plain XML format to a .NET wrapper class. This clas

will create a .NET object from within its implementation and then call the WCF proxy. The transformations will be done in

BizTalk but the deserialization will be handled in the .NET assembly.

Message translation is best handled in BizTalk via the mapper and the rich set of functoids. Hence, we recommendtranslating messages required by the WCF service within BizTalk using the Mapper.

However, the WCF service may expect and return a .NET Type and not an XML. In such a case, converting the XML messa

is best done in the .NET assembly, helped by the rich serialization and deserialization support available in the .NET

Framework.

The following table summarizes the same:

Done in Orchestration? Done in .NET Assembly?

Transformation Recommended (use BizTalk Mapper) Not recommended. Is an implementation overhead


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Serialization and

De-Serialization

Not recommended Recommended

Exposing BizTalk Orchestrations as WCF Services

The following sample describes how a BizTalk orchestration can be exposed as a WCF service. The steps are:

Convert the orchestration to a web service using the orchestration Web Services Publishing Wizard.

Modify the web service to a WCF service by manually editing the code contents of the web services as described i

the 'Configuration' section below.

Configuration

1. Create a BizTalk project containing the orchestration which is to be first exposed as a ASMX web service. The

orchestration process is as shown below and the actual code is present in the attached sample code:

2.

3. Figure 10: BizTalk Orchestration to be exposed as WCF service

4.

5. Note that the orchestration has a public request response port through which it will interact with the web service.

6. Deploy the BizTalk project and run the BizTalk Web Services Publishing Wizard against the project.


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7.

8. Figure 11: BizTalk Web Services Publishing Wizard

9.

10.

11. Figure 12: Selecting the BizTalk assembly to be exposed as service

12.


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13.

14. Figure 13: Selecting Orchestration Port that is to be exported

15.

16.

17. Figure 14: Specifying properties for ASP.NET web service project

18.

19. Once the orchestration is published as a web service, follow the steps below to convert the Web service into a WC

service. Both services can co-exist. This benefits existing clients since they can still make service calls via a regular

Web service even as they use the WCF service. WCF-aware new clients can make WCF service calls.

a. Open the BTS web service (created via the web service publishing wizard in previous steps) solution in Visu

Studio 2005 (VS 2005).

b. Add a reference to System.ServiceModel1. This namespace addition includes WCF in the solution

c. In the code-behind file, add a reference to the System.ServiceModel namespace.

d. Add the WCF ServiceContract attribute and give an appropriate namespace to the service contract:

e. [ServiceContract(Namespace="http://Infosys.invoice/BTSWSasWCFService/")]


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f. Assign the ServiceContract attribute to the WCF service class that defines the service contract. The service

contract defines the operations the WCF service is performing.

g. Define the WCF OperationContract attribute for the web method defined in the following class :

h.

[OperationContract]

public Invoice.XsdTypesBody.InvoiceResult

Operation_1([System.Xml.Serialization.XmlElementAttribute

(Namespace="http://Invoice.InvoiceSource",

ElementName="InventoryRequest")]

Invoice.XsdTypesBody.InventoryRequest part){}

i. Create a WCF Service file (.svc) and rename it to the same web service class name as the orchestration nam

Add the following code snippet to the file:

j.

().

k. Edit the web.config file to add WCF-specific XML tags as indicated below. This web.config file is created wh

the BizTalk orchestration is converted to a web service.

l.

m. Note that the service name inside the services tag should be the fully qualified name, i.e. with namespace, a

should match the service in the WCF service (.svc) file.

n. Build the solution


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o. Now, the BTS orchestration is exposed both as a web service as well as a WCF service that is ready to be

consumed as shown below:

p. BTS as web service

http://localhost/Invoice_Proxy/Invoice_InventoryProcessWS_Port_2.asmx

BTS as WCF service

http://localhost/Invoice_Proxy/Invoice_InventoryProcessWS_Port_2.svc

20. These services can now be consumed from a client. The sample code has been tested with the WCF binding set as

basicHttpBinding.

Issues and Troubleshooting

1. To add a web reference to a WCF service in a BizTalk project, we need to create the service using the File > New

Web Site option and select the WCF service template. WCF service cannot be created using New > Project option.

2. If Visual Studio is unable to create code files when adding web reference to the WCF service created, it could be a

proxy authentication issue. Check the proxy settings for the browser under Tools > Internet options > Connections

LAN Settings.

3. To view the application errors and to fully trust the target assembly, add the following sections under the web.con

file for all scenarios:

4.

5. When sending messages from BizTalk to MSMQ we need to set the target namespace property of the schema to

blank. If an instance of the schema is generated with the target namespace property specified, the WCF service is

unable to process the message it picks up from MSMQ.

6. For e.g., we can have a schema as follows:

7.

1

1999-05-31

2

10

10

100

8. And not as follows:

9.

1

1999-05-31

2

10

10

100

10. When pointing to a remote MSMQ, the queue name needs to be specified in the following format:

FormatName:Direct=OS:machinename\\private$\\queue


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Refer to this blogentry for more details.

11. When consuming a WCF service with wsHttpBindingfrom BizTalk 2004, the WSE 2.0 Adapter is unable to underst

the WSDL generated by the WCF service. The WSE 3.0 Adapter depends on .NET Framework 3.0 which has to be

installed on the BizTalk 2004 system. It should solve the issue of consuming a WCF service with wsHttpBindingfro

a BizTalk 2004 application.

Conclusion

Creating services using Service-Oriented principles is key in many software projects and WCF is a very good framework f

such a task. It enables developers to write the service logic once and expose the service over various endpoints which can

use different bindings like web services, MSMQ, TCP, etc. Microsoft BizTalk Server can then be used to orchestrate the

services and implement business processes.

This article presented options for enterprises that use BizTalk Server 2004 or BizTalk Server 2006 and wish to expose or

consume WCF services from BizTalk. However, enterprises should look to upgrading to BizTalk Server 2006 R2 that will ha

native support and out-of-the-box adapters for communicating with WCF services. The options given in this paper are

meant for scenarios where an upgrade to BizTalk Server 2006 R2 is not possible.

About the authors

Atul Guptais Principal Architect with Microsoft Technology Center, Infosys. He works on BizTalk Server 2006, BizTalk Serv

2006 R2 and Windows Presentation Foundation from .NET Framework 3.0 stack.

Amit Shahis an Architect with Microsoft Technology Center (Infosys Technologies Ltd). He is currently working on the

creation of integration solutions on the Microsoft platform using technologies like BizTalk Server, .NET Framework 3.0,

Office SharePoint Server 2007 and SQL Server 2005.

Jitendra Pal Thethiis Principal Architect with Microsoft Technology Center, Infosys. He is based out of Redmond and pa

of the Catalytic IT Solution Sales team and also the Infosys-MS Alliance team.

About the reviewers

Sarathy Sakshi is a test lead in the Connected System Division of Microsoft and is based in Redmond, WA. He has worke

in various areas of BizTalk server and has most recently been working on the WCF Adapter.

Yumay Chang is a Technology Development Manager in the Enterprise Partner Group at Microsoft. She leads the partner

strategy on SOA and Business Process Management and supports partner in their adoption of Microsoft technologies.

2014 Microsoft
http://infosysblogs.com/microsoft/2007/02/msmq_sending_message_to_remote.html

BizTalk Server and WCF Integration

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