BPEL4WS stands for Business Process Execution Language for Web Services (commonly named only just BPEL).
It is pure xml, it is only a new standard developped by IBM, Microsoft and BEA. (Used by orchestrator solutions like Websphere Business Integration or Bizztalk) There are a few open source solutions, but not a lot since it is relatively new. There is twister, which is at its early stage or ActiveBPEL which has just reached version 1.0 and is developed in java and uses axis to take care of the web services part. To make it simple, you define the process in BPEL. You run ActiveBPEL in tomcat and deploy the process. Then you access it like any other web service. Your BPEL could be a simple process that would do exactly what Arijit suggested. It waits for a client connection, then there is a timer and at regular times it queries your server web service, gets the result and send it back to the registered client. This way your web services can still work like they do today, and you have a new layer in the middle which takes care of the business logic. Of course it means a little more work right now to set everything running but it would be the best solution in my opinion, and a lot easier to expand it afterwards. The only negative point is that there is no free GUI tool to design BPEL now (not for a commercial use). So you have to learn the BPEL standard and code it yourself. But if you understand wsdl, bpel is not hard to get too. here are a few links that can help you: http://www-106.ibm.com/developerworks/library/ws-bpel/ http://www-128.ibm.com/developerworks/webservices/library/ws-bpelcol.html http://www.activebpel.org/ http://www.smartcomps.org/twister/ Daniel > I never used BPEL before, is it compatible with java or is it something > works on its own? > > -----Original Message----- > From: Daniel Beland [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] > Sent: 28 October 2004 13:37 > To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] > Subject: RE: Automating web service > > > > Wouldn't it be easier with BPEL? > Some kind of suscribe/publish message queue? > > ActiveBPEL is a free open source BPEL orchestrator which uses axis to > produce their web services. It would not be too hard to adapt your > current > web services with it. > > Daniel > > >> The client probably needs to register once - otherwise how would the >> service know where to send the stuff? So, a probable solution can be: >> >> 1. The client registers once and provides some means (some URI) where >> the server will send its stuff - shouldn't be a synchronous procedure > - >> the server will either send something via ftp/gridFTP/SMTP etc...if > you >> make this synchronous, it means the client will also have to be >> running... >> >> 2. The server continues to run, and sends the object or whatever at >> specific times - can be implemented using timers/counters... >> >> Seems do-able... >> >> Cheers >> Arijit >> >> >> ________________________________ >> >> From: Suzy Fynes [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] >> Sent: 28 October 2004 12:11 >> To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] >> Subject: RE: Automating web service >> >> >> Kinda of but an object would be sent to the client server. >> >> Is it do-able? >> >> -----Original Message----- >> From: Arijit Mukherjee [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] >> >> Sent: 28 October 2004 12:10 >> To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] >> Subject: RE: Automating web service >> >> Sounds like a notification service... >> >> Cheers >> Arijit >> >> >> ________________________________ >> >> From: Suzy Fynes [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] >> Sent: 28 October 2004 12:08 >> To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] >> Subject: Automating web service >> >> >> Hi, >> >> Can anyone tell me if its possible to automate an axis >> web service i.e. as oppose to a client making a request when they want >> information that the service sends out the information daily >> >> Thanks >> Suzy >> > >
