In this exercise, you’ll create the activities that will be used to capture order information for the Log Cabin Hardware division.

1. Open Excel, and select BAM Activity from the BAM menu. Click the New Activity button, and create a new activity called Header that contains the items listed in Table 12-1.

   

2. Click the New Activity button again, and create a second new activity called LineItem that contains the items shown in Table 12-2.

   

3. Click OK to close the Activity Definition dialog box.
4. In the Business Activity Monitoring View Creation Wizard, create a simple view called LogCabins that con- tains all the items from both activities, but no measures, dimensions, aliases, or durations.
5. If you completed Exercise 5-1, save the spreadsheet in your Excel Workbooks folder. If you didn’t complete that exercise, save the spreadsheet in any convenient folder. If you’re using Excel 2003, name the workbook Chap_12.xls. If you’re using Excel 2007, name the workbook Chap_12.xlsx.
6. Open a new command- line window as an administrator.
7. Change directory to your Excel Workbooks folder.
8. If you are using Excel 2003, run the following commands:
   path %path%;C:Program FilesMicrosoft BizTalk Server 2009Tracking
bm deploy-all –DefinitionFile:Chap_12.xls
bm add- account -AccountName:<your account name> -View:LogCabins
9. If you are using Excel 2007, run the following commands:
   path %path%;C:Program FilesMicrosoft BizTalk Server 2009Tracking
bm deploy-all –DefinitionFile:Chap_12.xlsx
bm add-account -AccountName:<your account name> -View:LogCabins

The sample BizTalk application used in this chapter is very simple; it has one receive port, one send port, and no orchestrations. In this exercise, you’ll examine the sample application that you’ll use as the source for your data.

1. Run the installation batch file for the sample code at C:pro bam sampleschapter twelve prepare.bat.
2. Using Visual Studio 2008, open the solution Relate.sln in C:pro bam sampleschapter twelve code.
3. The solution contains two schemas and a receive pipeline. One schema is the envelope that contains the order header information, and the other schema represents an individual line item. Examine the properties of the Envelope schema by clicking the schema node and pressing F4. You will notice that the Envelope prop- erty is set to Yes.
4. In Solution Explorer, double-click the pipeline to open it in the Pipeline Designer (see Figure 12-1). It contains only one component, the XML disassembler. The envelope schema for the disassembler is Envelope.XSD. The document schema for the disassembler is LineItem.XSD.
   

   Figure 12-1. The Pipeline Designer with a receive pipeline

5. Open the BizTalk Administration Console, and examine the bindings that have been set up for the Relate application.
6. The folder C:pro bam sampleschapter twelvefiledropsdata contains three sample input files. Double-click one of the files to view it in Internet Explorer.
7. Copy one of the sample files to C:pro bam sampleschapter twelvefiledropsin, and then examine the folder C:pro bam sampleschapter twelvefiledropsout. You should notice that one output file exists for each line item in your input file.

Now you have created an activity and tested the BizTalk application. The next step is to create tracking profiles that capture information from the sample application.

1. From the Start menu, select BizTalk Server 2009 Tracking Profile Editor.

   Note For detailed instructions on the using the Tracking Profile Editor, see Chapter 6.

2. Click the link in the left- hand pane and select the Header activity. Click OK to display the Header activity in the TPE.
3. You will notice a new node type in the TPE. Because you defined two activities in the same workbook, the TPE assumes they are related and displays a relationship node called LineItem. Click the Select Event Source button near the top- right corner of the TPE, and then click Select Messaging Payload. The Select Event Source Parent Assembly dialog box will be displayed.
4. In the Select Event Source Parent Assembly dialog box, choose the Chapter Twelve assembly. Click the Next button to display the Select Schema dialog box.
5. In the Select Schema dialog box, choose the Envelope schema. Click the OK button to return to the TPE.
6. Drag the OrderNumber, CustomerName, and LumberType fields from the schema to the corresponding items in the activity.
7. Right-click the OrderNumber field, select Set Port Mappings, and then set the port to Ch12In. Repeat the pro- cess to set the ports for CustomerName and LumberType to Ch12In.

   The relationship between Header and LineItem requires a shared piece of data that can be used to relate the activities. In Chapter 6, you left the Activity ID node blank, and BAM generated a globally unique identifier (GUID) for the activity ID. In order to support related activities, you need a shared number that is available in both the line item and the header. The order number is shared between the header and the line item, so it’s ideal for the purpose of this exercise. In the header, you will use the order number as the activity ID.

8. Drag the OrderNumber field from the schema to the Activity ID node. This ensures that the order number will be stored in the activity’s ID field, instead of a random GUID.
9. Right-click the OrderNumber field under the Activity ID node, select Set Port Mappings, and then set the port to Ch12In.

   Note In the Header activity, leave the LineItem relationship node blank.

10. Select Apply Tracking Profile from the Tools menu to apply the tracking profile.
11. If you completed Exercise 5-1, select Save from the File menu to save the tracking profile into your Tracking Profiles folder. If you didn’t complete Exercise 5-1, save the tracking profile into any convenient folder.

    Figure 12-2 shows how the Header activity should now look in the TPE.

    

    Figure 12-2. The TPE showing the completed Header activity

12. From the File menu, select Import BAM Activity Definition. The Import BAM Activity Definition dialog box will be displayed.
13. Choose the LineItem activity, and then click the OK button.
14. Click the Select Event Source button near the top-right corner of the TPE, and then click Select Messaging Payload. The Select Event Source Parent Assembly dialog box will be displayed.
15. In the Select Event Source Parent Assembly dialog box, choose the Chapter Twelve assembly. Click the Next button to display the Select Schema dialog box.
16. In the Select Schema dialog box, choose the LineItem schema. Click the OK button to return to the TPE.
17. Drag the ConnectorType, Diameter, OrderNumber, and Quantity fields from the schema to the corresponding items in the activity.
18. Right-click the OrderNumber field, select Set Port Mappings, and then set the port to Ch12Out. Repeat the process to set the ports for ConnectorType, Diameter, and Quantity to Ch12Out.
19. The Header activity uses the order number as the activity ID. In the LineItem activity, you will store the order number in the Header relationship node. This will create a relationship between the two activities.
20. Drag the OrderNumber field from the schema to the Header relationship node. This creates a link between the two activities.
21. Right-click the OrderNumber field under the Activity ID node, select Set Port Mappings, and then set the port to Ch12Out.

    Note Don’t associate any data with the Activity ID node in the LineItem activity. If you were to use order number as the activity ID, only one line item could be written for each order number, and data would be lost.

    Figure 12-3 shows how the LineItem activity should now look in the TPE.

    

    Figure 12-3. The TPE showing the completed LineItem activity

22. Select Apply Tracking Profile from the Tools menu to apply the tracking profile.
23. If you completed Exercise 5-1, select Save from the File menu to save the tracking profile into your Tracking Profiles folder. If you didn’t complete Exercise 5-1, save the tracking profile into any convenient folder.

In this exercise, you will run the sample application and capture data, and then use the portal to look at the data.

1. Copy all three of the sample files from C:pro bam sampleschapter twelvefiledropsdata to C:pro bam sampleschapter twelvefiledropsin, and then examine the folder C:pro bam sampleschapter twelvefiledropsout. You should notice that several line items were created, one for each line item in your input files.
2. Using Internet Explorer, browse to http://localhost/bam.
3. In the left-hand navigation bar, you will see a list of views. One of the views should be the LogCabins view that you created in Exercise 12-1. Open the LogCabins view, and then click the Header activity under Activity Search (see Figure 12-4).
   

   Figure 12-4. The Activity Search view

4. In the Available Data and Milestones box of the Column Chooser, click CustomerName to select it.
5. Hold down the Shift key, and then click OrderNumber to select the other two column names.
6. Click the >> button to move all three column names to the Items to Show box.
7. Click the Execute Query button to display a list of orders that have been captured by BAM, as shown in Figure 12-5.
8. Double-click the header with order number 2, bringing up the detailed data for order number 2, as shown in Figure 12-6.
   

   Figure 12-5. The list of captured orders

   

   Figure 12-6. Detailed data about an order. There are three links in the Related Activities box near the bottom of the page.

9. In the Related Activities box at the bottom of the page, you should see a link for each line item associated with your order. Click one of these links, and it will take you to a detail page for that line item.
10. In the Line Item detail page, the Related Activities box contains a link to the header associated with that line item. Click the link to return to the Header detail page.

In this exercise, you’ll learn about the implementation that underlies related activities.

1. Start SQL Server Management Studio from the Start menu.
2. Navigate to the BAM Primary Import database, and open the Views folder.
3. Right-click the dbo.bam_LineItem_AllInstances view and select Open View. This will display a list of all the line items that have been captured by BAM (see Figure 12-7).
   

   Figure 12-7. The bam_LineItem_AllInstances view

4. Right-click the dbo.bam_LineItem_AllIRelationships view and select Open View. This will display a list of all the line items that have been captured by BAM (see Figure 12-8).

   The relationships of interest to you will have the string “Header” in the reference name. Each of these relationships will contain a GUID for the activity ID and the order number in the reference data.

5. Right-click the dbo.bam_Header_AllIRelationships view and select Open View. This view is empty; the rela- tionship implementation stores reference data with the referencing activity, not the referenced activity.

Figure 12-8. The bam_LineItem_AllRelationships view

In this exercise, you will populate the related activity using the BAM API. You’ll use the same activity as in the previous exercises so as to avoid taking the time to create another activity. You’ll also use console applications for simplicity.

1. If you didn’t complete the previous exercises in this chapter, run the batch file C:pro bam sampleschapter twelvefinished.bat. This will create the activities and view you need for the exercise.
2. Open Visual Studio 2008, and from the File menu select New Project. In the Project Types tree view, select Visual C# Windows projects, and then click Console Application. Create a new console application called RelateAPIDemo.
3. In Solution Explorer, right- click References, and then select Add Reference. Click the Browse tab, browse to the C:Program FilesMicrosoft Biztalk Server 2009Tracking folder, and click Microsoft. BizTalk.Bam.EventObservation.dll. Click the OK button to add a reference.
4. Replace the code in program.cs with the following:
   using System;
using System.Text;
using Microsoft.BizTalk.Bam.EventObservation;

namespace APIDemo
{
    class Program
    {
        static private string connString = "Integrated " +
            "Security=SSPI;Data Source=.;" +
            "Initial Catalog=BizTalkMsgBoxDb";
        static void Main(string[] args)
        {
            try
            {
                for (int orderNumber = 10;
                     orderNumber < 18;
                     orderNumber++)
                {
                    WriteHeader(orderNumber);
                    for (int itemNumber = 0;
                         itemNumber < (orderNumber - 8);
                         itemNumber++)
                    {
                        WriteLineItem(orderNumber, itemNumber);
                    }
                }
                return;
            }
            catch (Exception excep)
            {
                Console.WriteLine(
                    "Exception Caught : {0}",
                    excep.ToString());
            }
        }

        static void WriteHeader(int orderNumber)
        {
            //Create an instance of BufferedEventStream
            BufferedEventStream eventstream =
                new BufferedEventStream(connString, 0);

            //activityGuid will be used to uniquely
            //identify this row in the table
            string activityID = orderNumber.ToString();
            Console.WriteLine("Writing Order Number : {0}",
                activityID);

            //Write data to the activity
            eventstream.BeginActivity("Header", activityID);
            eventstream.UpdateActivity("Header", activityID,
                "OrderNumber", orderNumber.ToString(),
                "CustomerName", "Piggy Palaces",
                "LumberType", "Oak");
            eventstream.EndActivity("Header", activityID);

            //Flush the data to the database
            eventstream.Flush();

        }

        static void WriteLineItem(int orderNumber, int itemNumber)
        {

            //Create an instance of BufferedEventStream
            BufferedEventStream eventstream =
                new BufferedEventStream(connString, 0);

            //activityGuid will be used to uniquely
            //identify this row in the table
            string activityGuid = Guid.NewGuid().ToString();
            Console.WriteLine("Writing Line Item : {0}",
                activityGuid);

            //Write data to the activity
            eventstream.BeginActivity("LineItem", activityGuid);
            eventstream.UpdateActivity("LineItem", activityGuid,
                "OrderNumber", orderNumber.ToString(),
                "Diameter", (itemNumber + 3.2).ToString(),
                "Quantity", (5 * itemNumber + 4).ToString(),
                "ConnectorType", "Straight");
            //Set up the relationship
            eventstream.AddRelatedActivity("LineItem",
                activityGuid, "Header", orderNumber.ToString());
            eventstream.EndActivity("LineItem", activityGuid);

            //Flush the data to the database
            eventstream.Flush();
        }
    }
}

   The vast majority of the code in this sample should be familiar to you, as it closely resembles code in Chapter 10.

   Note More information on the BAM API is in Chapter 10.

   The new API method is AddRelatedActivity in the WriteLineItem method.

           //Set up the relationship
        eventstream.AddRelatedActivity(
               "LineItem", activityGuid,
               "Header", orderNumber.ToString());

   This method tells BAM that Header is a related activity, and that the relationship uses orderNumber as the foreign key.

5. Press F5 to run the application. (It’s best to only run the application once to avoid generating duplicate order numbers.)
6. Browse to http://localhost/bam and investigate the new rows that were added. You should see several new rows in the Header and LinkItem activities.
7. If you wish, continue examining the data by using SQL Server Management Studio.