BPM Events, the rule engine of Business Process Server, enables you to create rules that manage business processes and messages. The BPM Events engine is implemented in Java and runs on any platform supporting a Java Virtual Machine (UNIX, Windows, Linux, etcetera) or native compiler. It has a small footprint and is easily installed and loaded.
In BPM Events, rules in online applications serve the following associated objectives:
Monitoring business messages/events and generate dynamic reports and alarms.
Controlling business processes.
The integration of report objects with rule processing is a unique feature of BPM Events.
BPM Events rules implement a wide range of actions, including:
Generating new messages/events — BPM Events can either immediately generate an event (for example, starting or terminating a workstep generates an event) or create an advanced time construct scheduled for a later date (for example, defining business time, time intervals, or scheduling). BPM Events defines rules with a rule language that can detect and describe complex patterns of events spanning long periods of time. The rule language uses an indexed event cache to store events of interest, and relies on event storage and queuing in a database.
Generating e-mails or alarms — BPM Events can trigger the sending of an e-mail or an alarm when specified conditions are met.
Calling external adapters and performers — Adapters to third-party event sources can be easily added and even plugged in at run-time. BPM Events is designed to work with external event handlers and with external management systems that operate efficiently in their particular domain. It can receive and send events from and to Enterprise Management Systems. For example, using an adapter to Unicenter TNG, it can obtain and monitor data from an Unicenter SNMP agent, as well as update MIB variables in a Unicenter MIB database.
Providing native JMS support — BPM Events has a built-in "adapter" that communicates with JMS. The JMS event channel contains JMS listeners, which listen to JMS queues, and map the JMS messages into BPM Eventss.
Updating and saving a report — Special emphasis has been given to the dynamic aspect of online operations: rules and reports can be dynamically created, loaded, saved and modified without shutting down the engine. The recovery function allows for restoring the latest valid state at any time, with minimal overhead on operations.
Managing the event cache for improved performance — Optimization features, including indexing of rules and cross-indexing of events for fast correlation, provide a thorough scalability unequalled by other rule systems less focused on event processing.
Supporting failure recovery — Given the mission-critical nature of business events, BPM Events now contains an advanced failure recovery technology. Whether shutdown occurs normally or accidentally, the BPM Events engine does not lose critical data. Its internal state can be entirely recovered from the repository stored in the database. When restarted, the engine reprocesses all pending events, after having recovered its last stable internal state.
Monitoring business messages/events and generate dynamic reports and alarms.
