MuleSoft Summit in Amsterdam

Last Wednesday I went to the MuleSoft Summit in Amsterdam to learn more about Mulesoft and their vision for the future of integration. The following topics / presentations were given during the day:

• API-led Connectivity: Driving Digital Transformation - Guy Murphy, MuleSoft Solution Principal - Strategic Accounts EMEA
• Lean Systems: Our experience in integration industry - Stijn Decneut
• Hybrid Integration Platform:  Foundational Infrastructure for a Digital Business - Guy Murphy, MuleSoft Solution Principal - Strategic Accounts EMEA
• API-led Connectivity - Paul Crerand, MuleSoft Director Solution Consulting EMEA
• "How" to enable Digital Transformation - Nick Cochran, MuleSoft Senior Director EMEA Customer Success
• Anypoint Platform: High-Level Roadmap - Paul Crerand, MuleSoft Director Solution Consulting EMEA

Of course these cover lot of content, so I will write about a few 3 industry trends that I found interesting. But first, a bit more on Mulesoft!

About Mulesoft

MuleSoft is a software company headquartered in San Francisco, but have offices around the world (including Amsterdam). Started in 2006, the company's Anypoint Platform of integration products are designed to tie together software as a service (SaaS) and on-premises software.

Mulesoft is also the only leader in all three Gartner Magic Quadrants:

Three new industry Trends

1. SOAP (WSDL) vs. REST (RAML)

Source: google.com/trends

Some organizations think that REST is still just for mobile and performance gains, however that is simply not true. It can be said that one reason SOA failed is that services were build for the consumer, and not for the customer.

SOAP’s pitfall is that it has become way too complex and is not human readable. Consider the example below:

• Customers don’t care about servers.
• Customers don’t care about policies.
• Customers work with whoever is the most (capable &) convenient, at that moment.

Just because you create it does not mean someone will use it.

When designing your API’s focus on your core business capabilities, and expose them as conveniently as possible. REST APIs can make connecting to a business as convenient as browsing their website. Just compare above example to below:

2. The new role of IT

"By the end of 2017 Demand for Enterprise Mobile Apps Will Outstrip Available Development Capacity Five to One" - Gartner

Thus, IT can no longer build the apps, IT must govern and supply the data (via API’s).

So, how do you get started on this? This leads to industry trend number 3...

3. Hybrid Integration Platform

Challenges:

• Enterprises have access to unprecedented amounts of data. Where are the API’s?

• “Everything will be digital and everything will connect.”

Solution:

Hybrid integration platform (HIP).

Definition:

“A hybrid integration platform is on-premises and cloud-based, integration technologies securely connected so that it supports the integration of on-premises endpoints, cloud endpoints and the combination of the two, for all integration patterns.” - Gartner

Thus, modern enterprises need to have a HIP strategy. There are different ways to tackle this, but of course the Mulesoft recommendation is to use their Anypoint Platform: “One Platform to connect any application, data source, or API, to support HIP needs”

iPaaS Platform Features

• Integration Services Development Platform Governance Platform
• Life Cycle Management Platform
• Content Marketplace Collaboration
• Monitoring, Management, and Administration
• Secure Connectivity to On- premises Platform

Application Integration Suite Features

• Communications Transformation
• Orchestration Intelligent Routing Adapters
• Legacy B2B Gateway
• Monitoring, Management and Administration

API Management Platform Features

• Policy Management
• Security, SLAs, ...
• Policy Enforcement
• Central PAP, Distributed PEPs
• Security
• Security Extensions
• Token Mapping, Redaction
• Management of Traffic
• Messages Interfaces
• Developer Support API Customization

All in all I enjoyed the day, and I am looking forward to start playing and learning more about the Mulesoft Anypoint Platform!

Code Snippet Icons in JDeveloper

When using the 'Code Snippets' feature in JDeveloper you have the option to browse for a .png file to use as a icon. However, I've found that this does not work (in both Jdev 11g and 12c) even though in the main window it will load the correct .png, it does not use it on the Components Pallet.

However, as a workaround I've found that you can use the build-in icons that are located in the jar files, but you need to know their names and paths. Thus, here is a list of the jar files that can be used for icons.

• [MIDDLEWARE_HOME]\oracle_common\modules\oracle.javatools_[JDEV_VERSION]\oicons.jar
• [MIDDLEWARE_HOME]\oracle_common\modules\oracle.javatools_[JDEV_VERSION]\javatools-nodeps.jar

You can open each of these files, and view the icons inside that can be used. (You will need a tool such as 7-Zip to open / extract the jar)

You can then use the following path to reference the files with the correct filename:

• /oracle/javatools/icons/[filename].png

Now even though you don't have your own icons, you still at least can have different and more appropriate icons for your snippets. 

Oracle BPM Worklist details display error

I’ve had the issue several times on Oracle BPEL Worklist app where the details of the task is not displayed with the error ‘Server not found’.
The the reason for this seems to be that the page is trying to resolve a internal load balancer address, and not the external facing client side load balancer that the browser can access. To fix this, do the following steps:
Go to the BPEL process of the specific composite in Enterprise Manager. Then click on the Human task under the Component Metrics tab.
You’ll then see the internal address and port that cannot be resolved from your web browser.
Replace these with the external address as well as port. (Most probably the one used when accessing the Worklist app url) Click “Apply”
 
Your Worklist app should now load.

Credit: Thanks to my colleague Ben Taljaard for helping to solve this issue.