Middleware Summit
BizTalk Server & Windows Workflow Foundation Day

BizTalk Server 2006 builds on the core architecture of BizTalk Server 2004, making it the must-have tool for application integration, B2B, and business process management. Learn about the new features and deployment options in a full day of sessions, and find out how WF will become the next-generation workflow engine.

Introduction to Windows Workflow Foundation
Paul Andrew, Microsoft
Windows Workflow Foundation is the programming model, engine and tools for quickly building workflow enabled applications on Windows. This session is a code-focused introduction to Windows Workflow Foundation. We cover the “hello world” of developing workflow enabled applications and take you to a level where you can be confident choosing workflow for everyday applications. We will present the basics of developing, designing, and debugging workflow solutions.

Around the BizTalk Server 2006 Design Environment in 60 Minutes
BizTalk Server 2006 includes a set of Visual Studio 2005 designers and a runtime engine which enable developers to assemble massively scalable, message based, process centric applications in far less time than ever before. In this session we’ll look at the XSD schema, XSLT mapper and message pipeline designers while exploring how BizTalk messaging handles flexible multi-format endpoint communications and management. Time is also spent examining the orchestration designer, a graphical domain specific language for system workflow, and studying the design and runtime characteristics of the engine. It will also touch on the built-in instrumentation and monitoring functionality included with BizTalk Server 2006.

BizTalk Server 2006 and Windows Workflow Foundation
Michael Woods and Paul Andrew, Microsoft
The two facets of workflow are system based workflow and human based workflow.  System workflow is the domain of BizTalk Server and Windows Workflow Foundation now provides a developer platform for human workflow in addition to system workflow.  This session looks at how a developer can take advantage of the enterprise scalability of BizTalk Server 2006 with the added benefit of human workflow using Windows Workflow Foundation.  To do this we will show a developer view of BizTalk Server 2006 connected with a workflow enabled application developed with Windows Workflow Foundation all in Visual Studio 2005.  We will also show how developers can build document centric workflow in the next version of Windows Sharepoint Services and how this can be used with BizTalk Server to create human-to-system workflow.

Creating Custom Activities for Windows Workflow Foundation
Gerard Walsh
This session follows on from the workflow introduction to describe the building block of workflows known as activities. Think of activities in a workflow like controls in an ASP.NET form.  Activities are used to encapsulate execution logic, communicate outside the workflow and to decompose a workflow into reusable components. In building workflow enabled applications you will often be building activities. We will walk you through the simple process of creating custom activities and describe how they work and their extensibility.

Future Directions: Beyond BizTalk Server 2006
BizTalk Server is at the center of a connected architecture. In 2006, key technologies for communications and workflow become available as part of the Windows platform. This session discusses the community supported Windows Communication Foundation adapter for BizTalk Server, and covers the roadmap for workflow integration with BizTalk Server. In addition, this session also covers future BizTalk innovations on developer productivity where we demonstrate two new prototypes in this area. The first prototype serializes design-time meta-data into a staging file (.bts), rather than working off the live server, enabling design-time creation of applications. The second prototype dramatically simplifies the user experience in mapping complex documents.