Efficient: a toolset for enabling the analysis, the design and the generation of B2B ebXML transactions

Workshop chair :  Eric Dubois, eric.dubois@tudor.lu
Centre de Recherche Public Henri Tudor
Avenue J.F. Kennedy, 29
Luxembourg-Kirchnberg
http://www.citi.tudor.lu
Presenters: Eric Dubois, Bertrand Gregoire and Michael Schmitt.

MainTopic: Case-tool supported analysis and design of ebXML transactions

Goal: Replacing progressively EDI, ebXML is becoming the new international standard for the specification and deployment of complex B2B transactions.  Such transactions are inherently distributed, involving many actors exchanging XML messages with each other according to complex flows and rules. This complexity hampers validation of the correctness of a modelled business transaction by business experts. To alleviate this problem, we have developed a tool set, consisting of a CASE tool for modelling ebXML transactions, generating the code associated with it and an animator for validating the modelled transactions.  The animator tool allows business experts to understand and "play" business transactions before they are implemented.

Organizer Presentation: Eric Dubois is the co-Director of the Centre for IT Innovation
(CITI), a unit of the Public Research Centre Henri Tudor. Besides management activities,
Dr. E. Dubois is active in the software engineering field for about 20 years. His specific
focus is on the requirements engineering (RE) topic where he published over 50 papers. He is member of the IFIP 2.9 WG and of the editorial board of the REJ journal. He was program co-chair of the international IEEE RE'02 conference and is member of the steering committee of the IEEE and REFSQ series of conferences. Recent interests are in new paradigms for B2B commerce (following a two years collaboration with SWIFT), in security requirements and the management of risks associated with them. Eric Dubois is also visiting Professor at the University of Namur, member of the Belgian FNRS IT scientific commission and of the ERCIM board of directors.

More on the B2B project: http://efficient.citi.tudor.lu/

Program:

 - introduction to ebXML (UML models and XML code)
- business modelling of a transaction
- UML specification of a transaction
- code generation principles ((generation of XML schemas, of the GUI, and of the workflow
engine)
- using the animator for validating transactions
- Conclusion: how to acquire and use the open-source tool
Duration: 3 hours
Audience: Interop members and industrial participants. In particular, those coming from the financial sector since our proposed toolset is fully compliant with the recent directions
taken by SWIFT regarding the usage of XML messages for financial transactions