X-Gen Integration Suite

Outline

Business Integration with X-Gen Integration Suite
“With X-Gen, we can react quickly to customer demands, new SWIFT standards, new
products, or new business models - we need a few days, not weeks or even months.”
- Guy Segalla, IT Manager for HSH Nordbank International S.A. (HQ in Luxemburg)

What makes X-Gen Integration Suite (XIS) a full blown celebrity among the middleware crowd
is its specialized design - ideally suited for business AND technical specialists:
 

• business validation and transformation tool
• flow processing
• financial workflow
• user intervention application

A compete toolbox of applications in one integrated suite

 

• Functionality
  Full blown business integration engine which covers legacy and financial network
• connectivity, business validation and transformation, flow processing, financial workflow as well as user intervention
• Technology
  Fully XML based configuration, multi platform capable (Windows, Unix, some modules
  on z/OS Mainframe)
• Intuitive
  Easy to use to graphical frontend for all configuration purposes which can be used by business oriented users
• Configurable
  Open because of set of open programming interfaces to enhance functionality
• SWIFT
  Integrated support for SWIFT standards and processes, certified with multiple SWIFT labels
• Scalable
  Scalable from tactical project based solutions to enterprise wide integration platforms

X-Gen Technology

Modular architecture: Strict separation of technical implementation and business logic
To be able to develop executable processes in an automated way, the business logic must be
implemented in a machine-representable business process definition. It’s here the technical
implementation is separated from the business logic.

Definition of Technical Implementation
In a technical implementation, operating systems, database platforms, interface protocols and
data formats are defined whereas the business logic determines organizational and business
process rules and the semantics. For example, the validation of data as well as process and
escalation rules for workflows.

X-Gen allows you to separate the business logic from the technical implementation. The business
department will then be able to handle and test the interaction of applications from the
business point of view without affecting any technical operation.

By separating the information necessary for the technical processing from the business
issues, a project’s completion time is considerably shortened due to the parallelization of
technical and business logic implementation tasks.

A universal graphical interface for project development:
Business specialists develop the rules
A truly integrated system is one of the most important factors to successfully control the
project scope, project risk as well as any organizational changes. No matter whether data
structures, transformation, validation, IT flow or workflow rules are concerned, X-Gen offers
graphical editors with an identical look and feel to develop these rules.

Users can thus concentrate on transferring the business rules to the IT world. In addition, this
provides a base for a continuous graphical design of a business process on all levels.
X-Gen’s graphical kit is an instrument not only to illustrate business processes but to
implement them too.

A very important tool to improve the quality and to shorten development times is X-Gen’s
graphical Flow Tracer. It allows you to superimpose the graphical process configuration and
its results protocol. This enables a user to visually check the data output by the individual
rules and to correct problems where they arise. This avoids having to painfully analyze the log
files.

Several Certification Labels: X-Gen supports the financing standards SWIFT and FIX
Within the scope of the vertical orientation of X-Gen in the finance industry, great value was
set upon the compatibility with the common market standards. X-Gen supports all SWIFT
message types of the FIN and XML standards according to ISO15022 and ISO 20022. Furthermore,
X-Gen can be used to integrate the usual SWIFT gateways such as SWIFT Alliance
Access and SWIFT Alliance Gateway. X-Gen supports the FIN, InterAct, and FileAct services.
Since 1999, X-Gen has been continuously awarded the SWIFTReady Label for Financial EAI.
Furthermore, X-Gen solutions received four more SWIFTNet Ready Labels (Real Time Account
Information User, Real Time Account Information Provider, SWIFTNet Funds, Investigations
& Exceptions) which is proof of X-Gen’s unique position in the finance industry.
X-Gen also has an integrated FIX Engine which supports all protocols from version 4.0 on.
X-Gen is a safe investment for the future and oriented towards modern market standards. For
our customers, supporting the common market infrastructures is a guarantee to protect their
investments now and in future.

An open and platform-independent software architecture – even for z/OS mainframe
The development of new functionalities and additional components is an important guideline
for X-Gen. Consistent extensibility by using open programming interfaces on several levels
as well as state of the art technology such as SOAP and XML emphasize the up-to-date
product philosophy of X-Gen. For the customer, this guarantees the protection of investments
now and in future. With regard to functions and data volumes, X-Gen is highly scalable.
This makes it possible to extend an X-Gen installation gradually depending on a customer’s
demands.
X-Gen is available on all common platforms: Windows, Linux, and Unix. Most components
are also available under z/OS. With z/OS, the X-Gen Engine is linked in an IMS runtime
environment.

X-Edit, the Graphical Rule Designer
X-Edit is the graphical user front-end to configure and operate X-Gen. The design of flows,
mappings, workflows, adapters, and processing units is developed in X-Edit. A monitoring
GUI allows the administration and display of processing information such as the amount
of processed messages, the error rate, as well as the triggering of alerts in exceptional
conditions.
The entire configuration is saved in an XML repository in the file system or in a source control
management system.

Open Programming Interfaces
In X-Gen, open programming interfaces (APIs) are available on three levels:
 

• adapter APIs in C++, JAVA and TCL/TK scripting to connect additional adapters to X-Gen
• a processing unit API in C++ to connect additional processing units such as e.g. parsers and builders to X-Gen
• operator APIs in C++ and TCL/TK scripting to program additional operators to be used in mappings

These programming interfaces allow to integrate extra functionalities which are already available
as separate programs or represent customer-specific add-ons to X-Gen. This can be
used, for example, to implement special algorithms to calculate data in X-Gen.

X-Gen Functional Components

X-Gen Workflow
The Workflow Engine controls business processes running on a longer time scale. It is thus possible to describe and execute a complete process and to consider also the handling of exceptions. A workflow is driven by events (external events, timeouts, interactive events) and may trigger activities depending on the state of this process. A manual intervention in the execution of a workflow can be performed by means of an “interactive event”. This allows a user, for example, to view and edit messages (“Repair Station”). In each workflow, a message is displayed based on its logic structure, i.e. without any format information. Messages sent by a workflow to an external system as activities may be transformed by means of mappings. A workflow is designed on an abstract logical level in a graphical editor.

M-Edit, the Graphical Mask Designer
The Message Editor M Edit is an additional front-end component for X-Gen Workflow. It allows a user to interact with X-Gen, e.g. to view, create and edit messages. The Message Editor can also be used to implement user dialogs as it is necessary for really professional applications. The Message Editor has a graphical mask editor which allows the developer to design the layout of the individual user dialogs. Mask templates may be generated automatically based on X-Gen data structures or stored messages.
The Message Editor is available as a standalone and as a web-based version.

Data Flow Engine
The Data Flow Engine controls the entire execution of a process in X-Gen, including the technical
transaction control. The definition of this process is performed in a data flow which is designed in a graphical editor. Such a flow includes the processing rules in the form of adapters, processing units, routing rules and workflows. The Data Flow Engine (and X-Gen Workflow) support the 2 phase commit transaction protocol according to the XA standard.

Mapping Engine
The Mapping Engine has two core functions: the semantic validation of messages and the transformation of messages into one or more target data structures. Mappings can be used in a workflow as well as independently from it. While the X Gen format parsers are responsible for the syntactical analysis of data, mappings can be used to check the contents regarding their semantic accuracy, as for example the compliance of market practice rules or bilateral conventions for the use of data standards. If a validation fails, a mapping may actively trigger the execution of an error routine.

The transformation functionality allows to convert a message into one or more output messages
of different formats. If a mapping outputs several messages, these messages are “split” (for example, a position data report will be split into positions). The Mapping Engine displays a message based on its logic structure, i.e. without any format information. It is visualized in the form of a tree structure consisting of groups, repeating structures, and fields. Five different basic data types are used: Binary, String, Numeric, DateTime, and Logical. Mappings are created in a graphical editor (Mapping Editor) with the aid of ready-made operators. An operator implements an operation on one or more message data fields. They are interpreted by the Mapping Engine. An operator defines a well defined operation (for example, adding two values or validating an ISIN code).

A multitude of operators is available as ready-made graphical elements in the Mapping Editor.
The only task that remains for the user is their configuration.

The X-Gen Message Repository
The X-Gen Message Repository allows to save messages in X-Gen transaction-safe and
persistently.
The message repository can be accessed via an adapter or the X-Gen Message Editor.
Messages are read using a field-oriented query language.

Besides an object-oriented database, the X-Gen Message Repository supports all common
SQL databases, such as Oracle, Sybase, SQLServer, and MySQL. To the user, the database
architecture is concealed by an abstract repository layer. With SQL databases, any X-Gen
message can be saved in a table without having to create a complex data model.

Permissioning System
The Permissioning System allows to control the access rights to X-Gen. Based on so-called
“Unified Resource Identifiers” the users are assigned rights (such as read, write and execute)
to resources (such as flows, mappings, queries). If a user tries to execute a function, X-Gen
will check whether he is allowed to do so. A graphical front-end is available to define these
access rights.

Processing Units
Processing units are part of a data flow. They are responsible to process the data in a flow. Each processing unit represents a well-defined processing step. In a flow, processing units can be combined arbitrarly depending on the necessities of a project. Processing units are, for example, the routing module, parsers, builders, and the Mapping Engine. A data flow thus represents a sequence of processing units.

Parsers and Builders
Parsers and builders are processing units that are reponsible to analyze the syntax of raw data formats, such as XML, tag value, separated lists, fixed-length formats, SWIFT FIN, SWIFT ISO20022 or FIX. Their function is to separate the technical format information, such as field separators or native data types, from the semantic data contents. The parsers and builders thereby reduce the messages to their semantic contents and free them of all unnecessary syntax details. This might be directly followed by a semantic validation and the transformation into another data structure by means of a mapping. Because of the possibility to divide the format analysis into different steps in the data flow, mixed or nested message formats can easily be processed. Using different parsers for generic formats, a multitude of formats common in the finance industry can be processed by X Gen.

Adapters
Adapters realize the technical connection of external applications on protocol level. They are responsible to abstract the technical protocol details of the connected systems for X‑Gen and thus allow to access data from third-party systems in a standardized way. Usually, adapters have no inherent business logic and are mainly used to exchange data. Typically, adapters serve as a connection to MQSeries, SQL databases, file or FTP, Email, the SWIFT Alliance product family or the FIX Engine.

X-Gen in Projects

Effective implementation of business-relevant automation projects:
the Workflow Engine – an integral part of X‑Gen
Successful projects are characterized by the rapid development and dynamic implementation of business processes and services which improve the results of an enterprise in a verifiable way. The emphasis is placed on the modeling of holistic business processes and the development of an executable software. The workflow serves as a parenthesis for the whole process. For the actual implementation in the software, exception handling plays a major role in a workflow. Therefore, a seamless cooperation of the workflow and other integration components is indispensable. In X‑Gen, the Workflow Engine is totally integrated in the core product – thus, X‑Gen is a powerful tool to implement complex processes in a simple, understandable, maintainable and scalable way. Furthermore, it allows users to intervene processes by using a graphical front-end (M‑Edit) which is also available as a web-based product for a large amount of users.

Process templates: Reuse the work you have done once
Work has to be repeated often in projects. Data structures and transformation rules are used in multiple interfaces and process flows. Define the core bits once and reuse them as often as you like. X-Gen allows to modularize data objects. The outcome of the segmentation process is a repository of data objects which can be used commonly. This applies also to transformation and business validation rules: Data mappings can be derived from other mappings. Common rules are taken over, specific rules are defined in the derivate mapping. This allows to define rule templates for general purpose use which can be adapter for specific used in projects. For example Market Practice Template rules for SWIFT ISO15022 messages are available in X-Gen. They may be adapted to counterparty specific ruels in a SWIFT integration project.