Patent Publication Number: US-8112382-B2

Title: Process for data driven application integration for B2B

Description:
CROSS REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATIONS 
     This is a divisional of U.S. patent application Ser. No. 11/000,450 filed Nov. 30, 2004, now U.S. Pat. No. 7,475,081, and a divisional of U.S. patent application Ser. No. 09/837,041 filed Apr. 18, 2001, now U.S. Pat. No. 7,373,349, which are both herein incorporated by reference. 
    
    
     BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 
     1. Field of the Invention 
     The present invention relates to distributed systems configured to process requests provided in different formats. 
     2. Background of the Related Art 
     Wide area networks such as the Internet provide a convenient forum for engaging in a variety of commercial activities, generally referred to as eCommerce. A typical eCommerce environment  100  comprising buyers and sellers connected by the Internet is illustrated in  FIG. 1 . In the illustrative buyer/supplier model, a buyer organization  102  has purchased procurement software  103  from a third party vendor. The procurement software  103  allows an individual in the buying organization  102 , commonly referred to a requisitioner  104 , to use a browser to make purchases. The requisitioner  104  can choose from a list of approved catalogs and shop for the desired items. The catalogs are hosted locally at the buyer organization  102  on a catalog server  106 . The catalog information is uploaded to the catalog server  106  by a supplier  110   1 ,  110   2 , . . .  110   N . Each supplier  110   N  is responsible providing their catalog information to the buyer organization  102 . 
     Viewing the catalog, the requisitioner  104  selects the items and quantities needed. When finished, this order is submitted and captured by the procurement software. 
     The procurement software  103  next notifies a designated approver  108  that a new order request has been placed. The approver  108  is part of the buying organization and uses a browser to view the order and make any necessary changes in price and/or quantities. If the request looks satisfactory, the approver  108  approves the order request. 
     An approved order request results in a purchase order (PO) message being sent by the procurement software  103  to the appropriate supplier  110   N  of the goods. The supplier  110   N  accepts the PO, processes it as necessary and sends a PO response message to indicate that the order was accepted. 
       FIG. 2  shows an alternative eCommerce environment  200  in which a requisitioner  204  of a buying organization  202  is provided with the ability to shop from a remote catalog hosted directly at the web site of a supplier  210   N . In this scenario, the requisitioner  204  again uses a browser to choose an approved catalog to shop from. The procurement software  203  then indicates that the catalog is hosted remotely. The procurement software  203  obtains, either from local storage or from the supplier site, the URL to use for shopping the catalog and returns this information to the browser of the requisitioner  204 . The requisitioner  204  then shops the remote catalog and places items in a shopping cart. Upon completion, the requisitioner  204  confirms the order and checks out. The supplier  210   N  is then responsible for sending the shopping cart contents to an approver  208  of the buyer organization  202 . The remaining steps are as those described with reference to  FIG. 1 . Thus, the approver  208  approves the order and causes a PO to be sent to the supplier  210   N . The supplier  210   N  processes the PO by integrating it with back-end applications or by directing it to a commerce application for processing. 
     One problem with conventional eCommerce systems is that the buying organizations are installing newer versions of procurement software in an attempt to streamline the purchasing process and reduce expenses. These versions utilize protocols not supported by the legacy systems of the suppliers. These protocols include XML-based protocols, such as Commerce XML (cXML), which allow buyers to communicate with multiple seller organizations. Accordingly, buyers are motivated to do business with suppliers that support the new protocols. Suppliers must therefore support these new protocols or be at a competitive disadvantage to those sellers who do support the protocols. To this end, suppliers must either install new applications or find a means to support the new protocols using the existing order processing software (e.g., reprogram the legacy equipment). Installing new applications and reprogramming existing software are both cost prohibitive and therefore not viable solutions. 
     There are several existing products that attempt to address integration of existing business solutions with defined B2B protocols. In general, existing solutions allow an XML formatted message to be mapped to one or more business applications for processing. However, the user is required to have knowledge of all fields in the XML message that apply to a given type of B2B request. Furthermore, some products require a unique adapter program to be generated for each B2B request type to be mapped to a given business application. This adapter program must be ported, compiled and installed on the platform hosting the target business applications. 
     Therefore, there is a need, in an eCommerce environment, to process requests having various formats including formats not originally/directly supported by supplier&#39;s applications. 
     SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION 
     Systems, methods and articles of manufacture are provided for processing eCommerce transactions. In one embodiment, a system for handling eCommerce requests is provided. The system comprises at least one application configured to process a request in a transformed format, wherein the request is received from one of a plurality of requesting entities in an original format and mapped to the transformed format. At least one specification document is configured to produce metadata defining a relationship between data of the request in the original format and data of the request in the transformed format. A flow manager is configured to utilize the metadata to map the request in the original format to the request in the transformed format and to call the at least one application. 
     In still another embodiment, a system for handling eCommerce requests received from one of a plurality of requesting entities is provided. The system comprises at least two applications each configured to process requests in a transformed format; wherein a first application is configured to process a first request type and a second application is configured to process a request of a second type. At least two access methods are each configured to define an interface for the at least two applications. Illustratively, the at least two access methods comprise a first access method configured for the first request type and for the first application and a second access method configured for the second request type and for the second application. A flow manager is configured to utilize metadata to map the requests from an original format to the transformed format and to call one or more of the at least two applications. 
     In yet another embodiment, a method of processing eCommerce requests is provided. The method comprises receiving a request of a first request type comprising a first plurality of input fields; determining an application to invoke, wherein the application is configured to process a request of a second request type comprising a second plurality of input fields; invoking an access method, wherein the access method is configured to define an interface of the application for the second request type; mapping at least a portion of the first plurality of input fields to the second plurality of input fields; and invoking the application. 
     In still another embodiment, a signal bearing medium, comprising a program which, when executed by a processor, performs a method processing eCommerce requests is provided. The method comprises receiving a request of a first request type comprising a first plurality of input fields; determining an application to invoke, wherein the application is configured to process a request of a second request type comprising a second plurality of input fields; invoking an access method, wherein the access method is configured to define an interface of the application for the second request type; mapping at least a portion of the first plurality of input fields to the second plurality of input fields; and invoking the application. 
     In still another embodiment, a data structure is configured as an interface definition of a message format of a particular eCommerce transaction type. The data structure comprises protocol information identifying a protocol and the particular eCommerce transaction type, request data format information identifying a request message format for the particular eCommerce transaction type, wherein the request message format comprises a plurality of input fields and input field information identifying at least a portion of the plurality of input fields. 
     In still another embodiment, a data structure is configured as an interface definition of a request message format and a response message format of a particular eCommerce transaction type. The data structure comprises protocol information identifying a protocol and a transaction type; request data format information identifying the request message format, wherein the request message format comprises a plurality of input fields; and input field information identifying at least a portion of the plurality of input fields. The plurality of input fields includes input fields for at least two different request types and the input field information represents only a first request type. The data structure further comprises response data format information identifying a response message format, wherein the response message format comprises a plurality of output fields; and output field information identifying at least a portion of the plurality of output fields. The plurality of output fields includes output fields for the at least two different request types and the output field information represents only the first request type. 
    
    
     
       BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS 
       So that the manner in which the above recited features and embodiments are attained and can be understood in detail, a more particular description of the invention, briefly summarized above, may be had by reference to the embodiments thereof which are illustrated in the appended drawings. 
       It is to be noted, however, that the appended drawings illustrate only typical embodiments of this invention and are therefore not to be considered limiting of its scope, for the invention may admit to other equally effective embodiments. 
         FIG. 1  shows a typical eCommerce environment comprising buyers and sellers connected by the Internet. 
         FIG. 2  shows an alternative eCommerce environment in which a requisitioner of a buying organization is provided with the ability to shop from a remote catalog hosted directly at the web site of a supplier. 
         FIG. 3  shows a high level diagram of an embodiment of a B2B environment. 
         FIG. 4  shows a B2B environment which, in one embodiment, may be understood as a more detailed illustration of the B2B environment shown in  FIG. 3 . 
         FIG. 5  shows an exemplary Application Connector Document. 
         FIG. 6  shows a relational diagram of two request message formats and an access method for an application. 
         FIG. 7  shows an embodiment of a runtime metadata document. 
         FIG. 8  shows a data flow diagram illustrating development and deployment of specification artifacts. 
         FIG. 9  shows a data flow diagram illustrating deployment of process flow models. 
         FIG. 10  shows a data flow diagram illustrating deployment of specification artifacts and processing requests. 
         FIG. 11  shows a flow chart of a flow manager configured to handle eCommerce requests. 
         FIG. 12  shows a data flow diagram illustrating a price check. 
         FIG. 13  shows a graphical user interface of a specification development tool. 
         FIG. 14  shows a graphical user interface of a specification development tool. 
         FIG. 15  shows a graphical user interface of a specification deployment tool. 
         FIG. 16  shows a graphical user interface of a deployment tool. 
         FIG. 17  shows a graphical user interface of a deployment tool. 
     
    
    
     DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENTS 
     Introduction 
     Aspects of the present invention provide an eCommerce environment adapted to accept and process various message types (e.g., cXML and mXML). In general, requests are provided from a requesting entity to an application hosting entity. Data from incoming requests are mapped to a format understandable to an appropriate application(s). Responses from the application(s) are then mapped into a response format acceptable by the requesting entity. 
     To this end, embodiments disclosed herein provide processes for the development and execution of a data driven process for mapping multiple request/response message pairs to a single application interface or set of application interfaces. In one embodiment, these processes are driven by development time and run time documents that describe a development time view of the message pairs and the application interfaces as well as runtime instructions for providing the mappings, respectively. As used herein, “development time” documents/view refers to various artifacts that describe flow processing and mapping rules. “Run time” documents/view refers to the collection of software components that operate to implement the flow processing and mapping rules. 
     As used herein, “mapping” generally refers to the process of relating one input to another input. For example, mapping includes converting a message in one format to a message in another format based on predetermined rules (this may be referred to as message-to-message transformation). In addition, mapping refers to extracting a value from a field in a message, converting it to an appropriate data type, and then placing that data at a location where an application is expecting it. In one aspect, the location may be a message passed into an application that is expecting a message as input. In another aspect, the location is a parameter on an application that is expecting a set of parameters on call invocation. The foregoing aspects illustrate input mapping; however, the present embodiments also provide for output mapping. Output mapping involves taking values output from an application and placing the values in a message in the proper format (i.e., in a format understandable by procurement software). 
     Accordingly, mapping assumes that the structure of a source and a target are known. For example, messages are typically broken into separate fields. In XML parlance, fields in a message are delimited by tags which name an element. A single element has attributes that further describe that element. A single element may also contain other elements with associated attributes. In non-XML messages, fields may be arbitrarily defined by the message designer as structures, strings or bits, etc. The mapping rules indicate how a particular source field is to be processed and subsequently placed into a target field. An example of mapping according to the embodiments provided herein would be associating a product number from a B2B request to a parameter of a program. 
     Mapping is needed because two separately developed applications or processes rarely have the same input and output requirements in terms of message format and/or data. Such applications that were not originally designed to communicate with one another require an intermediate process, such as those described herein, that allow the applications to communicate with each other without modification. 
     Embodiments described herein use a markup language known as extensible mark up language (XML) to advantage. XML is a popular, well-accepted language in the industry. Because many tools are available to process XML documents, viewing such documents for purposes of education and debugging is made easy. In addition, the extensible nature of XML facilitates adding functionality to existing products while continuing to maintain compatibility between releases of the products. These and other advantages make XML an excellent candidate for the methods and systems of the present application. However, embodiments of the invention are not limited to XML or XML-based protocols and the inventors contemplate using other languages, known and unknown. Accordingly, reference to XML and other specific languages and protocols is merely illustrative. 
     Moreover, while the embodiments have and hereinafter will be described in the context of fully functioning computers and computer systems, those skilled in the art will appreciate that the various embodiments of the invention are capable of being distributed as a program product in a variety of forms, and that embodiments of the invention apply equally regardless of the particular type of signal bearing media used to actually carry out the distribution. Examples of signal bearing media include, but are not limited to, recordable type media such as volatile and nonvolatile memory devices, floppy and other removable disks, hard disk drives, optical disks (e.g., CD-ROMs, DVDs, etc.), and transmission type media such as digital and analog communication links. Transmission type media include information conveyed to a computer by a communications medium, such as through a computer or telephone network, and include wireless communications. The latter embodiment specifically includes information downloaded from the Internet and other networks. Such signal-bearing media, when carrying computer-readable instructions that direct the functions of the present invention, represent embodiments of the present invention. 
     SYSTEM ARCHITECTURE, DATA STRUCTURES, DATA PROCESSORS  AND INTERFACES 
       FIG. 3  shows a high level diagram of an embodiment of a B2B environment  300 . The environment generally includes a plurality of trading partners  302  connected to a supplier system  304  via a network  306  (e.g., the Internet). The trading partners  302  execute procurement software to generate a B2B request and transmit the request to the supplier system  304 . Illustrative requests include purchase orders (PO), order status checks, and catalog maintenance. The supplier system  304  includes a front-end gateway  404  adapted to handle the interfacing with the trading partners  302  over a variety of connectivity mechanisms and protocols. In one embodiment, the front-end gateway  404  includes a collection of front-end protocols  310  to support the requests received from the trading partners  302 . The front-end protocols  310  may be plug-ins and may be installed locally from a signal-bearing medium (e.g., a CD-ROM) or downloaded from the network  306 . 
     A back-end flow manager  312  and the front-end gateway  404  communicate via a transport mechanism  316 . In one embodiment, the transport mechanism  316  is a queuing mechanism. The back-end flow manager  312  is responsible for processing the requests by tying them to an appropriate application  314  (e.g., Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP), supply chain application, etc.). Back-end access methods  318  are provided to facilitate a connection with the appropriate application  314 . As with the front-end protocols  310 , the access methods  318  may be installed locally or downloaded from a remote site on the network  306 . Each access method  318  is configured to handle a particular type of interfacing mechanism, as will be described in more detail below. 
     For simplicity, the front-end gateway  404  and the back-end flow manager  312  are shown as an integral part of a single system. However, in another embodiment, the front-end gateway  404  and the back-end flow manager  312  reside on different systems remotely located from one another. Such a distributed embodiment is facilitated by the use of transport mechanisms (e.g., transport mechanism  316 ) to communicate. 
       FIG. 4  shows a B2B environment  400  which, in one embodiment, may be understood as a more detailed figure of the B2B environment  300  shown in  FIG. 3 . Accordingly, in some cases, like numbers have been used to correlate  FIGS. 3 and 4 . In general, the B2B environment  400  includes trading partners  302  connected to the supplier system  304  via network  306 . The trading partners  302  receive responses from the supplier system  304  in response to requests. The requests may be any variety of protocols, such as cXML from Ariba and mXML from Metiom. Other protocols include xCBL, OCI, and ebXML. Accordingly, the supplier system  304  is configured to support the protocols used by the trading partners  302 . 
     The supplier system  304  includes a front-end gateway  404  connected to an HTTP server  402 . The HTTP server  402  is configured to receive and send messages from/to the network  306  in the popular transfer protocol known as hyper-text-transfer-protocol (HTTP). Incoming requests are sent from the HTTP server  402  to the front-end gateway  404  which, in a particular embodiment, is implemented as a Java servlet. As such, the supplier system  400  includes an application servlet engine  406  to allow communication between the HTTP server  402  and the front-end gateway  404 . Two available engines that may be used to advantage are (1) the WebSphere Application Server used in combination with the IBM HTTP server and (2) the Domino server. The Domino server has a built-in servlet engine and an HTTP server that can also be used to host Java servlets. 
     The front-end gateway  404  is responsible for examining and validating incoming requests. Any authentication and authorization information associated with a particular request is validated. In some cases, requests need to be transformed by the front-end gateway  404  to a normalized format consumable by a back-end flow manager  408 . In other cases requests are passed exactly as received. For example, in one embodiment, the back-end flow manager  408  is configured for XML. If the requests are received in a format other than XML, the front-end gateway  404  is configured to convert the request into an XML representation. 
     The front-end gateway  404  communicates with the back-end flow manager  408  via a queuing mechanism  410 , such as MQ Series from IBM. Thus, upon validating, authenticating and, in some cases, transforming an incoming message, the message is placed on the queuing mechanism  410 . The front-end gateway  404  then waits for an associated response from the back-end flow manager  408  on a response queue. 
     The back-end flow manager  408  is configured to map incoming requests into a format understandable by a plurality of applications  412  and then return an appropriate response. Illustratively, the rules for mapping these messages are provided as a series of XML documents which embody the mapping rules used to associate data provided with a B2B request and the interface defined for an existing application. These documents are referred to herein as a runtime metadata document  422  (also referred to herein as the “runtime metadata  422 ”). 
     In one embodiment, the runtime metadata document  422  is created and/or utilized by tools  413  (also referred to herein as “tools suite  413 ”). In one embodiment, the tools  413  comprise a Process Deployment Tool  413 A and a Business Process Editor Tool  413 B. The Business Process Editor Tool  413 B in turn comprises an ACD creation tool  424  and a Process Flow creation tool  426 . These XML documents and the tools  413  will be described in more detail below. 
     Illustratively, the applications  412  include Java classes, ERP applications, legacy business applications and data, MQ applications, and custom applications. For each application type, an access method  414  (which may also be referred to herein as a “connector”) is provided. The access methods  414  are adapted to support an appropriate interfacing mechanism for each application  412 . For the applications  412  shown in  FIG. 4 , three popular interfacing mechanisms are program calls, queues and Java methods. Accordingly, the supplier system  304  of  FIG. 4  includes three access methods  414 : a Java access method  414   a , a program call access method  414   b , and a queue application access method  414   c.    
     It is understood that the applications  412  and the access methods  414  shown in  FIG. 4  are merely illustrative and the supplier system  304  may support any number of applications  412  and access methods  414 . For example, the supplier system  304  may also include an SQL access method for databases. For brevity, discussion of specific access methods  414  is limited to the Java access method  414   a , the program call access method  414   b , and the queue application access method  414   c.    
     In general, an access method  414  is the “template” for an access method instance. Thus, an access method  414  is specialized into a specific access method instance, herein referred to as an Application Connector Document (ACD). By analogy to object oriented programming, the access method  414  can be thought of like a class and the access method instance (i.e., the ACD) is like an object. ACDs are described in more detail below. 
     Each access method  414  defines properties that are needed by the access method  414 . Properties are name-value pairs that are presented to an end user at deployment time and allow for configuration information to be passed to the access method  414 . For example, a property may be a system name, a user profile, a class name or a path to a document. In one embodiment, properties will always be strings and may have default values or values set at deployment. 
     Each access method  414  also has a mechanism used to define input and output fields. In one embodiment, such mechanisms include a PCML (Program Call Markup Language) documents and XML documents. PCML documents provide a rich tag specification for describing parameters to a program. The PCML document may be optimized to define a fixed structure buffer which is passed into an application. An XML document is a tagged string that is self-describing and can be used for applications that require XML as input. 
     Which mechanism/document to use depends on the nature of the application  412  to be accessed. An access method  414  may support one or both of these mechanisms. If an access method  414  uses PCML as the technique for defining input and outputs, then a property field can be defined to contain a path to the PCML document. This allows the creator of the access method  414  to specify the PCML document that describes the input/output to the application. If an access method  414  uses XML as the technique for defining input and output fields, then two property fields may be defined, one to contain a path to the XML document for input and one for the path to the XML document for output. 
     Illustratively, each access method  414  contains a root element called “Connector” that contains properties, input and output elements. The properties element contains a set of elements with names for the properties that access method  414  has defined. In one embodiment, the properties of an access method  414  are specified by a user using a tool, as will be described in more detail below. Once the properties have been defined to the tool, the tool will present them to an administrator so that values can be provided. In addition, the tool will allow the administrator to map fields from the input/output message to the application interface (input/output fields). When the administrator has finished providing all the information required, the tool will generate a runtime metadata specification that will be used by the back-end flow manager  408  to invoke the access method  414 . 
     PCML Access Method: The program call access method  414   b  can be used to call any program resident locally or remotely. In one embodiment, the program call access method  414   b  is a PCML document that describes the program to be called and the parameters expected by that program. 
     The properties that are defined for an exemplary program call access method  414   b  are shown in Table I. 
     
       
         
           
               
             
               
                 TABLE I 
               
               
                   
               
             
            
               
                 001  &lt;!ELEMENT connector (properties,input,output)&gt; 
               
               
                 002  &lt;!ATTLIST connector 
               
               
                 003   type NMTOKEN #FIXED “programcall” 
               
               
                 004   name CDATA #REQUIRED 
               
               
                 005   version (1.0) #REQUIRED 
               
               
                 006  &gt; 
               
               
                 007  &lt;!ELEMENT properties (system,userid,password,pcmldocument)&gt; 
               
               
                 008  &lt;!ELEMENT system (#PCDATA)&gt; 
               
               
                 009  &lt;!ELEMENT userid (#PCDATA)&gt; 
               
               
                 010  &lt;!ELEMENT password (#PCDATA)&gt; 
               
               
                 011  &lt;!ATTLIST password 
               
               
                 012  encrypt (yes) #REQUIRED 
               
               
                 013  &gt; 
               
               
                 014  &lt;!ELEMENT pcmldocument (#PCDATA)&gt; 
               
               
                 015  &lt;!ELEMENT input (field*)&gt; 
               
               
                 016  &lt;!ATTLIST input 
               
               
                 017   type (pcml) #REQUIRED 
               
               
                 018  &gt; 
               
               
                 019  &lt;!ELEMENT output (field*)&gt; 
               
               
                 020  &lt;!ATTLIST output 
               
               
                 021   type (pcml) #REQUIRED 
               
               
                 022  &gt; 
               
               
                 023  &lt;!ELEMENT field EMPTY&gt; 
               
               
                 024  &lt;!ATTLIST field 
               
               
                 025   ref CDATA #REQUIRED 
               
               
                 026   display (yes | no) #REQUIRED 
               
               
                 027   name CDATA #IMPLIED 
               
               
                 028   default CDATA #IMPLIED 
               
               
                 029  &gt; 
               
               
                   
               
            
           
         
       
     
     The program call access method  414   b  only supports a PCML interface definition. A business partner or customer who desires to create an instance of the PCML access method  414   a  to invoke a specific application  412  generates a PCML document to describe the interface to the specific application. For example, assume an application  412  that is going to be invoked with the program call access method  414   a  has three input fields and two output fields. A user writes a PCML document that lists the name of the application, the three input fields and the two output fields. 
     Queue Access Method: The queue application access method  414   c  is used to send and receive messages on a queuing mechanism, such as an MQ Series queue or an iSeries data queue, both available from IBM. The queues can be defined locally or on a remote system. The queue application access method  414   c  defines the format of the message to be placed on the queue and, illustratively, is a PCML document or an XML document. The message is in a format expected by the receiving application  412 . 
     In one embodiment, the queue application access method  414   c  supports two queue techniques: iSeries  400  data queues and MQ series queues, both available from IBM. The queue application access method  414   c  may also support two interface specification techniques: PCML and XML. Therefore, in one embodiment, the properties define a sending queue (required, SendQueue) and a receiving queue (optional, ReceiveQueue). The properties defined for one embodiment of the queue application access method  414   c  are shown in Table II. 
     
       
         
           
               
             
               
                 TABLE II 
               
               
                   
               
             
            
               
                 001   &lt;!ELEMENT connector (properties,input,output)&gt; 
               
               
                 002   &lt;!ATTLIST connector 
               
               
                 003    type CDATA #FIXED “DataQueue” 
               
               
                 004    name CDATA #REQUIRED 
               
               
                 005    connectversion (1.0) #REQUIRED 
               
               
                 006   &gt; 
               
               
                 007   &lt;!ELEMENT properties 
               
               
                 008   (MessageType,DQSendKeyed,DQSendKey, 
               
               
                       DQSendQueue Name,DQSendLibrary,DQReceiveKeyed, 
               
               
                       DQReceiveKey,DQReceiveQueueName, 
               
               
                       DQReceiveLibrary,DQReceiveWaitTime,pcmldocument, 
               
               
                       system,userid,password)&gt; 
               
               
                 009   &lt;!ELEMENT input (docref,field*)&gt; 
               
               
                 010   &lt;!ATTLIST input 
               
               
                 011    type (pcml | xml | all) #IMPLIED 
               
               
                 012   &gt; 
               
               
                 013   &lt;!ELEMENT output (docref,field*)&gt; 
               
               
                 014   &lt;!ATTLIST output 
               
               
                 015    type (pcml | xml | all) #IMPLIED 
               
               
                 016   &gt; 
               
               
                 017   &lt;!ELEMENT MessageType (#PCDATA)&gt; 
               
               
                 018   &lt;!ATTLIST MessageType 
               
               
                 019    proptype CDATA #FIXED “list(pcml;xml;csv)” 
               
               
                 020    default CDATA #IMPLIED 
               
               
                 021    label CDATA #FIXED “Message Type” 
               
               
                 022   &gt; 
               
               
                 023   &lt;!ELEMENT DQSendKeyed (#PCDATA)&gt; 
               
               
                 024   &lt;!ATTLIST DQSendKeyed 
               
               
                 025    proptype CDATA #FIXED “list(yes;no)” 
               
               
                 026    default CDATA #IMPLIED 
               
               
                 027    label CDATA #FIXED “Keyed Send Queue?” 
               
               
                 028   &gt; 
               
               
                 029   &lt;!ELEMENT DQSendKey (#PCDATA)&gt; 
               
               
                 030   &lt;!ATTLIST DQSendKey 
               
               
                 031    proptype CDATA #FIXED “string” 
               
               
                 032    default CDATA #IMPLIED 
               
               
                 033    label CDATA #FIXED “Send Queue Key” 
               
               
                 034    enabledBy CDATA #FIXED “DQSendKeyed(yes)” 
               
               
                 035   &gt; 
               
               
                 036   &lt;!ELEMENT DQSendQueueName (#PCDATA)&gt; 
               
               
                 037   &lt;!ATTLIST DQSendQueueName 
               
               
                 038    proptype CDATA #FIXED “string” 
               
               
                 039    default CDATA #IMPLIED 
               
               
                 040    label CDATA #FIXED “Send Queue Name” 
               
               
                 041   &gt; 
               
               
                 042   &lt;!ELEMENT DQSendLibrary (#PCDATA)&gt; 
               
               
                 043   &lt;!ATTLIST DQSendLibrary 
               
               
                 044    proptype CDATA #FIXED “string” 
               
               
                 045    default CDATA #IMPLIED 
               
               
                 046    label CDATA #FIXED “Send Queue Library” 
               
               
                 047   &gt; 
               
               
                 048   &lt;!ELEMENT system (#PCDATA)&gt; 
               
               
                 049   &lt;!ATTLIST system 
               
               
                 050    proptype CDATA #FIXED “string” 
               
               
                 051    default CDATA #FIXED “localhost” 
               
               
                 052    label CDATA #FIXED “Send-Receive Queue System” 
               
               
                 053   &gt; 
               
               
                 054   &lt;!ELEMENT userid (#PCDATA)&gt; 
               
               
                 055   &lt;!ATTLIST userid 
               
               
                 056    proptype CDATA #FIXED “string” 
               
               
                 057    default CDATA #FIXED “” 
               
               
                 058    label CDATA #FIXED “Send-Receive Queue Userid” 
               
               
                 059    encrypt CDATA #FIXED “yes” 
               
               
                 060   &gt; 
               
               
                 061   &lt;!ELEMENT password (#PCDATA)&gt; 
               
               
                 062   &lt;!ATTLIST password 
               
               
                 063    proptype CDATA #FIXED “string” 
               
               
                 064    default CDATA #FIXED “” 
               
               
                 065    label CDATA #FIXED “Send-Receive Queue Password” 
               
               
                 066    encrypt CDATA #FIXED “yes” 
               
               
                 067    keyfield CDATA #FIXED “userid” 
               
               
                 068   &gt; 
               
               
                 069   &lt;!ELEMENT DQReceiveKeyed (#PCDATA)&gt; 
               
               
                 070   &lt;!ATTLIST DQReceiveKeyed 
               
               
                 071    proptype CDATA #FIXED “list(yes;no)” 
               
               
                 072    default CDATA #IMPLIED 
               
               
                 073    label CDATA #FIXED “Keyed Receive Queue?” 
               
               
                 074   &gt; 
               
               
                 075   &lt;!ELEMENT DQReceiveKey (#PCDATA)&gt; 
               
               
                 076   &lt;!ATTLIST DQReceiveKey 
               
               
                 077    proptype CDATA #FIXED “string” 
               
               
                 078    default CDATA #IMPLIED 
               
               
                 079    label CDATA #FIXED “Receive Queue Key” 
               
               
                 080    enabledBy CDATA #FIXED “DQReceiveKeyed(yes)” 
               
               
                 081   &gt; 
               
               
                 082   &lt;!ELEMENT DQReceiveQueueName (#PCDATA)&gt; 
               
               
                 083   &lt;!ATTLIST DQReceiveQueueName 
               
               
                 084    proptype CDATA #FIXED “string” 
               
               
                 085    default CDATA #IMPLIED 
               
               
                 086    label CDATA #FIXED “Receive Queue Name” 
               
               
                 087   &gt; 
               
               
                 088   &lt;!ELEMENT DQReceiveLibrary (#PCDATA)&gt; 
               
               
                 089   &lt;!ATTLIST DQReceiveLibrary 
               
               
                 090    proptype CDATA #FIXED “string” 
               
               
                 091    default CDATA #IMPLIED 
               
               
                 092    label CDATA #FIXED “Receive Queue Library” 
               
               
                 093   &gt; 
               
               
                 094   &lt;!ELEMENT DQReceiveWaitTime (#PCDATA)&gt; 
               
               
                 095   &lt;!ATTLIST DQReceiveWaitTime 
               
               
                 096    proptype CDATA #FIXED “string” 
               
               
                 097    default CDATA #IMPLIED 
               
               
                 098    label CDATA #FIXED “Receive Queue Wait Time” 
               
               
                 099   &gt; 
               
               
                 100   &lt;!ELEMENT pcmldocument (#PCDATA)&gt; 
               
               
                 101   &lt;!ATTLIST pcmldocument 
               
               
                 102    proptype CDATA #FIXED “file” 
               
               
                 103    default CDATA #IMPLIED 
               
               
                 104    label CDATA #FIXED “PCML Document” 
               
               
                 105    enabledBy CDATA #FIXED “MessageType(pcml)” 
               
               
                 106   &gt; 
               
               
                 107   &lt;!ELEMENT docref (#PCDATA)&gt; 
               
               
                 108   &lt;!ELEMENT field (field*)&gt; 
               
               
                 109   &lt;!ATTLIST field 
               
               
                 110    ref CDATA #REQUIRED 
               
               
                 111    display (yes | no) #REQUIRED 
               
               
                 112    label CDATA #IMPLIED 
               
               
                 113    type (char | int | packed | zoned | float | byte | struct) “char” 
               
               
                 114    length CDATA #IMPLIED 
               
               
                 115    precision CDATA #IMPLIED 
               
               
                 116    repeating (Yes | No) “No” 
               
               
                 117    countfield CDATA #IMPLIED 
               
               
                 118    default CDATA #IMPLIED 
               
               
                 119   &gt; 
               
               
                   
               
            
           
         
       
     
     A business partner or customer who desires to create an instance of the queue application access method  414   c  to pass a message to their application must define queue identification information and has a choice of specifying the message format as an XML document or as a structured buffer with PCML. 
     Java Access Method: The Java access method  414   a  is used to call a user written Java method that in turn can call other Java programs (local or remote) or access local or remote databases. The data available to this Java method (i.e., the method called by the Java access method  414   a ) may be defined by either a PCML or XML document, for example. The Java access method  414   a  is a special case access method that is different from the access methods  414   b  and  414   c  described above. The access methods  414   b  and  414   c  “drive” the mappings for applications and then invoke the back-end application  412  with a fully-resolved parameter list. This design is successful for those access methods  414   b  and  414   c  because they provide a consistent, generic way to describe the application interface (either via PCML and/or XML). For the Java access method  414   a , this technique does not work because the Java parameters may be objects. Objects are more complex and do not facilitate a consistent generic way to describe the application interface such that all the diverse parameters types could be built. 
     Thus, the Java access method  414   a  invokes a method that implements a specific Java interface (referred to as the “JavaConnectorlnterface”). The method (herein referred to as the “Interface Method”) that implements the interface then performs a set of functions allowing it to build the parameters to the targeted back-end application  412 . Each Interface Method is configured with very specific “knowledge” of the interface to the targeted back-end application  412 . The JavaConnectorinterface will pass in an Object (ConnectorParms) to the Interface Method that will contain methods allowing the Interface Method to get runtime data from/to the request/response messages. The properties for one embodiment of a Java access method  414   a  are shown in Table III. 
     
       
         
           
               
               
             
               
                   
                 TABLE III 
               
               
                   
                   
               
             
            
               
                   
                 001   &lt;!ELEMENT connector (properties,input,output)&gt; 
               
               
                   
                 002   &lt;!ATTLIST connector 
               
               
                   
                 003    type NMTOKEN #FIXED “Java” 
               
               
                   
                 004    name CDATA #REQUIRED 
               
               
                   
                 005   &gt; 
               
               
                   
                 006   &lt;!ELEMENT properties (classname,pcmldocument)&gt; 
               
               
                   
                 007   &lt;!ELEMENT classname (#PCDATA)&gt; 
               
               
                   
                 008   &lt;!ELEMENT pcmldocument (#PCDATA)&gt; 
               
               
                   
                 009   &lt;!ELEMENT input (alias*)&gt; 
               
               
                   
                 010   &lt;!ATTLIST input 
               
               
                   
                 011    type (pcml) #REQUIRED 
               
               
                   
                 012   &gt; 
               
               
                   
                 013   &lt;!ELEMENT output (alias*)&gt; 
               
               
                   
                 014   &lt;!ATTLIST output 
               
               
                   
                 015    type (pcml) #REQUIRED 
               
               
                   
                 016   &gt; 
               
               
                   
                 017   &lt;!ELEMENT alias EMPTY&gt; 
               
               
                   
                 018   &lt;!ATTLIST alias 
               
               
                   
                 019    ref CDATA #REQUIRED 
               
               
                   
                 020    display (yes | no) #REQUIRED 
               
               
                   
                 021    label CDATA #IMPLIED 
               
               
                   
                 022   &gt; 
               
               
                   
                   
               
            
           
         
       
     
     “Class name” contains the name of the Java class that implements the abstract interface that is defined. The PCML document contains a document that provides the interface specification for the target Java method. The Java access method  414   a  utilizes an interface class to describe the interaction between the Java access method  414   a  and a Java method. An illustrative interface class definition is shown in Table IV. 
     
       
         
           
               
             
               
                 TABLE IV 
               
               
                   
               
             
            
               
                 001   public interface JavaConnectorInterface { 
               
               
                 002     public JavaConnectorResult run (ConnectorParms parameters, 
               
               
                 003   String PCMLDocName); 
               
               
                 004   } 
               
               
                 005 
               
               
                 006   public class JavaConnectorResult { 
               
               
                 007     public int returncode; 
               
               
                 008     public String returnstring; 
               
               
                 009   } 
               
               
                   
               
            
           
         
       
     
     An embodiment of the Java method that implements the Java connector face is shown in Table V. 
                     TABLE V                  001   public class GeneralConnector implements            JavaConnectorInterface {       002    public JavaConnectorResult run (ConnectorParms parms,       003    String PCMLDocName {       004      /* get the list of input fields */       005     fields = parms.getinputfieldlist( );       006     for (/* each field in the fieldlist */) {       007             /* repeat following section for each                     field data type */       008       {       009       / * get the field value by passing in the name attribute       010          in the field list entry; data type for field will       011          correspond to data type specified in the field                  list entry */       012            / * an array of values is returned */       013            For (/*each value in the arrays                    returned*/) {       014        /* use the value to set a parameter that will be       015            to  passed the target backend                     application */       016       }       017       018     } /* end for */       019     /* invoke the real back-end application */       020     /* get the list of output fields */       021     fields = parms.getoutputfieldlist( );       022     for (/* each field in the fieldlist */) {       023      for (/*loop if multiple values */) {       024      /* get value generated by target application */       025      /* use value to update the field identified by the name       026       attribute in the field list entry */       027      }/* end for */       028     } /* end for */       029    }       030   }                    
Specification Development
 
     A complete specification for servicing a given type of B2B request using one or more of the existing business application  412  is provided by a specification suite  415 . The specification suite  415  is a collection of specification artifacts comprising Application Connector Documents (ACD)  416 , Process Flow Models (PFM)  418  and Request/Response Message Formats (RMF)  420 . 
     ACDs, PFMs, and RMFs may be created by a variety of methods and entities. In one embodiment, the supplier system  304  includes a tool suite  413  adapted to create one or more of the artifacts included in the specification suite  415 . The following description further describes aspects of ACDs, PFMs, and RMFs and describes embodiments for their creation. 
     ACD: An ACD  416  provides an abstract and reusable interface definition for a particular business application  412 . A given ACD is unique to a particular application  412  provides the back-end flow manager the format of the messages and parameters the application  412  expects. Accordingly, the ACD enables use of that application  412  to service one or more types of B2B requests. To that end, an ACD describes an access method instance. An “instance” is the coupling of an access method  414  with a description of the data to be processed by that access method  414 , i.e., data passed to an application  412  or placed on the queuing mechanism  410 . The “description of the data” includes the format of the messages and parameters expected by an application  412 . One or more access method instances can be created for each access method  414 . 
     In one embodiment, ACDs  416  are XML documents that adhere to the Document Type Definition (DTD) defined for the appropriate access method  414 . An ACD DTD exists for each of the supported access methods  414 . An ACD for the Java access method  414   a  and the program call access method  414   b  indicate the name of the class or program to be called and a description of the parameters the access method expects to be passed. An ACD for the queue access method  414   c  indicates the name of the queue to use and the format of the message to place on that queue. 
     In a particular embodiment, each ACD includes an ACD name, a type of ACD (i.e., the access method  414  this ACD is associated with), specific properties of the application  412  being accessed (such as system name, user-id and password to use), and the name of documents (referred to herein as input/output documents) that describe the input and output data for the application  412 . Illustratively, the input/output documents are PCML or XML documents and may be created using an editor or authoring tool. 
     An exemplary ACD  416  is shown in  FIG. 5 . The ACD  416  defines an encapsulation of a business application  412  or data source by defining both access method properties  502  and an interface model  504 . The access method properties  502  describe how to access the application  412  and the interface model  504  describes what the application  412  expects for input and output. Further, the access method properties are information needed by the particular access method at runtime to invoke a target application. Illustratively, a plurality of properties  506   1 ,  506   2 , . . .  506   N , are shown, each comprising a name-value pair. The interface model  504  comprises an input interface  508  and an output interface  510 . Each interface  508 ,  510  comprises a plurality of fields  512  and sub-fields  514  each, in turn, comprising a name-type pair. In general, the interfaces  508 ,  510  may be a suitable data schema  512  selected according to the application  412  to be accessed. Illustratively, the interfaces  508 ,  510  are XML documents or PCML documents. 
     Illustratively, an ACD can specify default values for fields, hide/expose selected fields from/to a user during flow mapping (described in more detail below) and provide alias names for fields. A default value can be used for the contents of a field in the case where explicit mapping is not done as part of the mapping rules in a PFM  418 . For example, a default value of 1 could be assigned to the quantity field for a purchase order item, for use when a specific quantity was not supplied with the purchase order request data. The ACD specifies for each field whether the field will be hidden from a user so as not to be confusing to the user. Thus, an ACD allows control over what portions of an application&#39;s interface are exposed (i.e., displayed for mapping purposes) in a graphical user interface (GUI). In one embodiment, if a field is to be exposed, alias names are provided for fields within the input/output documents that are modified at runtime (from data received in requests). The alias names provide a convenient expression of fields which is more intuitive than the original format defined by an application. These more intuitive alias names may then be used to advantage in the creation of PFMs  418 . 
     Development of an ACD for a particular application  412  may typically be done by a provider of a given application  412  or a business partner. Alternatively, it may be done by a service provider during configuration of a supplier&#39;s B2B software environment. Although an ACD can be manually created (e.g., using a text editor or XML editor), one embodiment provides an ACD Creation tool  424  (a component/function of the Business Process Editor  413 B) to facilitate creation of ACDs. Regardless of the manner of creation, a completed ACD is then used for flow mapping. In one embodiment, the mapping rules are defined by a Process Flow Model (PFM) and a single ACD can be reused in multiple PFMs. 
     One embodiment of an ACD (formatted as an XML document) for a PCML-based program call access method  414   a  is shown in TABLE VI. 
     
       
         
           
               
             
               
                 TABLE VI 
               
               
                   
               
             
            
               
                 001   &lt;?xml version=“1.0” encoding=“UTF-8”?&gt; 
               
               
                 002   &lt;!DOCTYPE connector SYSTEM 
               
               
                 003   “file://localhost/C:/B2BDTD/PgmConnector.dtd” &gt; 
               
               
                 004   &lt;connector name=“OrderEntry” type=“programcall”&gt; 
               
               
                 005     &lt;properties&gt; 
               
               
                 006       &lt;system&gt;rchas001&lt;/system&gt; 
               
               
                 007       &lt;userid&gt;rstevens&lt;/userid&gt; 
               
               
                 008       &lt;password encrypt=yes&gt;pwval&lt;/password&gt; 
               
               
                 009       &lt;pcmldocument&gt;orderentrypgm&lt;/pcmldocument&gt; 
               
               
                 010     &lt;/properties&gt; 
               
               
                 011     &lt;input type=“pcml”&gt; 
               
               
                 012       &lt;docref&gt;orderentrypgm&lt;/docref&gt; 
               
               
                 013       &lt;field display=“yes” name=“Item Number” 
               
               
                          ref=“xyz.inum”/&gt; 
               
               
                 014       &lt;field display=“yes” name=“Item Quantity” ref=“xyz.q” 
               
               
                          default=”1”/&gt; 
               
               
                 015    &lt;/input&gt; 
               
               
                 016     &lt;output type=“pcml”&gt; 
               
               
                 017       &lt;docref&gt;orderentrypgm&lt;/docref&gt; 
               
               
                 018      &lt;field display=“yes” name=“Item Price” ref=“xyz.p”/&gt; 
               
               
                 019     &lt;/output&gt; 
               
               
                 020   &lt;/connector&gt; 
               
               
                   
               
            
           
         
       
     
     RMF: An RMF  420  provides an interface definition of a message format for a given B2B request type (e.g., what are the input and output data flows for the request). In one embodiment, an RMF is an XML document. Regardless of the document type used for an RMF, an RMF generally provides an association (e.g., mapping) between the contents of a request and definitional information provided by the RMF. The association is then used to advantage by access methods  414  which access request and response information contained in the RMF without knowing the physical location of each field in a protocol-specific request. During retrieval and update operations the physical location of data is resolved from an RMF name field by the flow manager  408 . 
     Another feature of an RMF is filtering. Filtering refers to providing a view of or subsetting the complete data structure defined for a given B2B protocol. Some B2B protocols define a single request/response data schema for all types of requests supported by the protocol, cXML is an example of a protocol where a single XML DTD is used to describe data associated with all of the requests supported within the protocol. This places a burden on the business application which must determine which fields out of the overall data structure apply to each type of request. To obviate this need, a separate RMF may be defined for each request within a given protocol. The RMFs are configured to identify the specific set of elements and attributes within a given B2B schema that are used to service a particular type of B2B request. For example, the RMF for a purchase order request defines only the fields that apply to a purchase order request and does not include fields associated with other types of requests. In the case of XML-based message formats, a RMF may identify the XML DTD or schema associated with the request type and the subset of fields defined by the DTD or schema that are applicable for B2B requests of this type. Accordingly, RMFs eliminate the need to understand (by an application owner attempting to integrate existing applications with various request formats) which subset of a given request/response data structure applies to each type of request and simplifies the task of extending an existing business application to handle new B2B requests. Unlike back-end applications  412 , which may require the knowledge of the owner to gain access, request/response message protocols are widely known (that is, generally known to the public). Thus, RMFs  420  for each B2B response/request type may be provided to the supplier system from a third party that need not be familiar with the implementation of the supplier system  304 . 
       FIG. 6  shows a diagram illustrating the structure of two RMFs and their relationship to a business application access method in order to allow for data interchange within a particular B2B protocol context. A schema  602  for an illustrative protocol “X” includes a plurality of Fields  1 - 4  and Sub-fields  2   a - 2   b  and  4   a . A first RMF (RMF 1 ) and a second RMF (RMF 2 ) are configured to define particular request types for the protocol “X”. In this case, the first RMF is defined for a request type “A” and the second RMF are defined for a request type “B”. Illustratively, the protocol “X” may be cXML and the request type A is a purchase order while the request type B is a order status inquiry. The first RMF comprises input definition  604  and output definition  606 . Similarly, the second RMF comprises input definition  608  and output definition  610 . Each of the input/output definitions maps to the appropriate fields and sub-fields of the protocol schema  602 . In this manner, a plurality of RMFs may be provided for a single B2B schema. 
     In one embodiment, RMFs also allow more meaningful and intuitive field names to be associated with elements in a B2B request/response. Such a configuration provides a format more understandable to personnel provided with a B2B request/response, thereby facilitating the process of mapping a request/response to/from an existing business application  412 . Additionally, RMFs may allow for the definition of a default value to be used for an output field in cases where explicit mapping is not as part of the explicit mapping rules in the PFM  418 . 
     Table VII shows one embodiment of an XML DTD which serves as the template for an RMF. Key elements defined in the RMF DTD (Table VII) are described in Table VIII. 
     
       
         
           
               
               
             
               
                   
                 TABLE VII 
               
               
                   
                   
               
             
            
               
                   
                 001   &lt;!ELEMENT protocolmessageformat 002 
               
               
                   
                      (protocol,requestschema,responseschema)&gt; 
               
               
                   
                 003   &lt;!ATTLIST protocolmessageformat 
               
               
                   
                 004    version (1.0) #REQUIRED 
               
               
                   
                 005   &gt; 
               
               
                   
                 006   &lt;!ELEMENT protocol EMPTY&gt; 
               
               
                   
                 007   &lt;!ATTLIST protocol 
               
               
                   
                 008    name CDATA #REQUIRED 
               
               
                   
                 009    protocolversion CDATA #REQUIRED 
               
               
                   
                 010    transactiontype CDATA #REQUIRED 
               
               
                   
                 011    transactionsubtype CDATA #IMPLIED 
               
               
                   
                 012   &gt; 
               
               
                   
                 013   &lt;!ELEMENT requestschema (field*)&gt; 
               
               
                   
                 014   &lt;!ATTLIST requestschema 
               
               
                   
                 015    type (DTD) #REQUIRED 
               
               
                   
                 016    name CDATA #REQUIRED 
               
               
                   
                 017   &gt; 
               
               
                   
                 018   &lt;!ELEMENT responseschema (field*)&gt; 
               
               
                   
                 019   &lt;!ATTLIST responseschema 
               
               
                   
                 020    type (DTD) #REQUIRED 
               
               
                   
                 021    name CDATA #REQUIRED 
               
               
                   
                 022   &gt; 
               
               
                   
                 023   &lt;!ELEMENT field (field*)&gt; 
               
               
                   
                 024   &lt;!ATTLIST field 
               
               
                   
                 025    ref CDATA #REQUIRED 
               
               
                   
                 026    name CDATA #IMPLIED 
               
               
                   
                 027    default CDATA #IMPLIED 
               
               
                   
                 028    count (multiple | one) “one” 
               
               
                   
                 029   &gt; 
               
               
                   
                   
               
            
           
         
       
     
     
       
         
           
               
               
             
               
                 TABLE VIII 
               
               
                   
               
               
                 RMF Element 
                 Description 
               
               
                   
               
             
            
               
                 Protocol 
                 Identifies the protocol/transaction/subtype combination 
               
               
                   
                 this RMF is associated with. 
               
               
                 Requestschema 
                 Identifies the schema which describes the format of 
               
               
                   
                 request data for this protocol/transaction. In one 
               
               
                   
                 embodiment, schemas defined by XML DTDs are 
               
               
                   
                 supported. 
               
               
                 Responseschema 
                 Identifies the schema which describes the format of 
               
               
                   
                 response data to be generated for this 
               
               
                   
                 protocol/transaction. 
               
               
                 Field 
                 Used to identify the fields in the request and response 
               
               
                   
                 schema for this protocol/transaction that are available 
               
               
                   
                 for use in mapping to the various ACDs that are 
               
               
                   
                 defined to handle a given B2B request. Also 
               
               
                   
                 allows an alternative name to be associated with 
               
               
                   
                 this field. &lt;field&gt; elements may be nested to 
               
               
                   
                 reflect the hierarchical nature of the request and 
               
               
                   
                 response formats supported by various B2B protocols. 
               
               
                   
               
            
           
         
       
     
     Table IX provides an example of an RMF. Illustratively, Table IX illustrates how a monetary amount may be represented in an RMF. In this case, money is qualified by a given currency and can also be represented in a different amount in another currency. In one embodiment, key components of an RMF field include label, ref, and context. “Label” is the abstract name by which access methods and the flow manager  408  refer to a given request or response field. Label also serves as the name of the field exposed to users through various tools, allowing a more intuitive name to be used for fields that are poorly named or described. “Ref” is the actual, physical location of the field within the request or response data structure supported by a given request type. “Context” indicates whether the field is part of the request or response data structure for the request type. 
     
       
         
           
               
             
               
                 TABLE IX 
               
               
                   
               
             
            
               
                 001   &lt;field context=“Request” count=“one” label=“Money” ref 
               
               
                 002   =“/cXML/Request/OrderRequest/OrderRequestHeader/ 
               
               
                      Shipping/Money”&gt; 
               
               
                 003   &lt;field context=“Request” count=“one” label=“@currency” ref 
               
               
                 004   =“/cXML/Request/OrderRequest/OrderRequestHeader/ 
               
               
                      Shipping/Money/@currency”/&gt; 
               
               
                 005   &lt;field context=“Request” count=“one” 
               
               
                 006   label=“@alternateAmount” ref 
               
               
                      Shipping/Money/@alternateAmount”/&gt; 
               
               
                 008   &lt;field context=“Request” count=“one” 
               
               
                 009   label=“@alternateCurrency” ref 
               
               
                 010   =“/cXML/Request/OrderRequest/OrderRequestHeader/ 
               
               
                      Shipping/Money/@alternateCurrency”/&gt; 
               
               
                 011   &lt;/field&gt; 
               
               
                   
               
            
           
         
       
     
     Table X provides RMFs supported in one embodiment. Illustratively, only Ariba and Metiom message formats are shown. However, any number of RMFs may be supported. 
     
       
         
           
               
               
               
             
               
                   
                 TABLE X 
               
               
                   
                   
               
               
                   
                 Ariba cXML message 
                   
               
               
                   
                 format 
                 Metiom mXML message format 
               
               
                   
                   
               
             
            
               
                   
               
            
           
           
               
               
               
            
               
                 Retrieve 
                 ProfileRequest 
                 N/A 
               
               
                 Server 
                 Response = ProfileResponse 
               
               
                 Capabilities 
               
               
                 New 
                 OrderRequest with 
                 PurchaseOrderMessage 
               
               
                 Purchase 
                 type = new 
                 Response = PurchaseOrderAcknowledgement- 
               
               
                 Order 
                 Response = Response 
                 Message 
               
               
                 Change 
                 OrderRequest with 
                 PurchaseOrderChangeRequest- 
               
               
                 Purchase 
                 type = update or delete 
                 Message 
               
               
                 Order 
                 Response = Response 
                 Response = PurchaseOrderChangeRequest- 
               
               
                   
                   
                 AcknowledgementMessage 
               
               
                 Remote 
                 PunchOutSetupRequest 
                 N/A 
               
               
                 Catalog 
                 with type = create, edit, 
               
               
                 Shopping 
                 inspect 
               
               
                 Request 
                 Response = PunchOutSetupResponse 
               
               
                 Shopping 
                 PunchOutOrderMessage 
                 OrderRequestMessage 
               
               
                 Basket 
               
               
                 Content 
               
               
                 Invoice 
                 N/A 
                 InvoiceMessage 
               
               
                   
               
            
           
         
       
     
     PMF: Once an ACD has been defined for an application and an RMF provided for a given B2B request type, they can be referenced by a PFM  418  which serves to map a particular type of B2B request to the application(s) which will be used to service these requests. Thus, a PFM defines the specific data flow and control flow semantics required to service a particular B2B request type using one or more business applications described by ACDs. In one embodiment, a PFM is an XML document which defines  1 ) the B2B protocol and type of request to be handled, 2) the business application(s) to be used to service the request (specified by an ACD  416 ), 3) rules for mapping data provided with the B2B request to input parameters supported by the servicing application(s) and 4) rules for mapping output data generated by the application(s) into the response message format prescribed by the particular B2B protocol/request type. A PFM and the ACDs referenced by a PFM provide a complete specification of the business applications  412  that are defined to service a particular class of B2B request and rules denoting how data is to be mapped between the formats provided with the B2B request to the formats supported by the servicing business applications. 
     The PFMs  418  may be created by the creator of the ACD or others who will include a particular ACD. In one embodiment, the PFM is created using the Process Flow creation tool  426  (a component/function of the Business Process Editor  413 B). The Process Flow creation tool  426  helps describe the mapping information by displaying the mappable fields in the incoming transaction requests, as defined by its RMF, and the mappable fields in the ACD and allowing a user to match the appropriate fields together. For example, a user may want to map the “PostalCode” field from the “BillTo/Address” of a cXML “OrderRequest” message to the “ZipCode” parameter of your “New Order” application. 
     Tables XI and XII show an exemplary schema for a PFM and an example of a model defined for mapping order requests to a program call access method  414   a , respectively. 
     
       
         
           
               
             
               
                 TABLE XI 
               
               
                   
               
               
                 Process Flow Model DTD 
               
               
                   
               
             
            
               
                   
               
            
           
           
               
            
               
                 001   &lt;!ELEMENT processflowmodel (protocol,connector,inmap*, 
               
               
                      outmap*)&gt; 
               
               
                 002   &lt;!ELEMENT protocol&gt; 
               
               
                 003   &lt;!ATTLIST protocol 
               
               
                 004    name CDATA #REQUIRED 
               
               
                 005    protocolversion CDATA #REQUIRED 
               
               
                 006    transactiontype CDATA #REQUIRED 
               
               
                 007    transactionsubtype CDATA #IMPLIED 
               
               
                 008 
               
               
                 009   &gt; 
               
               
                 010   &lt;!ELEMENT connector EMPTY&gt; 
               
               
                 011   &lt;!ATTLIST connector 
               
               
                 012    acdref CDATA #REQUIRED 
               
               
                 013   &gt; 
               
               
                 014   &lt;!ELEMENT inmap EMPTY&gt; 
               
               
                 015   &lt;!ATTLIST inmap 
               
               
                 016    source CDATA #IMPLIED 
               
               
                 017    target CDATA #REQUIRED 
               
               
                 018    value CDATA #IMPLIED 
               
               
                 019   &gt; 
               
               
                 020   &lt;!ELEMENT outmap EMPTY&gt; 
               
               
                 021   &lt;!ATTLIST outmap 
               
               
                 022    source CDATA #REQUIRED 
               
               
                 023    target CDATA #REQUIRED 
               
               
                 024   &gt; 
               
               
                   
               
            
           
         
       
     
     
       
         
           
               
             
               
                 TABLE XII 
               
               
                   
               
             
            
               
                 001   &lt;?xml version=“1.0” encoding=“UTF-8”?&gt; 
               
               
                 002   &lt;!DOCTYPE processflowmodel SYSTEM 
               
               
                 003  “file://localhost/C:/B2BDTD/ProcessFlowModel.dtd” &gt; 
               
               
                 004   &lt;processflowmodel&gt; 
               
               
                 005     &lt;protocol name=”cXML” protocolversion=”1.0” 
               
               
                 006   transactiontype=”OrderRequest”/&gt; 
               
               
                 007     &lt;connector acdref=“OrderEntry”/&gt; 
               
               
                 008     &lt;inmap source=“/ItemOut/ItemID/SupplierPartID” 
               
               
                 009     target=“Item Number”/&gt; 
               
               
                 010     &lt;inmap source=“/ItemOut/@quantity” 
               
               
                        target=“Item Quantity”/&gt; 
               
               
                 011     &lt;outmap source=“Item Price” target=“/ItemOut/@price”/&gt; 
               
               
                 012   &lt;/processflowmodel&gt; 
               
               
                   
               
            
           
         
       
     
     Once the ACDs and PFMs are in place, the specification suite  415  is deployed to provide a runtime view of the artifacts. Deployment involves association of a PFM and one or more ACDs and occurs before receiving requests. In operation, the deployment of the specification suite  415  results in runtime metadata  422 . In one embodiment, the runtime metadata  422  is an XML document and is structured in such a way as to provide efficient runtime processing. Once generated, the runtime metadata  422  is bound to (or associated with) an instance of a flow manager  408 . The runtime metadata  422  may then be used by the flow manager to handle incoming requests and outbound responses of specified types. 
     There are multiple pieces of information included in the runtime metadata  422 . Illustratively, the runtime metadata  422  includes a request to flow mapping, a connector interface specification, a flow and response creating rules. The request to flow mapping uniquely describes the requests that should be handled by a particular process flow. The connector interface specification is the runtime view of the ACD. The flow consists of multiple steps that can be taken when handling a particular request. The flow also describes the field level mapping rules to be applied to each step. The response creating rules are non-protocol specific rules that allow the flow manager  408  to create a valid response document based on the information in the RMF  420 . 
     In one embodiment, the foregoing runtime metadata  422  components are defined as XML elements.  FIG. 7  shows a runtime metadata document  700  containing runtime metadata  422  comprising the following XML elements: Selection  702 , Flow  704 , Steps  706 , Connector  708 , Property  710 , Field  712 , Mapin  714 , Mapout  716 , InsertSpec  718  and ConnectorInterface  720 . Arrows denote references from one type of element to another. This represents a relationship between the two elements but does not imply that one element is necessarily contained within another. This allows multiple elements of one type (e.g., the Selection element  702 ) to reference the same element of another type (e.g., the Flow element  704 ). In other words, the same Flow element can be used by multiple protocol/request Selections. These elements are described in more detail below with reference to  FIG. 11 . 
     To create the runtime metadata  422 , one embodiment of the B2B environment  400  provides a process deployment tool  413 A. Illustratively, the process deployment tool  413 A is a component of the tool suite  413 . The process deployment tool  413 A may be any tool configured to convert the ACDs and PFMs into a runtime format that can be processed by the flow manager  408 . In one embodiment, process deployment tool  413 A is accessed from a browser session and allows a B2B request that is to be serviced to be uniquely identified. A request can be uniquely identified by the protocol being used (e.g., cXML, mXML), the marketplace it is received from (e.g., Ariba Network, Joe&#39;s Fishmarket), the specific Action/Subaction specified (e.g., OrderRequest), the buying organization submitting the request, and the supplier that this request is targeting. The unique request is then associated with a previously built PFM which identifies the ACD to be used and the field level mappings to take place. In one embodiment, a PFM can reference one ACD and therefore one back-end application  412 . In another embodiment, a PFM can reference multiple ACDs which constitute a flow. This information is provided to the flow manager  408  as runtime metadata  422  for real-time processing. At this point, the supplier system  304  is ready to accept requests from various trading partners  302 , call the appropriate back-end applications  412  and return responses. 
     SYSTEM OPERATION 
     Development time, deployment and run time may be illustrated with reference to  FIGS. 8-12 . Referring first to  FIG. 8  a method  800  for development and deployment of ACDs, PFMs, and RMFs is shown. To this end, method  800  shows a series of steps and indicates the data structures utilized in the execution of the steps. 
     Method  800  is entered at step  802  when a user initiates execution of the tools  413 . Method  800  then proceeds to step  804  where an ACD is created to define an instance of an access method  414 . At step  806 , a PFM is created to define a flow using the access method instance. At step  808 , the ACD and the PFM are published to (i.e., sent to) a B2B instance server. In one embodiment, steps  804 - 808  employ the Business Process Editor  413 B. At step  810 , the PFM is associated with a request type and is then deployed to a B2B instance. That is, a PFM and its associated ACDs are transformed into runtime metadata. In one embodiment, step  810  employs the Process Deployment Tool. The flow manager  408  is now configured with the appropriate runtime metadata to handle a specified request type. 
     The relationship between PFMs and a FlowMetaData document is further illustrated in  FIG. 9 .  FIG. 9  shows a process flow correlating a development view  902  and a runtime view  904 . The development view  902  includes a plurality of PFMs  906   1 ,  906   2 ,  906   N  . . . , each PFM being representative of a particular request type. Illustratively, an order request PFM  906   1  and a punch out PFM  906   2  are shown. A third PFM  906   N  indicates that any number of PFMs may be provided for. When deployed, the PMFs produce runtime metadata  908  configured to handle requests received from trading entities (e.g., trading partners). 
     The overall operation of a B2B environment (such as the B2B environment  400  shown in  FIG. 4 ) may be described with reference to  FIG. 10 .  FIG. 10  shows a supplier system  1000  comprising a flow manager  1002 , an application  1004  for servicing incoming requests and providing responses and a plurality of specification artifacts  1006 . The specification artifacts  1006  comprise RMFs  1006 A, PFMs  1006 B and ACDs  1006 C. The supplier system  1000  is configured to receive a request and provide an appropriate response to a requesting entity (e.g., a trading partner). 
     In general, steps ‘A-D’ represent development and deployment. At step ‘A’ the appropriate RMF  1006 A is identified according to a request protocol to be supported by the supplier system  1000 . At step ‘B’ an ACD  1006 C is created to describe the interface to the application  1004 . At step ‘C’ the PFM  1006 B correlating the request protocol with the appropriate application  1004  is created. Step ‘D’ represents deployment at which point runtime metadata is generated from the RMF, PFM and ACD. Step ‘D’ may be facilitated by a tool, such as the process deployment tool  413 A shown in  FIG. 4 . The supplier system  1000  is now configured to receive requests. 
     Steps ‘E-G’ represent processing of a request. A request  1008  is received at step ‘E’ and provided to the flow manager  1002  at step ‘F.’ The flow manager  1002  processes the request according to predefined runtime metadata. The runtime metadata describes the sequence of applications to be invoked to handle the request, the access method used to invoke a particular application and how to transform data provided with the request into a format that is supported by each of the applications invoked to handle a request. At step ‘G’ the application  1004  is invoked to process the request  1008 . At this point the request is in a format understandable to the application  1004 . 
     The operation of the flow manager after being configured with runtime metadata may be illustrated in more detail with reference to  FIG. 11  which shows a flow manager method  1100 . Reference is also made to  FIG. 7  which shows one embodiment a runtime metadata document  700 . The method  1100  is entered at step  1102  and proceeds to step  1104  where the back-end flow manager reads a file (e.g., runtime metadata document  700 ) containing the runtime metadata. At step  1106 , the flow manager stands by for a request from the gateway  404 . When a request is received, the method takes steps to process the request according to the metadata  422 . 
     At step  1108 , the flow manager locates a flow to determine what processing to perform for the request. In particular, the flow manager searches a selection element for a corresponding flow description element (Flow element). A flow description element specifies the set of applications to invoke to perform the processing of the request and the generation of the response. A flow description element contains a sequence of step elements. Each step element represents a description of how to invoke the application and indicates the next step to process after the current step is complete. The flow manager utilizes the step element to invoke the application and to locate the next step element when the current step element is complete. Accordingly, at step  1110 , the flow manager enters a loop which is repeated for each step of the selected flow description element. 
     At step  1111 , the flow manager determines which application to invoke according to the selected flow. At step  1112 , the appropriate access method  414  for the application is called. The access method  414  is defined by the ConnectorInterface element  720  (which also describes how to invoke the application). The ConnectorInterface element  720  contains the name of a Java class that implements an access method  414 , the properties of the access method  414 , a set of data about the input fields of an application  412  and a set of data about the output fields of the application  412 . The ConnectorInterface is the part of the Connector element  708  that is specific to the application being invoked. It is the Runtime Metadata form of information found in an ACD. A Connector  708  contains a reference to a ConnectorInterface  720 . In addition to this reference, a Connector  708  contains mapping rules which describe how data is mapped into and from the referenced ConnectorInterface  720 . This allows a given ConnectorInterface  720  (which represents an ACD) to be used by a number of Connector instances, each with a different set of mapping rules targeting the same application. In other words, the same ConnectorInterface  720  can be used by one Connector  708  describing how data from cXML is mapped to the ConnectorInterface  720  and a second Connector  708  describing how mXML data is mapped to the same ConnectorInterface  720 . When processing a step element, the flow manager reads the connector element  708  and invokes the access method (Program Call, Queue or Java) implementation that performs the mapping of the data. The access method implementation will use the Property elements  710  to set up the operating environment for the application. 
     At step  1114 , the access method implementation gets a list of input field elements that describe the input parameters (or message fields) that the application requires. At step  1116 , the method  1100  enters a process (steps  1118  and  1120 ) performed for each field element in the list. At step  1118 , the access method invokes a Mapin method. The Mapin method will take a Field element and find a corresponding Mapin element. The Mapin element will indicate where the value that this field is looking for is located at (i.e., the field in the request message). The Mapin method will retrieve that value, and perform any data type conversion that is required. Any necessary data type conversion is known because the Field element specifies what data type the application is expecting for this parameter. The Mapin method will return the value from the request message, in the proper data type, to the access method. At step  1120 , the access method places the value in the appropriate place for the application to get access to it upon invocation. For example, the program call access method  414 B will put the value in memory is a structure that the application will understand. When the program call access method invokes the application, it passes to the application the memory location. 
     The method  1100  then returns to step  1116  to begin processing the next input field element. In this manner, the access method  414  continues processing Field elements, invoking Mapin methods to extract the values, until all the input Field elements have been processed. 
     At step  1122 , the access method  414  invokes the application in the access method specific technique. For example, the program call access method  414 B will call the application passing in the memory location of the parameters. The queue access method  414 C will put a message on a queue, etc. 
     After the application is invoked, the access method  414  gets a list of output Field elements at step  1124 . The output field elements provide the location of the output values to be located by the access method. At step  1126 , then the access method starts processing the output fields one at a time. At step  1128 , the access method then extracts the output value using the technique specific to that access method. Once the value for a field is extracted, the access method will invoke the Mapout method at step  1130 . The Mapout method is configured to locate the corresponding Mapout element and the corresponding InsertSpec element. The Mapout element indicates where to store the value in the response message while the InsertSpec element indicates how to insert the value in the response message. The response message has a specific order for the fields that is specific to each B2B protocol. The InsertSpec element contains a specification of the field order of the response message and allows the access method to store output field values in the response message without concern for the order of the fields. Accordingly, the fields can be specified in an order that is independent of the response message. In this way, the Mapout method takes as input the value to store from the access method, then using the Mapout element and InsertSpec element, the Mapout method places the value in the appropriate place in the response message. This process (i.e., steps  1128  and  1130 ) is repeated for each output field element at which point the access method then returns to the flow manager and the method returns to step  1110 . 
     At step  1110 , the flow manager then gets the next step to process from the Step element. When all step elements have been processed, the response message is placed on queue, at step  1132 , to send to the gateway  404 . 
     A particular example of a flow manager operation is described with reference to  FIG. 12 .  FIG. 12  shows supplier system  1200  configured to process a “price check” request. In general, the supplier system  1200  comprises a flow manager  1202 , an access method  1204  and an application  1206 . Illustratively, the incoming request  1208  is a “price check” formatted according to a protocol that the supplier system  1200  has already been configured to process. To this end, the flow manager  1202  is configured with metadata  1209  used to process the request  1208 . 
     Illustratively, the price check request  1208  includes an item field  1210 , a quantity field  1212  and a price field  1214 . The application  1206  has a corresponding item field  1216 , quantity field  1218  and price field  1220 . Upon receiving the request  1208 , the flow manager  1202  refers to the metadata  1209  to determine a type/format of the request  1208 , find the appropriate fields of the request  1208  to be accessed, call the appropriate access plan  1204 , and then return information to fulfill the request  1208 . 
     TOOLS 
     As described above, some embodiments employ tools for development and deployment of data structures and other artifacts of a supplier system. The following provides a description of some tools that may be used to advantage. It is understood that the tools described herein are merely illustrative and those skilled in the art will readily identify other methods and tools which may be used to the same end. 
       FIGS. 13-14  show an embodiment of GUIs for the Business Process Editor Tool (BPET)  413 B. In one embodiment, the BPET  413 B is a Java GUI tool used to create and update information associated with access method instances (e.g., ACDs) and to create and update business process flow information (e.g., PFMs) designed to handle particular B2B requests. Illustratively, the BPET  413 B may be configured to run on either a Windows NT or Windows 2000 client and can be used while connected via a TCP/IP network to the host that supports a B2B instance or in standalone mode where no connection exists to the host containing the supplier system runtime environment. A publish operation may be employed to transfer complete ACD or PFM definitions to a host where it can be deployed to a B2B instance running on that host. 
     Illustratively, the BPET  413 B is presented as a single GUI panel with separate tabs  1302  and  1304  used to navigate from an application access method edit mode to a process flow edit mode.  FIG. 13  shows a BPET GUI  1300  when the when an application access method tab  1302  is selected. The application access method edit tab  1302  is used to capture information required to define an instance of an access method  414 , including the properties and input/output fields supported by the access method instance. Table XIII shows information which can be specified using this interface. 
     
       
         
           
               
               
             
               
                 TABLE XIII 
               
               
                   
               
               
                 GUI 
                   
               
               
                 Control 
               
               
                 Name 
                 Description 
               
               
                   
               
             
            
               
                 Access 
                 Name associated with this access method instance. Names must 
               
               
                 Method 
                 be unique since they are used to reference a given access method 
               
               
                 Name 
                 instance from a business process flow (PFM). 
               
               
                 Access 
                 Defines the type of access method for this access method instance. 
               
               
                 Method 
                 Specific properties and the type of input/output message formats 
               
               
                   
                 allowed for the access method instance are defined by the access 
               
               
                   
                 method. Selection of access method will affect the information 
               
               
                   
                 presented in the Properties and Documents sections. When editing 
               
               
                   
                 an existing access method instance definition, the Access Method 
               
               
                   
                 field will be disabled; thereby preventing a user from changing the 
               
               
                   
                 access method for an existing access method instance. 
               
               
                 Properties 
                 Name/value pairs defining information needed by a particular 
               
               
                   
                 access method to service requests at runtime. The set of 
               
               
                   
                 name/value properties is specific to each access method type. 
               
               
                 Documents 
                 Identifies an XML document or PCML document, for example, which 
               
               
                   
                 defines the input and output fields supported by the individual 
               
               
                   
                 access method instance. Input document defines the set of fields 
               
               
                   
                 supported as input to the access method instance. Output 
               
               
                   
                 document defines the set of fields that are returned by the access 
               
               
                   
                 method instance. When PCML is used, the same document will 
               
               
                   
                 typically appear for both input and output. When document type is 
               
               
                   
                 XML, the element and attribute names defined by the XML 
               
               
                   
                 document represent the candidate set of fields supported by the 
               
               
                   
                 access method instance. When the document type is PCML, the 
               
               
                   
                 data and structure elements defined by the PCML document 
               
               
                   
                 represent the candidate field set for the access method instance. 
               
               
                 Field ID 
                 A hierarchical view showing the set of candidate input and output fields 
               
               
                   
                 supported by the access method instance as defined by the specified 
               
               
                   
                 input and output documents, respectively. 
               
               
                 Name 
                 Used to assign a more intuitive name (e.g., an alias) to a particular field 
               
               
                   
                 defined in either the input or output document for this access method 
               
               
                   
                 instance. Values specified for Name will be displayed when mapping B2B 
               
               
                   
                 request fields to access method fields on the Process Flow tab of the 
               
               
                   
                 Business Process Editor. 
               
               
                 Default 
                 Used to assign a default value to a particular field. Default value is used if 
               
               
                   
                 field is not explicitly mapped from data contained in the incoming B2B 
               
               
                   
                 request. 
               
               
                 Display 
                 Used to control whether a field is displayed when mapping B2B request 
               
               
                   
                 data to fields associated with the access method. Deselecting display will 
               
               
                   
                 cause the field to be treated as “hidden” so that it won&#39;t be displayed on 
               
               
                   
                 the Process Flow tab and cannot be the source or target for data mapped 
               
               
                   
                 from the B2B request being handled by this access method instance. 
               
               
                   
               
            
           
         
       
     
     Table XIV shows illustrative actions that are available as menu options from the BPET GUI  1300  while the application access method tab  1302  is selected and while working with access method instances. 
     
       
         
           
               
               
             
               
                 TABLE XIV 
               
               
                   
               
               
                 Menu Option 
                 Action 
               
               
                   
               
             
            
               
                 File -&gt; New 
                 Create a new access method instance definition. Only 
               
               
                   
                 Name and Access Method will be shown until Access 
               
               
                   
                 Method is selected. 
               
               
                 File -&gt; 
                 Bring up browse interface to locate pre-existing access 
               
               
                 Open . . . 
                 method instance file for update. 
               
               
                 File -&gt; Save 
                 Save changes made to this access method instance. 
               
               
                 File -&gt; Save 
                 Bring up browser interface to select file name and location 
               
               
                 As . . . 
                 to save this access method instance definition under. 
               
               
                 File -&gt; Exit 
                 Exit the Business Process Editor. 
               
               
                 Edit-&gt;Cut 
                 Cuts the selected text to the system clipboard. 
               
               
                 Edit-&gt;Copy 
                 Copies the selected text to the system clipboard. 
               
               
                 Edit-&gt;Paste 
                 Pastes current text from a system clipboard to the current 
               
               
                   
                 cursor location. 
               
               
                 Publish 
                 Select a host system and B2B instance to send a 
               
               
                   
                 completed PFM and access method instance definitions 
               
               
                   
                 to. A publish operation stores the completed PFM and 
               
               
                   
                 access method instance definition on a B2B server from 
               
               
                   
                 which it can be deployed to the runtime environment. 
               
               
                 Help 
                 Brings up online help for the Business Process Editor. 
               
               
                   
               
            
           
         
       
     
       FIG. 14  shows the BPET GUI  1300  when the when a process flow edit tab  1304  is selected. The process flow edit tab  1304  is used to describe a process flow model, including the type of B2B request to be serviced, the ACD to be invoked to handle the request and information describing how data provided with the B2B request is mapped to input fields supported by the ACD and how data returned by the access method instance is mapped to the response data format supported by the particular B2B request. Illustrative information that can be specified using this interface is shown in Table XV. The menu options for the process flow section of the BPET GUI  1300  are the same as those provided when the application access method tab  1302  is active. (See Table XIV). 
     
       
         
           
               
               
             
               
                 TABLE XV 
               
               
                   
               
               
                 GUI Control 
                   
               
               
                 Name 
                 Description 
               
               
                   
               
             
            
               
                 Protocol 
                 Allows a user to choose the protocol to be serviced by this process 
               
               
                   
                 flow definition. 
               
               
                 Action 
                 The Action dropdown is based on the selected protocol. Allows a user 
               
               
                   
                 to choose the action to be serviced by this process flow definition. 
               
               
                 Access 
                 This dropdown displays the list of available access method instances. 
               
               
                 Method 
                 Access method instances are defined using the Application Access 
               
               
                 Name 
                 method tab. Allows a user to choose the access method instance that 
               
               
                   
                 will be used to handle B2B requests of the specified protocol and 
               
               
                   
                 action. 
               
               
                   
                 Once an action and an access method are selected, the Load button is 
               
               
                   
                 enabled. When the Load button is clicked: 
               
            
           
           
               
               
               
            
               
                   
                 I. 
                 The Request Fields and Response Fields in the Input Mappings 
               
               
                   
                   
                 and Output Mappings sections are filled with the fields associated 
               
               
                   
                   
                 with the chosen protocol/action. 
               
               
                   
                 II.  
                 The Access Method Fields in the Input Mappings and Output 
               
               
                   
                   
                 Mappings sections are filled with the fields associated with the 
               
               
                   
                   
                 chosen access method instance. 
               
            
           
           
               
               
            
               
                 Input 
                 Shows the set of fields provided with this type of B2B request and the 
               
               
                 Mappings 
                 input fields supported by the specified access method instance. User 
               
               
                   
                 may select a Request Field and an Access Method Field and click Add 
               
               
                   
                 Mapping to indicate that the Request Field is to be mapped to the 
               
               
                   
                 selected Access Method Field at runtime. This data mapping 
               
               
                   
                 association is displayed in the Mapping Table at the bottom of the 
               
               
                   
                 Business Process Editor screen. 
               
               
                 Output 
                 Shows the set of fields returned by the specified access method and 
               
               
                 Mappings 
                 the set of fields that make up the response message for this type of 
               
               
                   
                 B2B request. User may select a Response Field and an Access 
               
               
                   
                 Method Field and click Add Mapping to indicate that the Access 
               
               
                   
                 Method Field is to be mapped to the selected Response Field at 
               
               
                   
                 runtime. This data mapping association is displayed in the Mapping 
               
               
                   
                 Table at the bottom of the Business Process Editor screen. 
               
               
                 Mapping 
                 This table lists all of the data mappings that have been defined 
               
               
                 Table 
                 between Request/Response data fields associated with this type of 
               
               
                   
                 B2B request and the input and output fields associated with the 
               
               
                   
                 specified access method instance. 
               
               
                   
                 To remove a mapping from the table, select the row containing the 
               
               
                   
                 mapping and click Remove. 
               
               
                   
                 To remove all mappings from the table, click Remove All. A warning 
               
               
                   
                 message appears to confirm this operation. 
               
               
                   
               
            
           
         
       
     
       FIGS. 15-17  show embodiments of GUIs for the Process Deployment Tool (PDT)  413 A. Illustratively, the PDT GUIs are web-based interfaces used to deploy a complete business process flow (PFM) and associated access method instance definition (ACD) into the runtime environment supporting a particular instance of a B2B server configured to process B2B requests. The PDT  413 A runs within the context of a given B2B server instance, allowing the business process flows defined for that instance to be updated or extended. In essence, the PDT  413 A will convert one or more PFM/ACD pairs into the runtime metadata format required by the Flow Manager responsible for handling incoming B2B requests within a given B2B server instance. 
     A primary task in the deployment process is the association of a particular PFM with the B2B request the flow is designed to service. In one embodiment, requests can be qualified by B2B marketplace, B2B protocol, transaction type and subtype, buying organization and supplier. Thus, the act of deployment involves (1) user selection of values for all of the B2B request qualifiers (e.g., protocol, protocol version, marketplace, request type, buyer and supplier), (2) user identification of the business process flow (PFM) that will handle these requests, (3) generation of runtime metadata representing these selections and (4) storage of this information in the runtime environment associated with the B2B instance. These four (4) steps are supported by one embodiment of the PDT  413 A. 
     In one embodiment, a wizard-like interface is provided to walk a user through the set of selections required to deploy a new PFM or to view the set of current PFM that are currently defined to a B2B instance. An embodiment of the “wizard-like interface” is illustrated with respect to  FIGS. 15-17 . A protocol selection screen  1500  of the wizard for the PDT  413 A, shown in  FIG. 15 , allows a particular B2B protocol to be selected. Only those protocols supported by a B2B instance will be shown to the user. Illustratively, a protocol selection window  1502  shows Ariba and Metiom as available protocols. 
     Clicking on the “Next” button on the protocol selection screen  1500  will bring up a marketplace selection screen where a particular marketplace supporting the chosen protocol can be selected. An illustrative marketplace selection screen  1600  is shown in  FIG. 16 . Only those marketplaces for the selected protocol will be shown in the marketplace list on this screen. The available marketplaces may be shown by clicking on a dropdown button  1604  of a marketplace selection window  1602 . 
     Once marketplace is chosen, clicking on the “Next” button on the marketplace selection screen  1600  will bring up a market configuration screen. An illustrative market configuration screen  1700  is shown in  FIG. 17 . The market configuration screen  1700  provides a configuration window  1701  which includes a request list  1702  of B2B requests that are currently supported for the selected marketplace and a PFM column  1704  (titled “Operation (Flow)”) identifying the PFM specified to handle each request. For a newly defined marketplace, the request list  1702  initially contains a transaction column  1706  and a subtype column  1708  for the set of B2B transaction types/subtypes defined by the B2B protocol associated with marketplace. Only those transaction types/subtypes enabled for the current B2B instance are shown. 
     Clicking an “Advanced” button displays a buyer column  1712  and a seller column  1714 . The columns  1712  and  1714  provide a list of buying organizations and supplier organizations, respectively, that are authorized to conduct commerce within a given marketplace. Accordingly, association of PFMs specific to a given buyer/supplier relationship is provided, thereby allowing definition of one PFM for one buyer/supplier pair and another PFM for another buyer/supplier pair. For example, one PFM may be defined for a large corporate buyer and another PFM may be defined for a sole proprietor. 
     In one embodiment, the buyer and supplier settings will be defaulted to *ALL, and the corresponding PFM entry in the PFM column  1704  will be empty since no business process flows have yet been identified to handle B2B requests from this marketplace. Defaulting to *ALL means the specified PFM will apply to request associated with all buyers and all suppliers. 
     From this initial screen, the user may select a PFM from the PFM column  1704  to handle a given request type. Only those PFMs that have been published to the B2B instance server and which support the selected B2B request type will be shown to the user for selection. Once a PFM has been selected, the user may enable or disable handling of the B2B request by using the checkbox provided in a checkbox column  1710 . 
     The Advanced button can be used if the user wishes to qualify the selected PFM based on the buyer organization and/or supplier associated with the B2B request. In one embodiment, only associations between buyer organization and supplier that have been previously specified will be allowed. Specification of specific buyer organization or supplier to qualify a B2B request will result in a new row in the configuration window  1701 , allowing a different PFM to be defined for a given buyer organization/supplier pair than that used for similar requests between other buyers and suppliers. 
     Once all changes have been made on this screen, a “Deploy” button is used to deploy these B2B request-to-PFM selections to the runtime environment for the current B2B instance. 
     While the foregoing is directed to the preferred embodiment of the present invention, other and further embodiments of the invention may be devised without departing from the basic scope thereof, and the scope thereof is determined by the claims that follow.