Carlos Medina's Blog

Microsoft.BizTalk.Deployment.dll is an unsupported assembly provided by Microsoft, it is used to perform all actions related with the deployment of EAI solutions in BizTalk Server 2006 Beta 2.  This assembly provides classes to import, export, add and remove resources, register and unregister assemblies in the gac, and so on....

Additionally, with Microsoft.BizTalk.Deployment.dll you can extract the artifacts contained inside a biztalk assembly (.dll) using its classes and interfaces.  For example, if you want to know if a file is a biztalk assembly you can use this code:

if (BizTalkLatamAssembly.BtsAssemblyManager.IsBizTalkAssemblyByPath(pathBtsAssembly))
{
// crate an instance of BizTalkAssembly
Microsoft.BizTalk.Deployment.BizTalkAssembly biztalkAssembly = 
new Microsoft.BizTalk.Deployment.BizTalkAssembly();
biztalkAssembly.Load(pathBtsAssembly);
// create an instance of BtsAssemblyManager
Microsoft.BizTalk.Deployment.Assembly.BtsAssemblyManager btsAssemblyManager = 
new Microsoft.BizTalk.Deployment.Assembly.BtsAssemblyManager(pathBtsAssembly, biztalkAssembly);
// load the BtsAssembly from BtsAssemblyManager
Microsoft.BizTalk.Deployment.Assembly.btsAssembly = btsAssemblyManager.BtsAssembly;
}

Also, you can get the pipelines from a biztalk assembly using BtsAssembly class and IBizTalkOrchestration interface, see below:

IEnumerator listOfPipelines = btsAssembly.AssemblyMetaData.Pipelines;
listOfPipelines.Reset();
while (listOfPipelines.MoveNext())
{
Microsoft.BizTalk.Deployment.MetaDataOM.IBizTalkPipeline pipeline = listOfPipelines.Current 
as Microsoft.BizTalk.Deployment.MetaDataOM.IBizTalkPipeline;
System.Console.WriteLine("Pipeline name: " + pipeline.Name);
}

I wrote an easy sample called "BTS Easy Reflector" that uses the classes of Microsoft.BizTalk.Deployment.dll to show information about a biztalk assembly.  You can download it from "BTS Easy Reflector: Workspace home" and send me your feedback.

This information and project was developed with BizTalk Server 2006 Beta 2, thus, is possible that it doesn't work to final relase .

If you get the System.OutOfMemoryException exception when you map large messages, may be you need to read this kb "The BizTalk service restart unexpectly when you map large message in BizTalk Server 2004".  It explains the cause and possible solutions to solve this problem.

For more information go to http://support.microsoft.com/kb/913959

Microsoft.BizTalk.Databases.dll is an unsupported assembly in BizTalk Server framework.  It provides functionality to query the servers (SQL Server, Windows, Clusters, etc) and its database – if is a SQL Server - over the network.  To do it, this assembly exposes 5 classes: BizTalkDatabaseInfo, Database, DatabaseCollection, Server, y ServerCollection; and each class have its own properties and methods.

The use of these classes is very easy, in the following example I query the SQL Server that exists in my network using ServerCollection y Server.

foreach (string name in Microsoft.BizTalk.Databases.ServerCollection.GetSqlServerNames())
{
    Microsoft.BizTalk.Databases.Server server = new Microsoft.BizTalk.Databases.Server(name);
    System.Console.WriteLine("Server name: " + server.Name);
    System.Console.WriteLine("Platform Identifier: " + server.PlatformIdentifier.ToString());
    System.Console.WriteLine("Type: " + server.Type.ToString());
    System.Console.WriteLine("Version: " + server.Version.ToString());
}

Or, to query the databases in each SQL Server you can use the code that I show below.  In the example, I query each database in SQL Server and I ask if the database is a BizTalk Database:

Microsoft.BizTalk.Databases.Server server = new Microsoft.BizTalk.Databases.Server("server_name");
bool isBtsDb = true;
foreach (Microsoft.BizTalk.Databases.Database database in server.GetDatabaseCollection())
{
    System.Console.WriteLine("Database: " + database.Name);
    try
    {
        isBtsDb = database.IsBizTalkDatabase;
        if ( isBtsDb ) 
            System.Console.WriteLine("///// Begin - BizTalk Database ");
    }
    catch
    {
        isBtsDb = false;
    }
    System.Console.WriteLine("Is BizTalk database: " + isBtsDb.ToString());
    if (isBtsDb)
    {
        System.Console.WriteLine("BizTalk Db name: " + database.BizTalkDatabaseInfo.Name);
        System.Console.WriteLine("BizTalk Db version: " + database.BizTalkDatabaseInfo.Version.ToString());
        System.Console.WriteLine("BizTalk Db description: " + database.BizTalkDatabaseInfo.Description);
        System.Console.WriteLine("///// End - BizTalk Database ");
    }
}

The last functionality doesn’t work in Database class because when I ask if a database is a BizTalk Database using IsBizTalkDatabase property, Database class only checks for BizTalk Management DB and ignore another database.

Unfortunately, by this reason, you cannot use this property… I hope that Microsoft people can resolve this “issue” in the next version; it’ll be a great help.

If you have(had) any problem when you are(were) publishing orchestrations as Web Services... then you must read this article "You cannot call an orchestration that is exposed as a Web service on a server that is running BizTalk Server 2004"....

The article explains three symptoms, its causes and how we can resolve it.  As part of article, these are the symptoms explained:

Symptom 1

The following error messages are logged in the Application event log on the server that is running BizTalk Server 2004:

The Messaging Engine failed to register the adapter for "SOAP" for the receive location "/VirtualDirectory/Name.asmx". Please verify that the receive location is valid, and that the isolated adapter runs under an account that has access to the BizTalk databases.

An attempt to connect to "BizTalkMgmtDb" SQL Server database on server "Server" failed with error: "Cannot open database requested in login 'BizTalkMgmtDb'. Login fails.".

Symptom 2

On a remote server that is running BizTalk Server 2004, the following error message is logged in the Application event log when you call the orchestration that is exposed as a Web service:

The "SOAP" adapter is suspending an outbound message going to destination URL:"<http://VirtualDirectory/Name.asmx>". Details: "Server was unable to process request. --> File or assembly name FileName.dll, or one of its dependencies, was not found.".

When you call the orchestration that is exposed as a Web service from a client computer that is not running BizTalk Server 2004, you may receive an error message that is similar to the following:

SoapException: Internal SOAP Processing Failure

Symptom 3

The following error message is logged in the Application event log on the server on which the Web service is exposed:

There was a failure executing the receive pipeline:
"Microsoft.BizTalk.DefaultPipelines.XMLReceive" Source: "Microsoft.BizTalk.Messaging" Receive Location: "/VirtualDirectory/Name.asmx" Reason: Specified cast is not valid.

Now, we can send e-mails with local file(s) as attachment(s) in BizTalk 2006 without add these files as Multipart-MessageParts of the message that we'll send.  This new feature can be used for both static and dynamic ports.

If you use static ports, you can use the new Admin Console to select the file(s) that you can send without problems.  But, if you need that these files change depending of message type, then you must use a dynamic port and set the path of file(s) to new SMTP.Attachments context property of http://schemas.microsoft.com/BizTalk/2003/smtp-properties namespace.  There is only one restriction, you have to use a pipe character (|) to separate all path file(s) and one more pipe in the end of path(s), for example:

This is a fantastic new feature of SMTP Adatper in BizTalk 2006.

To people that have not begin to test Windows Workflow Foundation yet... and people that are testing Windows Workflow Foundation now, here is 10 reason to love WF and believe in it....

Thanks to Michael Zammuto for it.....

In MSDN Magazine Aaron Skonnard has published An XML Guru's Guide To BizTalk, Part II, this is the last article in the serie.  You can read the first article in An XML Guru's Guide To BizTalk, Part I.

Microsoft has released Windows Workflow Foundation 1.2... this version must be installed on a machine with Visual Studio 2005 RTM.  There are two downloads available:

• The first download consists of the platform components for Office "12" Beta User needed to run WF applications
• The second download consists of solutions templates, activities, SDK and other tools that developers need to construct WF application using Visual Studio 2005 RTM