Software integration--necessity for integrated managemement systems.

Botezatu, Cezar ; Botezatu, Cornelia Paulina ; Carutasu, George 等

1. INTRODUCTION

Application integration represents a strategic approach for unification of several systems, both at services and data level. It offers the possibility to insure data exchange between systems and reuse the business processes in real time. Even if it seems a strictly technical issue, the resulting data and process flux provides for the enterprises a strategic advantage: the opportunity to conduct their businesses in real time, in an event-based environment, with low latency and reusing their IT support in optimal conditions. In Development and Implementation of the Integrated Management System (DI-IMS) project (Botezatu et al., 2008) a study was made to ensure the prerequisites for managing unstructured data, having the results the policies and strategies presented in this paper.

According to Nelson King (King, 1999), there are 3 main classes of integration technologies, which can be used in correlation at enterprise level:

* Data Integration Technologies;

* Enterprise Application Integration;

* Enterprise Resource Planning--ERP

* Business to Business Application Integration.

The most known are the 5 laws that IT systems integration has to fulfil designed by Industrial Consortium EAI Committee, in 2002:

* Whole is better than the sum of parts--any integrated system provides more facilities than the sum of the individual systems facilities, through data correlation and aggregation;

* There is no final status--the integrated system undergoes permanently through a series of modifications, due to multiple organizational and functional aspects and technological evolution;

* There are no universal standards--use of standards is different, according to the needs of the enterprise;

* Technologies adapt in order to meet the needs of the local requests--any methodology or technology must be adjusted at enterprise level;

* All the details are relevant--all the individual aspects have to be considered when developing an integrated system.

2. APPLICATION INTEGRATION

ARCHITECTURE

One of the classification criteria for Application integration architectures is the way the user interacts with the systems, as well as with the integrated application. The architectures presented include web components as well, as internet-based access is already a common feature (Botezatu & Botezatu, 2006).

They also contain correlation with the data storage deposits and other enterprises (Glazier, 2000).

As such, there are 3 types of architectures:

* Forward architecture

* Back-end architecture

* Mix architecture

Considering the complexity of the integrated IT system at the level of multiple legal entities communicating between them, as some examples from the public administration, they can choose a distributed system, through the development of multiple application servers, each of them containing an IT subsystem. Different types of users are involved that use a certain subsystem, so at least an application server will be used for each institution.

2.1 Forward type Application Integration Architecture

The forward type emphasizes user experience and puts the EAI server close to the user interface. In fact, a business process started by a user generates transactions in multiple applications, and the answer is provided almost in real time (Glazier, 2000). It's the case when a user accesses the integrated system, the integrating interface or the so-called EAI server, either by direct means or through internet.

The EAI server makes the updates in the individual systems. In figure 1, the user accesses through internet the web server that sends his request to the integrating application/system. The EAI application uses rules in order to identify the application that needs to be used and the parameters for it.

[FIGURE 1 OMITTED]

[FIGURE 2 OMITTED]

The individual applications can be both legacy applications, as well as new ones. The integrated system accepts requests from internal users as well as from the business partners.

This type of architecture is used only if there are well defined rules for mapping data for individual applications. The model can route the users' transactions through a single interface, connecting them to multiple applications; this type is very efficient in a B2C (business to customer) environment. The advantage is that the transactions are achieved almost in real time.

2.2 Back-end type Application Integration Architecture

This architecture type improves automatic data exchange between applications. The EAI server does not interact with the user, as it gathers data from the individual applications. In figure 2 the user accesses the application directly or through a web server. In the user interface can be integrated all the facilities provided by the individual applications, but in reality each application manages its own transactions. When an application needs data managed by a different application, it uses the EAI server.

This architecture type is easier to implement, as it has a lower number of rules to be implemented. It is used for B2B applications (business to business), which require data exchange between business partners (Bramer, M. & Terziyan, V. 2005).

2.3 Mix type Application Integration Architecture

User access different applications, such as the EAI application (figure 3). This architecture type is used when the forward model is needed, with front-end applications, but with some back-end applications as well that might be needed.

3. INTEGRATION TECHNOLOGIES

Application integration is very popular through the use of middleware technologies, which includes communication protocols, API integration interfaces, application servers, web servers. Middleware is defined as an intelligent component that works as an interface between user and a large number of systems with different functions. Through middleware the way to communicate between systems is controlled.

In practice, the user does not feel this level that sends the information to every system that needs that data (Naiman, et all.2006). At query, the middleware section gathers data from different applications correlates them and aggregates them. Integration of systems using middleware can be achieved in different ways:

* message oriented--through messaging;

* transaction oriented--communication through transactions;

* through distributed objects--the link between applications is done through distributed objects;

* for databases--uses databases.

[FIGURE 3 OMITTED]

4. CONCLUSION

In this paper were detailed the policies prescript by author after a study made on 76 Romanian companies for assuring the prerequisites for implement integrated management systems, project being in course, funded by Romanian Ministry of Education, Research and Innovation. Those results will be use to concept an Integration Software Handbook as a part of strategy, together with procedures and study cases.

In this project we have as goal to determine, model and design new management approach, having in mind the integration of subsystems such as: HR, AQ, environmental preserve etc. In most cases emphasized by the study mentioned above, each subsystem is supported by one or more software applications so integration of those is an imperative. Another issue is that the applications are very diverse and each case imposes a unique solution of software integration. The actual software business solutions implemented at large companies level, because of their high selling and implementation prices are incomplete (customers are not buying entire application with all facilities and features) combining new solutions with modules legacies from past. Some times, even is cheaper to combine a new solution with a old one

5. REFERENCES

Botezatu, C. P.; Carutasu, G. & Botezatu, C. (2008). Building Integrated Management Systems, Chapter 11 in DAAAM International Scientific Book 2008, pp 125-136, B. Katalinic (Ed.), Published by DAAAM International, ISBN 978-3-901509-69-0, ISSN 1726-9687, Vienna, Austria, DOI: 10.2507/daaam.scibook.2008.11

Botezatu, C. P. & Botezatu, C. (2006). New aspects of Software Development in Economy, International Journal of Computers, Communication and Control, Volume I Supplementary issue, ISSN 1841-9836, pp 100-104

Bramer, M. & Terziyan, V. (2005). Industrial Applications of Semantic Web, Springer Publishing house, ISBN 0387285687

King N. (1999). The New Integration Imperative, Intelligent Enterprise Magazine available from: www.intelligententerprise.com, Accessed: 2009-03-01

Glazier, S. C. (2000). Patent Strategies for Software, e-Commerce, the Internet, Telecom Services, Financial Services, and Business Methods (with Case Studies and Forecasts) BI Law & Business Institute; ISBN: 0966143779

Naiman, K., Kopackova, H., Simonova, S. & Bilkova, R. (2006). Approaches of quality outputs from the business systems, Proceedings of the 5th WSEAS Int. Conf. on Computational Intelligence, Man-Machine Systems And Cybernetics, pp 282-285, ISSN: 1790-5095, ISSN: 1790- 5117, ISBN: 960-8457-56-4