FW:Pipeline Stages

Receive Pipeline Stages
Receive pipelines have specific stages that help in processing the message in a logical fashion. Each of the stages of the pipeline is designed to perform a specific task:
• Decode: This stage is used to perform operations that are required to “read” the incoming message. Think of the Decode stage as where you would perform things like decryption,
decompression, and any processing logic that will be required as input data for the subsequent stages.
• Disassemble: Components tagged as Disassemblers are designed to produce multiple messages based on the input message. Disassemblers often are used to de-batch the
incoming messages into multiple smaller messages. Each of the messages produced by the Disassembler are then passed to the remaining stages within the pipeline.
• Validate: This stage is used to ensure the message that has been decoded and potentially produced by the Disassembler is considered to be “valid” according to the pipeline
rules. Often this involves verifying the XML schema of the message to be of a certain type. Custom validators are often created for custom business-level validation logic (i.e., ensuring that the purchase order number of an incoming message is valid and exists within a database).
• Resolve Party: This stage is used often in trading partner exchange scenarios. This stage is usually used to examine the digital certificates of a signed message to ensure the validity of the sending party.

 

Figure 1 Receive Pipeline designer stages

 

Send Pipeline Stages
Send pipelines have specific stages that are related to preparing the message to be sent out of BizTalk. The surface of the Send Pipeline Designer is shown in Figure 2. Each of the stages
of the pipeline are designed to perform a specific task:
• Pre-Assemble: This stage is often used to gather any specific information that will be needed by an Assembler and add it to the message.
• Assemble: Assemblers are responsible for combining multiple smaller messages into one large message. This is often the case when you are aggregating several messages
into a batch. Assemblers are also often used in flat-file conversion and EDI scenarios to aggregate the outbound flat file into one large batched file.
• Encode: Encoders are responsible for writing the message in a fashion so that it can be read by the downstream system. Often this involves ensuring the proper character set is used, compressing the message, MIME encoding, or attaching a digital certificate.

 

Figure 2 Send Pipeline designer stages