Among the technologies we follow:
Adapters
Adapters are devices that enable one system to connect to and work with another. Covered topics include JCA, API, ERP, BAPI, intelligent adapters, and adapter development kits (ADK).
Analytics
App/Web Servers
Application and Web servers manage software component modules containing business logic. Web servers manage HTML pages and Internet connections. Application and Web servers provide additional system services such as load balancing, failover, transaction management and connection pooling. In this section you'll find articles on WebLogic, WebSphere, Apache, edge servers, mobile servers, and more.
Application Grid
Application grid computing is the use of computer resources from multiple administrative domains that are applied to a common task.
Application Lifecycle Management
Application lifecycle management (ALM) is the combination of business management and software engineering made possible by architecture, coding, testing, tracking, and release management tools.
Application Management & Monitoring
Application performance management and monitoring software ensures the availability and performance of critical business applications. Solutions typically include real-time monitoring, dashboards and automated problem resolution. The goal: to detect, isolate and resolve problems to improve application accuracy and efficiency—and, by extension, increase user productivity.
Automated Workflow Management
Workflow management involves moving information, documents or tasks between people or machines within an organization. Typically, the goal of workflow management is getting the right information to the right person in the right order and at the right time. Automating that process can dramatically improve efficiency and productivity, reduce response time, prevent errors and cut costs. For those reasons, automated workflow is a common goal for business process management (BPM) programs and initiatives.
B2B
Business-to-business (B2B) refers the exchange of goods, services or information between business organizations, rather than between companies and consumers (B2C). The term also extends to transactions with other partners and suppliers throughout the supply chain, such as financial institutions and third-party logistics (3PL) companies. Business process management (BPM) initiatives can contribute to B2B commerce both through internal improvements and by automating business processes all along the supply chain.
B2B Security
Banking and Capital Markets
BPM & Enterprise 2.0
Enterprise 2.0 refers to the integration of Web 2.0 technologies into a company's intranet, extranet and business processes. The Enterprise 2.0 approach is expected to apply an increasingly strategic role in business process management (BPM). Enterprise 2.0 initiatives are often intended to increase productivity and innovation by allowing users to easily share information and collaborate on tasks and projects. Such initiatives may be in-house or Web-based, and they may involve a company’s partners or customers as well as its employees.
BPM & Web 2.0
Web 2.0 commonly refers to a “second generation” Web representing a transition from static Web pages to dynamic, interactive, application-rich sites that typically encourage user participation. Web 2.0 also refers to providing improved ability for people to meet, network, collaborate and share information online. This approach makes it easier for users to collaborate on business process management (BPM) and process-improvement initiatives. Blogs, wikis, video-sharing and social networking are among the many examples of Web 2.0 technologies.
BPM : Supply Chain
Business process management (BPM) can help enterprises view their supply chains comprehensively and optimize them for better performance. BPM can provide those benefits not just throughout an individual enterprise, but to outside suppliers, partners and other key parties as well. Ultimately, BPM can improve efficiency, visibility, control, accountability throughout the entire supply chain. To learn more about BPM for supply-chain management, see our collection of tips, articles and other resources.
BPM and Enterprise Architecture
As no application (or business process, for that matter) is an island anymore, organizations must invest in and use enterprise integration and enterprise architecture approaches to create effective IT infrastructures.
BPM Components
Covers the nuts and bolts of the components of business process management (BPM) solutions, either as standalone products or in context of Business Process Platform features. Includes business rules engines, process modelers and monitors, simulation and optimization features, integration capabilities, BPM standards efforts and similar computer-science detail related to BPM.
BPM in the Real World
Building the Enterprise Through BPM
Making better use of enterprise assets and resources through improved business processes is a top objective for organizations today. Enterprise business processes involve people, systems, and information, often across multiple departments, lines of business and value chains. The distributed, compartmentalized nature of these business processes makes it challenging for enterprises to adapt them to address competitive pressures, regulatory changes, market conditions, and customer demands. BPM provides the foundation for enterprise-wide business process management to improve business innovation, agility, and performance.
BPM Platforms/Suites
Process Visualization and Optimization
Market forces are compelling organizations to make dramatic changes that help cut costs, reduce risk, and capitalize on revenue opportunities. Business Process Management (BPM) platforms can serve as the common ground for business and IT professionals to create more agile, efficient, and cost-effective business processes to help companies rapidly respond to market needs.
Providing feature-rich, customer-centric solutions to over 2,500 enterprises worldwide, the Fujitsu Interstage BPM Suite provides companies with a solution that helps them discover and visualize, define and refine, automate, manage, and continuously optimize business processes. Customers can choose to install the Interstage BPM Suite on their own premises or leverage the Fujitsu Interstage Cloud BPM offering for an off-premise deployment.
Pace-setting technologies combined with expert services uniquely position Fujitsu to deliver comprehensive solutions that open up infinite possibilities for customer success.
BPM, SOA & Cloud Integration
Business process management (BPM) projects increasingly rely integrated approaches to service-oriented architecture (SOA) and cloud computing. SOAs incorporate modular reusable business services that have clearly defined and standardized interfaces. As a result, these architectures maximize reuse and business agility and enable rapid business change. Cloud computing generally refers an Internet-based approach outside traditional on-premises computing architectures. Business process management suites (BPMSs) and other BPM products are increasingly offered in cloud-based versions. Find BPM-SOA resources in this section.
BPM: Customer Management
Experts say that, in many ways, business process management (BPM) and customer relationship management (CRM) are moving toward convergence. CRM software increasingly offers some BPM functionality, while BPM initiatives are addressing customer-management issues such as acquiring new customers, retaining existing ones, planning for peak business periods and managing customer feedback. To learn more about using BPM to support CRM and improve customer experience, see our collection of tips, articles and other resources.
BPM: Financial Services
Business process management (BPM) programs and initiatives can improve organizational productivity, efficiency, effectiveness and even profitability--but only if the underlying BPM technology is correctly deployed. Our collection of strategic and tactical tips, resources and learning content provides expert advice on successfully choosing and implementing business process management suites (BPMSs) as well as solutions for decision management, operational intelligence, advanced analytics and other BPM-related activities.
BPM: Healthcare & Insurance
By using business process management (BPM), healthcare providers can cut costs and boost productivity by, among other things, streamlining and automating workflows and improving record-keeping and billing processes. BPM is widely used in insurance companies to speed up information flows, providing agents and other key players with accurate, up-to-date information. That can eliminate bottlenecks and time-wasting tasks, improve underwriting results and enable faster response to changing business demand, emerging opportunities and new regulatory requirements.
BPM:Government
Federal, state and local government agencies use business process management (BPM) to automate workflows, aggregate and analyze data, improve record-keeping, boost productivity, respond to citizen requests and cut costs. Agencies are also using BPM to better serve constituents by coordinating services and records throughout their own organizations and even across multiple agencies. Many government agencies increasingly rely on BPM to ensure compliance with the constantly growing number of statutes that regulate their activities. Find BPM-government resources in this section.
Business Activity Monitoring (BAM)
Business Activity Monitoring (BAM) refers to the combination of business process management (BPM) and operational business intelligence. BAM solutions provide real-time alerts in response to metrics signaling that something in the business needs intervention. BAM technology also enables real-time business intelligence, trend analysis and data mining that can provide information on how best to respond to alerts. Finally, information gathered by BAM can provide valuable data points for strategic-planning initiatives.
Business Event Processing
Business event processing (also known as complex event processing) helps organizations monitor and act on business events in near-real time. Event-processing programs aggregate information from distributed systems in real time, applying apply rules that reveal key patterns, relationships or trends. This type of "situational awareness," or "sensing and responding," helps companies quickly anticipate, identify and respond to both potential opportunities and possible threats. Learn more about business event processing from our tips, interviews and other resources.
Business Intelligence
Details approaches and technologies a business can use to acquire a better understanding of the market behavior and business context. This concept employs collection, integration, analysis, interpretation and presentation of business information in views that make sense for the business user.
Business Process Analysis & Optimization
In business process analysis, companies review existing processes and practices with an eye toward improvement, often by automating them. Business process optimization refers to making processes as effective as possible. Optimization begins with analysis, typically by taking process performance data from the process-modeling stage, and identifying potential or actual bottlenecks. That analysis can lead to enhancements applied to the overall process design to improve efficiency and overall business value.
Business Process Intelligence
Business process intelligence fuses business process management (BPM) and business intelligence (BI). Process intelligence involves monitoring analyzing key performance indicators (KPIs) and linking them daily activities and business processes for the purpose of ensuring that the entire enterprise is moving toward declared performance goals. Process intelligence can be strategic, tactical or operational in nature. See our collection of tips, articles and other resources for more information on process intelligence.
Business Process Management (BPM) Standards
Business process management (BPM) professionals are continually grappling with creating standards for the methodology and the supporting technologies. BPM is the subject of multiple existing and emerging standards, many geared to process modeling. Well-known standards include Business Process Modeling Notation (BPMN)2.0 and Business Process Execution Language (BPEL), among others. Our growing collection of tips, articles and other content can serve as resource for keeping up with constantly evolving BPM standards.
Business Process Management (BPM) Technology Implementation
Business process management (BPM) programs and initiatives can improve organizational productivity, efficiency, effectiveness and even profitability--but only if the underlying BPM technology is correctly deployed. Our collection of strategic and tactical tips, resources and learning content provides expert advice on successfully choosing and implementing business process management suites (BPMSs) as well as solutions for decision management, operational intelligence, advanced analytics and other BPM-related activities.
Business Process Management (BPM ) Best Practices
Business process management (BPM) best practices can go a long way toward ensuring success of your BPM programs and projects. Ultimately, tried-and-tested best practices will make your business more efficient, more effective and more capable of adapting rapidly to ever-changing industry conditions and market demands by improving productivity, streamlining workflow and eliminating bottlenecks. Learn more about BPM best practices in our growing collection of tips, articles, expert advice and learning content.
Business Process Management (BPM) and Enterprise Content Management
Enterprise content management (ECM) refers to methodologies and technologies used for managing a company's content, or information, in support of its business processes. Put another way, ECM allows an organization to manage its unstructured information assets, regardless of where they exist, and map them to those business processes. Besides enhancing business process management (BPM) ECM is designed to enable more effective information-sharing, better operational performance and improved compliance with internal rules and government regulations.
Business Process Simulation
Business process simulation plays an important role in the continuous improvement approach to business process management (BPM). By running business process simulations, companies can predict how business processes perform under specific conditions. Simulations can also be used to test process design, measure performance, identify bottlenecks and test changes. Ultimately, process simulation can identify the most effective process flow and help prevent problems from cropping up during process execution. Simulation models can be very simple or highly complex.
Business Process Visibility & Monitoring
The goal of business process visibility is providing a complete view into an enterprise's processes. From an operational perspective, process visibility can show that transactions and other activities are processing accurately. From a business perspective, process visibility shows whether processes are correctly aligned with key business goals. Business process monitoring helps provide such visibility, allowing organizations to proactively identify potential problems while ensuring that processes map to overall business objectives.
Business Rules Management
Business rules are clear, formal policies for how an organization responds to pre-defined events, activities or changes in its business environment, including in its business processes. A business rules management system (BRMS) can automate those policies, allowing for quick, easy changes and reliable monitoring of resulting decisions or activities. Business rules and BRMSs can save time, increase organizational agility and responsiveness and accelerate business process management (BPM) efforts.
Business Service Management
Business Service Management (BSM) is the method of measuring and monitoring IT services from a business perspective to ensure maximum IT ROI.
Business to Business
Business-to-business (B2B) refers to the exchange of products, services or information between business organizations, rather than from businesses to consumers (B2C). The term is also commonly used to refer to business e-commerce—that is, companies using the Internet to buy, sell and deliver goods, services and information to other businesses, directly or via distributors, resellers or partners. The term also covers transactions and automation of business processes along the end-to-end supply-chain, including external organizations such as banks and third-party logistics (3PL) companies.
Business-Driven SOA
The SOA Consortium defines business-driven SOA as involving three activities:
- Creating a portfolio of services that represent the business, information or technology capabilities that an organization offers or requires.
- Composing or orchestrating those services--along with events, rules and policies--into business processes and solutions.
- Working towards realizing a business outcome.
A business-driven SOA approach can improve business/IT alignment, increasing flexibility, improving productivity and reducing costs for both.
Business/IT Alignment
IT-Business Alignment refers to bringing an organization’s IT strategy into line with its business goals. While these two factors often seem to be at cross purposes, many business and technical experts call aligning them critical to a company’s long-term success. At the management level, alignment requires optimizing communication between an organization’s key business and IT decision-makers. Critical factors for most alignment efforts include clear business plans, a responsive operational environment, flexible service-driven IT architecture, effective IT staffing and initiatives designed to provide fast, significant return on investment (ROI).
Cloud Computing
Cloud computing refers to the use of scalable, real-time, Internet-based information technology services and resources. This concept incorporates software as a service (SaaS), utility computing, Web 2.0 and other technology trends of the second half of the first decade of the 21st century.
The cloud element of cloud computing derives from a metaphor used for the Internet, from the way it is often depicted in computer network diagrams, and is an abstraction for the complex infrastructure it conceals.
Cloud Orchestration Services
The term “cloud services” refers to products, services and information delivered and consumed in real time via the Internet. But many IT experts now say that cloud computing involves more than a single giant cloud; instead, the term refers to a federation of clouds (in the same way that “Internet” refers to a network of networks). Clouds may be private (corporate) or public; general-interest or highly specialized. The “orchestration” piece refers coordinating multiple interconnected clouds to provide access to their applications, business processes and services.
Complex Event Processing
Complex event processing (CEP) software aggregates information from distributed systems in real time and applies rules to discern patterns and trends that would otherwise go unnoticed. This gives companies the ability to identify and anticipate opportunities represented by seemingly unrelated events.
With CEP, businesses can map discrete events to expected outcomes and relate series of events to key performance indicators (KPIs). CEP gives businesses insight into which events will have the greatest operational impact so they can focus their resources to seize opportunities and mitigate risks
This section chronicles the emergence of CEP applications and products, and to discuss their relevance to managing the event-driven real time enterprise.
Compliance and Security
Connected Web
The Connected Web refers to tools and techniques that businesses are using to transform their operations and gain competitive advantage in today’s hyper-connected digital economy. Connected Web technologies include enterprise collaboration software, cloud platforms, Software as a Service, social networking, Web content management and mashups, among others.
Continuous Process Improvement
Continuous process improvement refers to ongoing efforts to improve business processes. In truth, most business process management (BPM) efforts are constant works in progress. But continuous process improvement is a formal, ongoing approach to improving processes (and, ultimately, productivity, services and products). Processes are constantly evaluated, often based on employee and customer feedback, then adapted as needed to meet organization goals. Improvements may be made incrementally or in large-scale "breakthrough" implementations.
Corporate Performance Management
Corporate performance management—sometimes called business performance management allows an organization to monitor and manage current business activities in order to improve achievement of corporate goals and objectives. It involves measuring a company’s activities against targets set by management on key performance indicators (KPIs) such as overhead expenses, operational costs, revenue and return on investment (ROI). Initially used primarily by finance departments on a historical reporting basis, CPM software and processes are now used enterprise-wide in real-time in order to achieve continuous improvement of operations. CPM software includes forecasting, budgeting and planning functions, as well as analytics, graphical scorecards and “dashboards” that display information.
CRM Integration
Customer Relationship Management (CRM) refers to the software, hardware and Internet tools that enable enterprises to profitably manage relationships with their customers. This section contains articles on vendors, tools and best practices for integrating enterprise information with CRM solutions. Covered topics include providing a unified view of the customer, call centers, customer satisfaction, customer value, and customer self-service initiatives.
Data Integration
Processes and technologies for moving information between many different information systems. Deals with data mediation issues, as information moves from information system to information system, including transformation, routing, and flow control.
Data Security
Data security ensures data is kept safe and that access to it is controlled.
Decision Management & BPM
Decision management refers to a systematic approach to automating and improving decisions underpinning daily business operations. Decision management can drive value and improve business performance through the use of technologies such as business rules and predictive analytics. Ultimately, decision management aims to increase the precision, consistency and agility of these decisions as well as the business processes that support or drive them. It’s also designed to decrease decision time and cost.
Development Trends
Building agile and open applications and systems to move today's organizations forward.
Document-centric BPM
Document-centric business process management (BPM) refers to a BPM approach that focuses more on document management than on people or processes. Document-centric BPM technologies and methods are typically used for routing, collaborating on and approving documents.
Dynamic Case Management (DCM)
Dynamic case management (DCM) is an approach to work supported by technologies that can automate various aspects of each case. It is a semi-structured, yet collaborative and dynamic, process that is driven by incoming events. As they arrive, those events change the context of the information, requiring responses from the caseworker. DCM is viewed as especially important for handling "untamed" business processes--that is, those lacking structure or with no added value. It also provides for dynamic allocation of work.
E-Commerce/B2C
e-commerce, also sometimes called Business-to-Consumer (B2C), covers the tools, techniques and practices that enterprises adopt to do business on the Web.
EAI
Enterprise Application Integration focuses on the integration of applications within organizations - behind the firewall. Among the articles in this section are ones on message brokers, integration servers, point-to-point integration, data transformation, intelligent routing, and semantic integration.
ebizQ
EDA
End to End Process Orchestration
Business process orchestration involves the coordination and central management of process events or components. Business process orchestration often involves a variety of components that are compiled into a new application or process. Orchestration differs from a similar concept, choreography, in that it implies a single coordinating force, or "conductor," rather than multiple participants. Like business process modeling, business process orchestration can be graphically depicted in a diagram.
Enterprise Collaboration
Collaboration refers to individuals, groups or organizations working together on a common project or toward reaching shared goals either synchronously or asynchronously. Collaborative programs (commonly known as groupware) enable all project participants to work collectively on the same documents, tasks or projects, even in different locations and at different times. Collaborative tools—which may be either traditional software or Web-based applications—typically fall into three categories: communication tools, conferencing tools and collaboration-management tools.
Enterprise Identity Management
Enterprise Information Integration
Processes and technologies for information integration, typically using data abstraction to provide a single metadata interface for viewing all the data within an enterprise as a single set of structures and semantics. This approach and technology provides any data user with the ability to view data from many different data sources, as a single database that exists only in middleware.
Enterprise Mashups
Mashups are based on the concept that a final product is greater than the sum of its parts. The term refers to Web pages or applications that dynamically integrate data or content from multiple sources in real time, creating valuable new functionality. For example, a business user could invoke a shipping-pricing service from a package-delivery company and build a product-shipping-cost application without doing any programming. Enterprise mashups involve using Web technologies for on-the-fly integration, situational applications and in business-to-business infrastructure. Mashups can enhance an organization’s agility while still meeting its compliance and security requirements.
Enterprise Portals
An enterprise portal provides an organization’s employees, customers and partners with a single Web-based point for interacting with each other and with applications, processes, documents and other information. An enterprise portal serves up personalized applications based on users’ individual roles, locations, preferences or other factors. By delivering customized, constantly updated and highly relevant content via a familiar Web browser, enterprise portals can provide valuable support for business process management (BPM) and other organizational improvement efforts.
Enterprise Service Bus
Enterprise Service Bus (ESB) provide similar functionality to message brokers, including messaging, routing, data translation and transformation, but do not have a hub and spoke architecture. Additional integration services can be "plugged into" the bus, providing a flexible and scalable solution. ESB vendors are seeking to provide a full integration platform by adding BPM, BAM, and B2B capabilities, and other integration services.
Enterprise Technologies
EXECUTIVE CORNER
Exchanges
Exchanges, sometimes called electronic marketplaces or digital exchanges, are used by some organizations for e-procurement. This section covers vertical markets, types of services and solutions available, and vendors and products for creating your own exchange.
Financial Services
Financial Services integration is being used for such initiatives as Straight-Through Processing (STP) and T+1 settlement of trades. The Sarbanes-Oxley law is driving many organizations to implement integration solutions to document, monitor, and certify their financial processes.
Government
Grid/Utility Computing
The concept of grid or utility computing is similar to the electric grid. When you buy an appliance you just need to plug it into the wall socket for it to work. You don't need to rewire the entire house or neighborhood. But behind this ease of use is an extensive utility grid that powers each appliance. This is the concept behind grid/utility computing, and the integration infrastructure is a large part of the computing grid. While grid computing may focus on the architecture, the concept of utility computing also relates to paying for computing services as you utilize them. Many vendors view this as the future of computing, and are building products to deliver on this future.
Healthcare
Healthcare integration technologies are used by providers and insurance companies to integrate applications within their organizations and to connect to their partners, suppliers and customers. HIPAA is among the numerous topics covered in this section.
Human-Centric BPM
Human-centric business process management (BPM) refers to a BPM approach that focuses on human interaction more than on processes or documents. Human-centric BPM is designed to more closely align people and processes, relying on user-friendly tools, such as dashboards, that help business professionals better understand the processes—and, where appropriate, better manage them.
Industry Solutions
Industry solutions drills down on how IT solutions are directly transforming industries like Insurance and Financial Services.
Information as a Service
Accesses many types of information through APIs and other interfaces for any application usage, including creating composite applications and/or mashups. Information providers typically produce information through subscription services. Examples of this information include D&B information, address lookups, census data, and any information that would be of value within business systems.
Insurance
The Insurance industry is ready to literally transform the way it does business, and those companies (both insurers and vendors) that take the lead in this change will best be positioned for market dominance and long term financial success. And finally, companies with strong linkage between clear strategies, optimized business processes and the right technology choices, will be poised for success.The purpose of the ebizQ insurance community is simple - to aggregate a single view of leading research, fresh insights and clear perspectives that facilitates the linkages between strategy to process to technology solutions that will guide insurance marketplace transformation and success.This section covers trends around: business & IT strategies, business & IT solutions that connect the insurance value chain of marketing, distribution, underwriting, policy administration, billing, claims and other back office functions...to enterprise architectures including business, data, application and infrastructure and to specific application software, tools and hot technologies like BMP, SOA, predictive analytics, etc.
Integration Architecture
The integration architecture includes all the different types of integration technologies, such as messaging, message brokers, enterprise service buses (ESBs), data translation and transformation, intelligent routing, mobile integration, portals, B2B integration, composite application development, integration and orchestration, application architecture, including service oriented architecture (SOA), data and enterprise information integration, collaboration, process management, and the solutions built on top of the integration technologies. It also includes the business processes, procedures, policies and organizational structure that enable the integration architecture to deliver business agility.
Intelligent Process Automation
Sits at the intersection of Business Intelligence (BI) and BPM, where features like performance measurement and alert monitoring combine to drive process flow. Hybrid BI/BPM systems are often considered the most important future wave of enterprise software.
IT Governance and Compliance
IT governance looks to create a system in which all stakeholders in the enterprise have the required input into the IT decision making process so that systems and applications perform as expected.
IT Operations Management
IT Operations Management looks to define common processes and procedures, policies, roles, responsibilities, terminology, best practices and standards for managing IT.
ITIL
JMS
Java Messaging Service (JMS) is a standard that implements asynchronous messaging for Java objects and includes point-to-point messaging to a queue, publish-and-subscribe for delivery of messages to multiple subscribers, and certified message delivery. This section includes information on vendor and customer implementations of JMS.
Legacy Integration
Legacy Integration involves the integration and Web extension of existing (legacy) systems--especially mission-critical mainframe systems, in order to leverage existing IT assets. Various techniques and technologies can be used to extend legacy systems into Internet-based systems. This section covers the methods, vendors and products for legacy integration, including screen-scraping, user interface-level integration, data-level integration, and method-level integration.
Management Best Practices
EXECUTIVE CORNER
Mashups
MDM
A set of processes and technologies that defines and manages the data entities of an organization, also called reference data. Is used for collecting, aggregating, matching, consolidating, quality assuring, persisting and distributing such data throughout an organization to ensure consistency, control, and maintenance of the data.
Messaging Middleware
Messaging Middleware provides the foundation for, among other things, MQSeries, JMS, publish and subscribe, asynchronous messaging, synchronous messaging, message queues, object request brokers and multicast technology.
Mobile Integration
Mobile Integration involves the integration into an enterprise infrastructure of mobile devices such as PDAs, cell phones, "crack" berries, pagers, and other mobile devices. Articles in this section cover mobile standards, architecture, technologies, vendors and products.
Mobile Middleware Integration
Mobile middleware is a type of enterprise software designed to connect enterprise applications with remote workers who need access to them. Typically, workers access these applications via portable computers, smart phones and other mobile devices.
Network Security
Open Source
Open Source follows what OS means to enterprises in terms of
applications, infrastructure, services, and as functionality.
Operational BI
Operational Business Intelligence (BI) refers to a proactive approach to complement traditional business intelligence systems. This approach allows employees at all tiers of responsibility—strategic, analytical and operational—to participate in problem-solving and decision-making. Operational BI differs from traditional BI in that it can provide real-time information on system activity and events; it also tracks business performance in real time.
Operational Intelligence
Operational intelligence is an approach to data analysis that helps companies make decisions based on the real-time data they generate every day. Operational intelligence is typically targeted to front-line workers, such as call-center employees, who need the most up-to-date information possible to do their jobs. Operational intelligence can take place in tandem with business processing so that problems can be spotted immediately rather than after the fact, as they are when traditional business intelligence is used.
PIM
Portals
Portals are an increasingly popular corporate integration strategy of aggregating information and functionality from multiple back-ends to provide an easy-to-use customized interface for different types of users. This section covers the integration techniques and vendors, and products for implementing enterprise portals.
Process Discovery
Business process discovery (BPD) is often a first step in business process management. It refers to a collection of techniques and tools for defining, mapping and analyzing existing work processes to document the current state of business processes, providing a baseline for improvements. BPD may be manual or automated.
Process Governance
Process governance refers to rules that organizations use to manage business process management (BPM) programs and initiatives. Process governance typically involves setting standards and priorities for BPM efforts, identifying BPM governance leaders, defining BPM project participants’ roles and creating internal BPM “centers of excellence" or "competency centers" to share process-improvement best practices. Learn more about process governance in our collection of tips, articles, expert advice and other resources.
Process Management
Process Modeling
Process modeling refers to representing an organization’s real-world processes, typically with the goal of analyzing them and then improving them to boost productivity, efficiency, effectiveness, agility or quality. Business Process Modeling Notation (BPMN) refers to a standard method of illustrating processes with flowchart-like diagrams that can be easily understood by both IT and business managers; the current version is BPMN 2.0. Learn more about process modeling from our collection of tips, feature articles and other resources.
Process Monitoring
Process-centric BPM
Process-centric business process management (BPM) refers to a BPM approach that focuses primarily on processes themselves, rather than on people or documents. Process-centric BPM often involves three stages: discovery, implementation and maintenance. Discovery is widely viewed as the most important stage; according to Gartner, organizations with successful process-centric BPM initiatives spent more than 40 percent of the total project effort on that initial phase.
Real-Time Enterprise
Real-Time Enterprise articles focus on the requirements, technologies, solutions and best practices for creating e-business infrastructures that deliver the scalability, performance, and reliability required for conducting business in real-time. Real-time management practices, dashboards and integration requirements are covered.
RFID Integration
Radio Frequency Identification is a technology that uses electronic transponders to track shipments and automatically capture data about the shipments, then provides real-time information about goods and shipments. RFID integration takes the information captured from the RFID tags and integrates it with systems for analysis and tracking. While RFID is in the early adoption stage, the real-time information it provides has the potential to significantly alter how processes occur and how companies operate. Therefore, we expect RFID integration to become very important to companies who manufacture, ship and sell goods.
Risk Management
Rules Engines
SaaS
Software as a Service (SaaS) refers to a software-delivery model in which vendors or service providers deliver applications to customers over a network, usually the Internet. In the SaaS approach, companies essentially “rent” the applications, often for a monthly fee, rather than buying and installing packaged software on their computers or servers. SaaS is an increasingly popular choice for many businesses because it streamlines administration, updates applications automatically and can be accessed from anywhere. SaaS applications are now typically delivered over a cloud infrastructure.
Security
Security is a critical issue for most organizations implementing Web systems. Security topics include processes, policies, techniques, technologies and best practices for securing the enterprise. Securing networks and IT infrastructures is also discussed.
Security Incident and Event Management
Semantic Integration
Covers approaches and technologies for managing the meaning of information between systems, accounting for the differences for use in transformation layers and within services, as well as managing common notions and concepts that map back to physical records, and in some cases instances of information.
Service Governance
Service governance supports business process management (BPM) by creating reusable enterprise-class services and monitoring their deployment and reuse across an organization. Such efforts are directed by a service governance organization that may include a governance leader (often the platform architect), a cross-functional governance council and a services "librarian." This organization oversees service definitions, sets service-ownership boundaries and appoints services owners. Learn more about service governance in our tips, articles and other resources.
Service Intermediaries
Tracking the middleware platforms that help connect systems, applications, and data in new ways across enterprises.
Service Security
SOA Governance
SOA in the Real World
Service-Oriented Architectures (SOAs) incorporate modular reusable business services that have clearly defined and standardized interfaces. SOAs maximize reuse and business agility and enable rapid business change. Web Services and BPM are important technologies for implementing SOAs. This section covers strategies, best practices, case studies, technologies, and solutions for creating successful SOAs.
SOA Management
Service-oriented architecture (SOA) is expected to become the dominant enterprise IT architecture. That’s because SOA can transform your IT organization from a bottleneck and cost center into a key source of business flexibility and competitive advantage. You can accelerate SOA adoption and reduce risks by deploying high-quality SOA services that deliver measurable business outcomes. SOA management will help you achieve the highest levels of operational integrity for your SOA initiatives. Management solutions enable you to achieve operational integrity, enforce policies, manage service levels and access rich reporting and monitoring.
SOA Platforms/Suites
Service-oriented architecture (SOA) promises to reduce the amount of new code required to create new applications by allowing the reuse of existing services. To get significant benefit from SOA, an organization must have as many services exposed as possible at as broad a level as possible.
To reuse services, companies must first service-enable existing assets and build services to meet the needs of ongoing business initiatives. With each project built according to SOA principles, the library of services available to the next project will grow. As that library grows, so will the benefits of SOA.
SOA Security
Social BPM
This amorphous, still-evolving term refers to approach that uses social techniques and tools to develop and improve business processes. Using technologies such as wikis and social-networking sites allows organizations to undertake user-driven business process management (BPM) initiatives leading to user-generated improvements. Essentially, social BPM is collaborative BPM in a networked environment. It can extend BPM access and decision-making to select external partners without compromising the exclusivity of the core group.
Social Networking
Standards
Standards enhance interoperability both within and between enterprises. In this section we track all defined and emerging standards that impact enterprise integration, as well as the organizations involved in defining standards.
Storage
Storage Topic
Straight-Through BPM
Follows the development of "look Mom, no hands" BPM as it emerges from very specialized niches. This includes integration with supply chains, CRM software, ERP suites and other middleware.
Supply Chain Mgmt.
Supply Chain Management (SCM) includes the integration of a company with its business and trading partners and suppliers, and monitoring and managing the electronic transactions between and among them. Companies are leveraging existing EDI systems and extending them with newer Internet solutions. This section includes articles on strategies, technologies, best practices, vendors and solutions for SCM initiatives.
Systems and Business Service Management
As it takes more than mere applications or IT systems to enable effective business processes, it also takes good systems and business services management.
The Role of Technology in Business
EXECUTIVE CORNER
Virtualization
Web Client Architecture
Web Content Management
Web content management refers to administering website content, including text, graphics, photo, audio, video and applications. It can also involve cataloging, indexing or assembling content at runtime, or to providing specific users with customized information—for instance, delivering content in different languages or tailoring advertising to a specific user’s interests based on site use or search terms.
Web Oriented Architecture
Improving the user experience in web applications with client-side technologies such as AJAX, Flex, AIR and Silverlight.
Web Services & XML
Web Services are business functions packaged as services that can be published to the network and used by other programs via standard interfaces and communication protocols. Web services located on disparate servers on the Internet or other IP network can be incorporated into Web applications, enabling programmers to assemble applications from pre-built services and allowing service providers to make their digital assets easily available worldwide. In this section, you'll find articles on the latest developments in Web services standards, tools and strategies.
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