Business Services (BSSVs) are the JD Edwards version of the more common term “Web Services.” As a JD Edwards footprint matures, Business Services often form an integral part of an organization’s daily operations.
Unfortunately, from a CNC Administrator’s point of view, BSSVs are a proverbial “black box.” In this post, we’ll discuss why that’s the case and highlight how CNCs can simplify the management of BSSVs.
A Quick Look at BSSVs and Their Role within JD Edwards
This is how Oracle defines BSSVs:
Business Services are JD Edwards EnterpriseOne Business Function objects that are used for interoperability between JD Edwards EnterpriseOne and other applications or systems.
They are written in Java and provide access to business logic in JD Edwards EnterpriseOne for many supported business transactions including:
- Journal Entries
- Exchange Rates
- Accounts Payable Vouchers
- Inventory Look-ups
- Pricing
- Sales Orders
CNCs install and configure the BSSV server by following Oracle’s documentation. Once installation is complete, CNCs notify the development team that JD Edwards Business Services are now available, and the developers then use the BSSVs to aggressively advance an organization’s business processes. As the development team becomes more familiar with taking advantage of Business Services, BSSVs grow to become a critical function of business operations. At that point, the CNC’s role is to support JD Edwards development teams by investigating errors and bugs.
This is where things can start to get tricky.
Common Challenges and Solutions for Managing BSSVs
Managing the day-to-day health of BSSVs is an important task for CNCs, and diagnosing and resolving errors and bugs can often be a challenge.
CNCs have several tools to help them monitor BSSVs.
Out of the box, JD Edwards EnterpriseOne’s Server Management Console provides a monitor that will send an email when general events occur, such as Managed Instance Down/Up/Restarted or Security Server Connection Failure. CNCs can also test BSSV functions by using third party API testing tools.
These tools are useful, but they have their limitations. First, the Server Management Console’s basic status notifications only arrive after a general event has occurred. And neither Server Management Console nor the API testing tools provide a detailed enough picture of the overall health of the Business Services Server processes to allow CNCs to be proactive. To be proactive, CNCs need to know:
- How is the BSSV server performing?
- Do Business Services’ performance change based on the day of the week or the time of day?
- Does the execution of specific business processes adversely impact BSSV performance?
Being able to monitor response time and compare that over a period can be the difference between having the ability to proactively prepare for and execute a change (hardware upgrades, business process modifications, etc.) and having that change mandated during a Monday morning Emergency System Performance Meeting.
Effective BSSV Monitoring Solution Available
Fortunately, CNCs can avoid such an uncomfortable meeting by using Syntax EnterpriseCare® to monitor the health of Business Services servers. Not only does EnterpriseCare® provide heartbeat-like monitoring, it verifies that a BSSV function returns a response and measures its performance. CNCs can then compare those measurements to a pre-defined threshold and send alerts when that threshold is breached, acting before critical business processes are disrupted.
Likewise, CNCs can also use these performance measurements to track performance over time and to determine trends based on the time of day and day of the week.
Armed with this insight, CNCs can either proactively adjust the timing of business processes that may reduce system performance by overtaxing the BSSV server or they can recommend hardware upgrades.
Learn More about Syntax EnterpriseCare® for JD Edwards
Syntax EnterpriseCare® is a proprietary solution and is the industry’s leading JD Edwards monitoring tool. This blog entry is the first in a year-long series focused on Oracle ERP monitoring challenges and solutions. Stay tuned for future entries on both JD Edwards and Oracle E-Business Suite monitoring.
To learn more now, visit our Syntax EnterpriseCare® page, read our fact sheet, or contact us and we will be happy to schedule a 1-1 meeting with one of our experts.