PowerShell provider for BizTalk getting started guide

10 November 2009

For people interested in both PowerShell and BizTalk, I just finished a getting started guide to introduce the basics of the PowerShell provider for BizTalk (version 1.0 beta). The guide can be downloaded from here.

1 Comment | BizTalk, PowerShell | Tagged: , , , | Permalink
Posted by Randal van Splunteren

PowerShell Provider 1.0 (Beta) released

6 November 2009

After a couple of months of hard work (mainly in the evenings :-( ) we are very proud to announce the beta release of the PowerShell provider for BizTalk.

The setup (and source) can be downloaded from codeplex.

I hope BizTalk developers and administrators will find this a useful addition to their toolbox.

In the coming weeks we will provide more information on usage and show some tips.

3 Comments | BizTalk, PowerShell | Tagged: , , , | Permalink
Posted by Randal van Splunteren

ExpressionMaximizer

30 October 2009

A bigger expression shape window is a feature that almost always appears on “next version of BizTalk wish lists”.

Every time Microsoft releases a new version of BizTalk we are all very disappointed that they did not make the expression window resizable or at least bigger.

There are rumors that this is done to discourage developers to write a lot of code in those windows and move to external assemblies with helper classes instead.

Although I agree with that I still think it would be very nice to have a bigger window occasionally.

Like the “Orchestration Variable Retriever Functoid” this was on my “experimental things to do list” for a long time. I never had or took the chance to try it until BizTalk king Stephen W. Thomas announced his competition for the best BizTalk tip or trick.

Of course I want to join this competition so I started coding. Now that it is finished I must admit it has become quite a hack but it seems to work :-) .

Anyway the “ExpressionMaximizer” will be my entry for the competition.

A quick walkthrough:

I have an orchestration with an expression shape containing a lot of code:

orchestration

I double click the expression shape to open it (in normal mode):

normal_expressionwindow

With expression window still open I press CTRL+SHIFT+ALT+M (nice key combination :-) ) and ……:

maximized_expressionwindow

I have a big expression window where I can type many long lines of code!!!!

Everything is back to normal when you close the window and open it again.

Note that you first have to open the expression shape before pressing the key combination.

Want to try it yourself?
(description below is based on Visual Studio 2008)

- Download this zip file and extract it somewhere.
- Click ‘Tools’ –> ‘External Tools…’
- Press the ‘Add’ button
- Type a title, e.g. ‘Expression Window Maximizer’
- Fill in the command text box by browsing to the extracted ‘ExpressionMaximizer.exe’

ExternalTools

- Press the ‘OK’ button
- Select ‘Tools’ –> ‘Customize…’
- Press the ‘Keyboard…’ button
- In the ‘Show commands containing:’ text box type ‘Tools.External’
- Select the correct ‘Tools.ExternalCommandX’ from the list. (You need to find out the correct entry by counting the external tools in the Tools menu).
- Click in the text box ‘Press shortcut keys:’ to set the focus to it.
- Press CTRL+ALT+SHIFT+M
- Click the ‘Assign’ button.

Customize

- Press the ‘Ok’ button.
- Press the ‘Close’ button.

I tried this on ‘Windows Server 2008 R2/VS2008′ and ‘Windows Server 2003 R2/VS2005’ without problems but I still take no responsibility for malformed windows or other disasters :-) After all it is a big hack!

If you’re interested you can find the (VS2008) source code here.

4 Comments | BizTalk | Tagged: , , , | Permalink
Posted by Randal van Splunteren

BizTalk Management Classes Sample

18 October 2009

In my previous post I wrote about the beta of the BizTalk management classes.

Every now and then you need to do some BizTalk management things in code. This is where the classes come in very handy.

Last week I wrote a small sample to show and explain the use of the classes to a co-BizTalker. He was excited about this but told me it would be a good thing if we provide some more sample code. I’m sure we (me and the great people I work with on this project) will come up with a lot more information when we release the final version. For now I will only post this small sample.

It shows that a lot of “BizTalk management work” can be done using only a couple lines of code. Also this is done in a uniform way (using a single API).

This is what the sample does:

  • connect to a BizTalk group (management database).
  • create an application.
  • add a BizTalk assembly (resource) to the application.
  • import a binding file.
  • creates and exports an MSI file from the new application.
  • Starts the application.
  • Resets the BizTalk Host.

Here is the code:

BTSMgmtClasses_sample

As you can see below I only need 8 lines of code to accomplish it. I don’t know how much code this would take when it was done using the “regular” API’s but I’m very sure many more lines are needed.

If you like this please download the beta from codeplex and start using the classes.

2 Comments | BizTalk | Tagged: , , , | Permalink
Posted by Randal van Splunteren

Create applications using PowerShell provider for BizTalk

8 January 2009

I wrote a small article that shows how to create BizTalk applications using my PowerShell provider for BizTalk. You can find it here.

2 Comments | BizTalk | Tagged: , , | Permalink
Posted by Randal van Splunteren

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