WebSphere Sensor Events

New in V6.2

Sensor event services components
Sensor event services components are a suite of business-level services that can be used as building blocks when orchestrating applications built on the WebSphere Sensor Events platform. The sensor event services components complement the WebSphere Sensor Events API by exposing higher-level functionality through easy-to-use interfaces. The interfaces enable clients to implement new real world aware applications that exploit new insights from sensor technologies. Each sensor event services component provides a set of capabilities related to a particular business task. They can be reused in many different situations where business tasks need to be performed by an application or a business process. Sensor event services components can be invoked to run commands, publish events to a backend repository, query a backend repository, or interface with a rules engine. In most cases, calling the sensor event services components greatly simplifies tasks, such as integrating events with InfoSphere Traceability Server or by providing interfaces that are agnostic to the backend systems.

The business-level services are exposed as:

• Stateless session bean methods

• Web services interfaces

• Message-driven beans

WebSphere Business Events
WebSphere Business Events is integrated in WebSphere Sensor Events to provide Business Event Processing. It enables the business user to sense and respond to sensor events by detecting any occurrence or happening within a business context that could present opportunities or threats.

WebSphere Business Events V6.2 is a software system designed specifically for managing business events flowing across systems and people, with the goal of providing timely insight and response. Business events are discovered and described in business terms to meet business objectives based on high-level management goals. WebSphere Business Events allows business users to sense (detect and decide) and respond effectively to the impact of business events.

WebSphere Business Events delivers this capability through intuitive business user tools that define, implement, and manage business events. WebSphere Business Events uniquely provides graphical, codeless authoring for defining related elements:

• Business event actions

• Business interaction logic

• External sources for event data enrichment

• Consoles for task management and business event flow visualizations of charts, graphs, and dashboard layouts

Key features

• Enables straightforward expression of business event interaction logic

• Understands business language and vernacular

• Senses business events and patterns and initiates the appropriate business actions

• Includes codeless, graphical authoring tools

• Delivers simple and integrated visualization dashboard support

• Connects to existing islands of event information

• Supports both simple and complex business event pattern correlations

• Delivers an integrated development and execution system

• Installs as plug and play to extend your existing environments

• Operates with high performance, scalability, and high availability

• Enhances existing BPM, connectivity products, and SOA infrastructures

WebSphere Sensor Events will often require information from other sources to establish the business context of sensor events and derive relevant business events from sensor events. In these cases, the limited license of WebSphere Business Events embedded in WebSphere Sensor Events will be used. However, if the combination or correlation of multiple business events from different applications or business processes is required, the full license of WebSphere Business Event.

WebSphere Sensor Events delivers new and enhanced services supporting sensor integration solutions leveraging the foundation of a SOA, to create a robust, flexible, and scalable platform for capturing new business value from sensor data. WebSphere Sensor Events is the platform for integrating new sensor data, identifying the relevant business events from that data using situational event processing, and then integrating and acting upon those events with the SOA business processes.

New business value is unlocked from business process innovation based on insights derived from sensor events. It is enabled by:

• Delivering a platform for implementing solutions where data and events from networked sensor technology, such as:

• Supply chain transformation. End-to-end visibility of goods enabling improved inventory management.

• Individual asset or tracking enabling effective resource management, location awareness, and asset utilization solutions.

• Remote collection of sensor data monitoring the state, condition, and utilization of the asset to improve asset usage, and visibility to the status of the asset or its environment.

• Enabling an end-to-end solution from business case development, pilot validation, and production deployment, to business process flexibility and innovation enabled by sensor technologies to be recognized
• Enabling collaborative data sharing enterprise-wide and with partners allowing visibility across the extended enterprise of customers and suppliers, trend analysis of collaborative process executions, and traceability of products and assets

Leveraging a worldwide ecosystem of device business partners, an Eclipse, open-standards device model approach has been established enabling IBM Business Partners to integrate with Eclipse-based J2EE applications and the WebSphere Sensor Events platform. The flexible architecture for data capture and delivery event handling assures reliable messaging support to distributed device platforms as well as direct Sensor Events connections.

Networked sensor technologies such as passive RFID, active RFID, and other condition sensors, provide information about individual items, products and assets and provide visibility to areas that were previously "dark" to the business process. Emerging technologies, such as sensors, provide unique sensing capabilities. Unlike barcodes, sensors do not require line-of-sight access to read, and contain a unique serial number, such as the Electronic Product Code (EPC), which allows identification of tagged items. Active RFID technology can determine the location of the item within its physical environment. Using information from sensing technologies such as RFID enables businesses to streamline processes, deliver new capabilities, and transform their operations to be responsive to real world events.

Data from the edge of the business environment, such as the exact items delivered to a distribution center or retail facility dock door, or the unique parts and components used in an assembly process, can be used in context of the business operations and line-of-business applications to improve the efficiency, effectiveness, and responsiveness of business execution.

WebSphere Sensor Events enables companies to collect and aggregate the sensor data sensors, identify the events in operational and business context that are relevant to the business and execute business processes in response to specific situations or opportunities by integrating these new insights with enterprise applications and new business processes. Systems management of the software used in local, distributed RFID devices and servers is another important element of sensor data solutions, since the data collection environment is usually in non-IT environments and frequently must operate in harsh conditions. Sensor data solutions provide the enabling capabilities that allow companies to benefit from improved visibility, accuracy, and responsiveness to provide faster supply chain execution, improved inventory information, and more efficient asset management.

The following industries recognize the value in the use of sensor technologies:

• Retail

• Consumer products

• Transportation

• Industrial manufacturing

• Automotive

• Aerospace

• Pharmaceuticals

• Healthcare

• Communications

• Energy and utilities

• Financial services

WebSphere Sensor Events creates a business context that enables automatic operational decision making and helps facilitate reliable delivery of messages between devices and Sensor Events server, as well as between Sensor Events server and WebSphere business integration products such as WebSphere Business Events and WebSphere Business Monitor. WebSphere Sensor Events benefits include:

• Recognizable impact on asset management, asset tracking, and working capital

• Collaborative data sharing enterprise-wide and with partners, allowing trend analysis and traceability

• Increased distribution center productivity through automated data capture and verification

• Increased data accuracy to improve customer service

• Improved profit potential with enhanced point-of-decision capabilities and cross-channel selling

• Reduced shrinkage, return, and reconciliation costs through improved planning and allocation

• Minimized disruption and impact to business processes as sensor and RFID technology evolves

Ready for IBM WebSphere Sensor Events validation program
IBM provides the Ready for IBM WebSphere Sensor Events validation program which allows device manufacturers to ensure that data capture devices can deliver data to IBM WebSphere Sensor Events. Through the Ready for validation program, equipment manufacturers can obtain the documentation, software, and test capabilities needed to build adapters which enable their devices to provide sensor data to the WebSphere Sensor Events. Manufacturers of intelligent readers or device controllers can even enable their devices to run the WebSphere Sensor Events’ data capture and delivery services remotely. Manufacturers of LLRP compliant RFID readers can validate that their reader works with the LLRP device agent released with WebSphere Sensor Events.

Clients benefit from having a wide number of device types available for their deployments. Device vendors benefit from having an open-standards based device model and from the ability to extend the device model to add support for device features unique to their offerings. More information on the Ready for IBM WebSphere Sensor Events validation program can be found on the IBM PartnerWorld website.

The partner directory can be found on the Sensors and Actuators website.