The Business One Integration framework (B1if) is optionally available for SAP Business One 8.8 and integral part of SAP Business One 8.8.1 and higher. B1if is free of charge for all customers holding an SAP B1 license. B1if is used to connect SAP B1 to its eco system. Therefore the main task for B1if is to enable SAP B1 to publish/send data to external systems and to allow SAP B1 to consume/access data from external data provider. Another aspect of introducing B1if is to consolidate certain client functionality to run these on server side and herewith having one single platform to perform all integration related tasks.
CitiXsys provides consulting services to companies that need to integrate their diverse systems and SAP Business One.
With the current version B1if 1.3.5 (for B1 8.8.1. PL 2) SAP provides three Scenario Packages.
The Scenario Package sap.B1Mobile is covering more than 40 web services to be called by a mobile device (e.g. the Apple iPhone) to interact with SAP B1.
Thesap.Xcelsius package is providing generic services to be called from SAP B1 to administer, authenticate, cache and launch any Xcelsius based dashboard, be it shipped by SAP or developed by the partner resp. the customer.
The Scenario Package sap.DATEV-HR is providing B1 HR data in the file system, ready to be imported into the interface of the German payload provider DATEV and imports payload voucher from DATEV into SAB B1.
The Scenario Packages are built in the B1if Design Time and are processed inside the B1if Runtime. The strong B1if Repository, the B1if Flow Atoms and the generic B1if Process Flow are controlling the complete integration process. This allows the Scenario Packages to focus on the business logic. All the tricky things like error- and conflict handling, transactional control, in-order processing, exactly once processing, guaranteed delivery, monitoring, debugging facilities, administration etc. are covered in a consistent and reliable way inside B1if. Via the inbuilt adapters you have mature, reliable connectivity to all SAP systems and via generic adapters to all kind of technologies.
To develop a new integration scenario, there are no programming needed to specify the inbound and outbound phases of your integration process. The processing flow defined inside the development environment with the graphical Flow Designer. Using the B1if Flow Atoms, which are powerful out-of-the-box functional units for value mappings, it is easy to set up calls (e.g. SAP B1, SAP ERP, HTTP, SQL, File System, …), for running XSL transformations, for conversions, etc. The concrete field mapping will be done by xsl, optional by an embedded xml editor. Strong debugging facilities makes it easy to develop the individual processing flow in a well structured and controlled manner.
The strict model-driven approach of B1i allows even people without years of experiences in integration to develop an individual, robust integration scenario with high reliability, with short implementation time and change friendliness from beginning on.
Aspects
- Proven & innovative technology (model drive, 6 patents)
- Lightweight architecture to address especially Small Business
- Scalable due to parallel processing (by programming model)
- Multiplatform support (OS, DB)
- Tailored deployment (S, M, L, – local, centralized, cloud)
- Based on established integration standards (XML, XSLT, HTTP)
- Fully aligned with SAP overall technology (PI, SOA, RFC, …)
- Robustness due to pluggable apps/scenarios (Isolation concept)
- Browser based administration (Remote administration)
- SW logistics (Packaging, Hot Deployment, Incremental)
Technical Capabilities
- Transactional Control, Recovery & Resumption Management
- Concurrent processing (coordination service)
- InOrder, Guaranteed Delivery, Exactly Once
- Job Scheduling, Event Subscription
- XML Persistency (incl. Indexed Access, Cache Control, WebDAV)
- Resource Tracking & Logging (e.g. queues, cache, pools, processes)
Business Capabilities
- Business Repository
- System Landscape Directory
- Scenario Control, Setup, (De)Activation incl. Extensibility
- Multi Level Monitoring
- Error/Conflict Handling
- Graphical Scenario Designer & Debugger
- Flow Atoms, Integration Pattern
Related Topics
Business One Branch Consolidation (B1BC)
Business One integration with SAP NetWeaver (B1iSN)
Integration Services
CitiXsys provides application integration services to large corporations with SAP ERP having subsidiaries, vendors and associated companies running SAP Business One.
Few companies using B1i Framework
Supply chain management applications (for managing inventory and shipping), customer relationship management applications (for managing current and potential customers), business intelligence applications (for finding patterns from existing data from operations), and other types of applications (for managing data such as human resources data, health care, internal communications, etc) typically cannot communicate with one another in order to share data or business rules. For this reason, such applications are sometimes referred to as islands of automation or information silos. This lack of communication leads to inefficiencies, wherein identical data are stored in multiple locations, or straightforward processes are unable to be automated.
Enterprise application integration (EAI) is the process of linking such applications within a single organization together in order to simplify and automate business processes to the greatest extent possible, while at the same time avoiding having to make sweeping changes to the existing applications or data structures. In the words of the Gartner Group, EAI is the “unrestricted sharing of data and business processes among any connected application or data sources in the enterprise.”
B1i Framework is the only integration framework with SAP Business One DI Adapter and integrates seamlessly SAP Business One with any application. CitiXsys is the leader of B1i integration services with largest number of B1i consultants globally engaged in several projects.
