Eric D. Schabell: BPM Suite Starter Kit

BPM Suite Starter Kit


The purpose of this kit is to provide the means to get started with the Red Hat JBoss BPM Suite product, from introduction, to installation, to using the product to build a first application.

It will present the available content in a logical order, providing a learning path for first time users. With the video tutorials designed to be non-specific to a version, these initial steps will save you time spinning up your first process application or project. Just follow the numbered steps below and you will be on your way to mastering JBoss BPM Suite.

This starters kit is currently targeting the product JBoss BPM Suite 6.1.

1. Target audience

Anyone interested in getting started quickly with JBoss BPM Suite:
  • developers evaluating open source rules, events and process tooling
  • architects tasked with evaluating technology for potential use in an organization
  • business or information analysts interested in exploring rules, events and process design tooling

2. Rules, events and processes

Before you get started with products in this technology space, a bit of a background on what rules, events and processes are about in relation to JBoss offerings is in order. Here you will find a nice walk through the concepts as they can be applied using JBoss products, all in around 15 minutes.



3. Get the products

The first thing one needs is the product, so with JBoss BPM Suite this means we want the installer and a JBoss EAP server to install this onto. We have two options depending on the what you are looking for:

  1. Red Hat Customer Portal - hosts all available versions of JBoss EAP & JBoss BPM Suite that you can access via your credentials when you have a valid subscription for JBoss BPM Suite product. 
  2. Developers Product Pages - hosts selected major versions of JBoss BPM Suite and you can get selected versions of JBoss EAP without a full subscription. You only need a valid jboss.org account and agree to a $0 developer subscription before gaining access to the available versions for download. 

Below you will find demo projects that are based on various versions of the products, some of which you can preview without a subscription by downloading at jboss.org. Please check the revisions available to pull a tagged version of a project that uses product versions you want to try out.

4. Quick video tour

The list of videos in this section are provided as an introduction and orientation to the product as a whole. They are intended to get you ready to use JBoss BPM Suite and take your first small steps into the world of process applications.

This series will not take you through how to use the product beyond installation and a tour, the rest will be left for the workshops below.

5. How it's done

There is an extensive collection of example demo projects that range from a simple clean JBoss BPM Suite installation to more complex multi-product integration scenarios and everything in between.

Each demo project has the same consistent template, the same user login unless specified in the documentation and install in exactly the same way as shown in the Quick Tour videos above. Not all, but where possible, there are three options for installation and running the demo projects:

  1. Install on your local machine
  2. Install with one-click on xPaaS (bpmPaas)
  3. Generate a containerized installation

Here you have a list with some details as to the contents of each of the demo projects ranging from the simple to the most advanced.

Basic install project:
Install project: Details:
JBoss BPM Suite Install Example automated install of JBoss BPM Suite with typical standalone configuration.

Example projects:
Example projects: Details:
JBoss BPM Customer Evaluation Straight through process (STP) to evaluate if a give customer meets our criteria, showcasing rules integration with a business process.
JBoss BPM HR Employee Rewards Provides examples of human task integration, form designer and a custom email work item handler in a business process.
JBoss BPM Mortgage Application Provides financial home loan application (mortgage) with examples of human task integration, form designer, service task, error handling, decision table, tests and validation rules.
JBoss BPM Signavio Integration Provides same process for financial mortgage application, but highlights importing process designed in Signavio Process Editor into JBoss BPM Suite.
JBoss BPM Travel Agency Online retail travel agency booking process that has validation rules, decision table, human task integration, service tasks, external service integration, credit card fraud detection, external UI integration example with RestAPI, task forms, data model and BPM compensation (rolling back service tasks).
JBoss BPM Baggage Delivery Online business friendly baggage delivery process showcases forms modeler, BPM process, rules from an external spreadsheet, a decision table, use of domain specific language (DSL) and Business Activity Monitoring (BAM).
JBoss BPM Generic Loan Application Online financial loan application with data model, rules for rate and eligibility calculations, human tasks, task forms and an example of signal integration into a business process.
JBoss BPM Document Integration Business process to activate a mobile service based on document management, user must download, sign and upload service agreement that is integrated into a business process. Runs by default with document storage on the filesystem but includes example project that leverages Content Management Integration Standard (CMIS) to connect to any supported Content Management System (CMS).

Integration projects:
Integration projects: Details:
JBoss BPM Travel Agency Microservice Migration JBoss BPM Travel Agency application highlighting original standard web services migrated to JBoss Fuse microservices.
JBoss BPM Suite and Signavio Mortgage Application JBoss BPM mortgage application leverages initial exported business process design from Signavio Process Editor, showcasing seamless integration between the two products.
JBoss BPM Travel Agency Data Virtualization JBoss BPM Travel Agency migrated to disparate data sources after acquisition requiring integration through JBoss Data Virtualization. Ties toegether original data model to new data sources with JBDC connections.
JBoss BPM & JBoss Fuse Integration Project showcases starting a business process from a Camel route.
JBoss BPM & OSGI Several examples based on JBoss Fuse & JBoss BPM Suite in OSGI.

To explore the full collection of example projects, see JBoss Demo Central.

6. Get hands with workshops

The best way to discover a new technology is without a doubt to get hands-on with the product.

We have put together an online JBoss BPM Suite workshop, where you are introduced to the product in an overview presentation before embarking on installing and building the project. We have two workshops available for you, one simple and one that is more complex.



JBoss BPM HR Employee Rewards
In this project you will be building an HR employee rewards process project that includes human tasks, domain specific nodes, and a process, all within the latest JBoss BPM Suite product. Note the versions of the product and supporting technologies are clearly stated at the start of the workshop.

The Red Hat JBoss BPM Suite - HR Employee Rewards workshop is laid out with links, video and guided steps you need to build the entire project from scratch:



JBoss BPM Travel Agency
The newest entry in the JBoss BPM Suite workshop series and still a work in progress. This project will have to putting together a fully functional online BPM Travel Agency process project that includes human tasks, domain specific nodes, service integration, BPM compensation (service roll backs) and both a main process but also two sub-processes. Note the versions of the product and supporting technologies are clearly stated at the start of the workshop.

The Red Hat JBoss BPM Suite Travel Agency workshop is laid out with links, video and guided steps you need to build the entire project from scratch:




Workshops in a can
Looking for an easy way to promote, present or demonstrate how easy it is to get started with JBoss BPM Suite product?

Look no further as we have pulled together a few workshops so that you can construct an evening, half day or full day session of learning around JBoss BPM Suite. You can setup this workshop and run it at any event as it can be constructed to take from a half to full day to complete. Think of the following possibilities for this workshop:
  • local Java User Group (JUG)
  • local JBoss User Group (JBug)
  • local tech meetup
  • work interest group
  • after hours meetup at work
  • submit it to a conference (yes you can use this!)
The first workshop outlines how to build a human resources employee rewards BPM project that uses all the tooling JBoss BPM Suite offers:


The second workshop takes you through a partially finished JBoss BPM Travel Agency, lets you complete the process project work that needs to be done, then takes you through the integration with JBoss Fuse where you construct a few microservices:


7. References

Below you will find links to all the materials, articles, blogs, video channels, demo collections and other content that you might want to bookmark as your JBoss BPM Suite collection.
We hope this kit will help you accelerate your JBoss BPM Suite experience!

Note: Also available, the Red Hat Decision Manager starter kit and the Red Hat Process Automation Manager starter kit.