WebMethods Interview Questions and Answers

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1.What is EAI ?

EAI or Enterprise Applications Integration can be defined as data that can be integrated from disparate applications regardless of the platform, allowing the sharing of business processes amongst multiple organizations.

2.What are the Major categories of EAI?

Integration can be at different application layers:

• Data Level Integration:

1.     Batch data transfer, OR

2.     On-line propagation of data updates

• API Level Integration:

1.     Data is accessed through published API services

• Service Method Level Integration:

1.     Common services shared by different applications

• User Interface Level Integration:The controller reacts to the user input. It creates and sets the model.

1.     Common user interface (e.g. web based) for unified access to multiple applications.

3.What are the Advantages of EAI?

Advantages of EAI solutions are:

• Streamlines business processes and helps raise organizational efficiency.
• Real time information access among systems.
• Maintains information integrity across multiple systems.
• Speedier transactions at reduced costs.
• If one of the applications misbehaves and requires to be shut down for maintenance, then with EAI, we can easily “decouple” it from rest of the systems. Which avoids having to bring down other systems.

4.What are the disadvantages of EAI?

The main disadvatages of using EAI systems:

• Constant change: The very nature of EAI is dynamic and requires dynamic project managers to manage their implementation.
• Lack of EAI experts : EAI requires knowledge of many issues and technical aspects.
• EAI is a tool paradigm: EAI is not a tool, but rather a system and should be implemented as such.
• Building interfaces is an art : Engineering the solution is not sufficient. Solutions need to be negotiated with user departments to reach a common consensus on the final outcome. A lack of consensus on interface designs leads to excessive effort to map between various systems data requirements.
• Loss of detail : Information that seemed unimportant at an earlier stage may become crucial later.
• Accountability : Since so many departments have many conflicting requirements, there should be clear accountability for the system's final structure.

5.What are the main companies which provide EAI tools / software?

• TIBCO
• webMethods
• Vitria
• iPlanet
• MQSeries (IBM)
• iPlanet
• BizTalk (Microsoft)
• WebLogic (BEA)

6.What is webMethods?

A company that provides integration tools. The key products include Integration Server, Enterprise Server, Business Integrator, Workflow and Mainframe Integration Server. webMethods is a company, not a product.

7.What are the modules of webMethods Product Suite?

• Integration and B2B
• Service Oriented Architecture
• Business Process Management
• Business Activity Monitoring

8.What are the tools of webMethods Integration ?

• webMethods Adapters
• webMethods Developer
• webMethods Integration Server
• webMethods Integration Platform
• webMethods Broker
• webMethods Monitor
• webMethods Optimize for Infrastructure
• webMethods Trading Networks
• webMethods EDI Module
• webMethods EDIINT
• webMethods eStandards Modules
• webMethods PIM

9.What Is Developer?

webMethods Developer is a graphical development tool that you use to build, edit, and test integration logic. It provides an integrated development environment in which to develop the logic and supporting objects that carry out the work of an integration solution. It also

provides tools for testing and debugging the solutions you create.

10.What Is an Element?

An element is an item that exists in the Navigation panel in webMethods Developer.Elements include folders, services, specifications, IS document types, triggers, and ISschemas. In the Navigation panel, servers and packages are not considered to be elements.

11.What Is an Element?

An element is an item that exists in the Navigation panel in webMethods Developer.Elements include folders, services, specifications, IS document types, triggers, and ISschemas. In the Navigation panel, servers and packages are not considered to be elements.

12.What Is a Startup Service?

A startup service is one that Integration Server automatically executes when it loads a package into memory.

13.What Is a Flow Service?

A flow service is a service that is written in the webMethods flow language. This simple yet powerful language lets you encapsulate a sequence of services within a single service and manage the flow of data among them.

14.What Is the Pipeline?

The pipeline is the general term used to refer to the data structure in which input and output values are maintained for a flow service. It allows services in the flow to share data.The pipeline starts with the input to the flow service and collects inputs and outputs from subsequent services in the flow. When a service in the flow executes, it has access to all data in the pipeline at that point.

15.How to invoke a service from a browser ?

Use a URL in the form:
http://servername:port/invoke/folder.subFolder.subsubFolder/serviceName 
(the package name is not part of the URL in any way)