Working with Processing Rules

Adding a Processing Rule

On the Processing Rules page, the sequence of processing rules is important because, for every inbound document, IBM webMethods B2B selects an appropriate processing rule in the specified sequence. Therefore, for the matching to occur in the correct sequence, ensure that you place a processing rule with specific criteria above a general processing rule that accepts any document from any sender or receiver.

To add a processing rule

1. In IBM webMethods B2B, go to Rules > Processing rules.

2. Select an existing processing rule and click Add Processing Rule. Depending on the sequence in which you want to place the processing rule, select one of the following: Above, Below, or Last.
   

3. Provide a name and description for the processing rule. Sequence displays the order in which the new processing rule appears.

4. In the Configure Criteria step, specify the criteria that IBM webMethods B2B must use to select a processing rule to apply on receipt of an inbound document.

   Criteria	Description
   Sender criteria	Criteria extracts the values of the sender attribute (the sender of the document) to determine the sending partner. Then IBM webMethods B2B matches the sender partner from the document with the sender you specify in the processing rule. For example, if you specify the sender criteria in a processing rule, IBM webMethods B2B uses the value extracted for the sender attribute to find the profile for the sending partner. Then, IBM webMethods B2B matches that partner with the sender criteria in the processing rule. The possible values are: Any. Matches with any known or unknown sender. Enterprise. Matches only if the enterprise is the sender. Unknown. Matches only with unknown senders. Selected. Matches with a select group of senders.
   Receiver criteria	Criteria extracts the values of the receiver attribute (the receiver of the document) to determine the receiver partner. Then IBM webMethods B2B matches the receiver partner in the document with the receiver you specify in the processing rule. For example, if you specify the receiver criteria in a processing rule, IBM webMethods B2B uses the value extracted for the receiver attribute to find the profile for the receiver partner. Then, IBM webMethods B2B matches the partner with the receiver criteria in the processing rule. The possible values are: Any. Matches with any known or unknown receiver. Enterprise. Matches only if the enterprise is the receiver. Unknown. Matches only with unknown receivers. Selected. Matches with a select group of receivers.
   Document	Criteria matches the type of business document that is used for the document you specify in the processing rule. For example, if you have an EDI UNEDIFACT D97B document of type ORDERS, you can the define document criteria to select a processing rule if the document matches with the ORDERS purchase order. The possible values are: Any. Matches with any type of document. Unknown. Matches with unknown type of document. Selected. Matches with a selected business document.
   User status	Criteria matches with the value of the user status in the document to the user status criteria specified in a processing rule. For example, you might set the user status attribute to PENDING in certain circumstances, and you can then define criteria to select a processing rule if the user status attribute is PENDING. The possible values are: Any. Matches with any type of user status. User specified status. Matches with a user-specified status. Type a value and click Add value to add a user status. You can add multiple user status values in a similar way.
   Recognition error	Criteria matches with the value you specify for the recognition of errors in a processing rule. For example, you might set up processing rule criteria to select the processing rule only if IBM webMethods B2B did not encounter errors. The possible values are: May have errors. Matches even if document may have errors. Has no errors. Matches when a document has no errors. Has errors. Matches even when a document has errors.

5. Click Next.

6. In the Configure extended criteria step, click Add Extended Criteria and provide the following details:
   

   Field	Description
   Attribute	Select an attribute from the list.
   Data type	Data type for the attribute is automatically selected.
   Operator	Indicate how to match the Value against the value extracted from the documents. For example, you can match string values that contain specified characters using the operator Contains, match number values that are greater than a specified value using the operator Greater than, or match date values to a specified date using the operator Equals. The operator you specify depends on the data type of the attribute specified
   Value	Provide a value to match against the value extracted from the documents. If you use the operators Blank or Not blank, you do not need to specify a value in this field. You can specify the value types specific to the attribute selected as follows: String. Type the string. This match is case-sensitive. Number. Type the number. Date and Time. Click to select the date from the calendar or type the date and time using the format yyyy-mm-dd hh:mm:ss and a 24-hour clock for hh. Note Ensure that the date and time stamp attributes in the incoming document payload is specified in UTC.

   You can use one or more extended criteria in a processing rule to identify documents with document attributes of your interest. For example, you could check that the incoming purchase order is not above or below a certain amount.

7. Click Add. The extended criteria are added in the list of available extended criteria.

8. Click Next.

9. In the Configure pre-processing options step, specify the details for IBM webMethods B2B to decide the pre-processing actions to perform before applying the processing rules:

   Pre-processing action	Description
   Duplicate check	Checks if the shared document is a duplicate. The possible values you can set are: Yes. Check if the document is a duplicate based on the following attributes: Document ID only Document ID and sender Document ID, sender, and receiver Document ID, sender, and document By invoking a FlowService.You can write a FlowService in IBM webMethods Integration and select it by specifying the following details: The project name in which the FlowService resides. The FlowService you want to run for duplicate check. The username with which you want to run the FlowService. For the complete signature specification, see Checking for Duplicate Documents by Invoking a Flow Service in IBM webMethods Integration No. Do not check for duplication. Defer to business document. Check the business document for mention of a preference for duplicate checks and perform the relevant action.
   Persist document	Saves a copy of the document in IBM webMethods B2B. Save a copy based on one of the following options: Yes Only unique documents. Save only unique documents to IBM webMethods B2B. All documents. Save all documents. The parts of the documents you can save are: Content. Save only the content part of the document. Attributes. Save only the document attributes. Note If you reprocess a document without saving document attributes, you might get unexpected results. Because if the attributes are not saved, the document would not match the intended processing rule. Instead, the document would match another processing rule, such as the Default rule, and IBM webMethods B2B would perform the processing actions defined in that rule. Activity log. Save only the activity logs of the document.

10. Click Next.

11. In the Configure actions step, specify the details for IBM webMethods B2B to perform on the document.

    Action	Description
    Stop processing duplicate documents	Enable this option to stop duplicate documents from getting processed multiple times.
    Call an integration	Call a Flow service that is designed using IBM webMethods Integration or use any other integration software to invoke the service endpoint with basic authentication. By default, IBM webMethods Integration is selected. Note: The timeout for IBM webMethods B2B to receive a response from an integration call is 5 minutes. If IBM webMethods B2B does not receive a response in this timeframe, it timeouts and processes the transactions with an error. When you call an integration from IBM webMethods B2B to IBM webMethods Integration, the content for the large document is null. To view the content of the large document, you must call getTransactionContentParts from IBM webMethods B2B operations in IBM webMethods Integration. IBM webMethods Integration Provide the following details: Project. Select a project where the Flow service resides. Flow service. Select the Flow service you want to run. Note: Ensure that the Flow service is enabled to be invoked over HTTP in IBM webMethods Integration. Username. Select the username to access the Flow service. Ensure that the user you select has the required roles and permissions to execute this project. The filter allows you to select the Flow service created or modified by any developer. The filter works based on the first name or last name of the developer. You can obtain this information from the Administration page under the IBM webMethods iPaaS App. Execution mode. IBM webMethods B2B can invoke the Flow service in one of the following ways: Asynchronous. IBM webMethods B2B continues with the remaining processing actions immediately. If there are no subsequent processing actions, IBM webMethods B2B returns to the caller that sent the document for processing. You can track the result of this type of Flow service on the Monitoring page in IBM webMethods Integration. Synchronous. Before performing the rest of the processing actions, IBM webMethods B2B waits for the Flow service to complete before returning to the caller that sent the document for processing. You can track the result of this type of Flow service in the Course of transaction section. Reliable. (Default) Allows IBM webMethods B2B to automatically retry running the failed Flow service by creating a task to track the completion. When IBM webMethods B2B attempts to run a Flow service and if the Flow service fails, IBM webMethods B2B retries running the Flow service subsequently until it succeeds before reaching the maximum retry limit. If the Flow service execution reaches the maximum retry limit without succeeding, IBM webMethods B2B marks the Flow service execution task as failed . Tip IBM recommends using Reliable execution mode for processing the large documents. This mode minimizes the risk of failures while processing the document. External Call Provide the following details: URL. Specify the URL with which you want to invoke a service endpoint. Username. Type the username to connect to the server on which the service endpoint resides. Password. Type the password to connect to the server hosting the service endpoint. Execution mode. IBM webMethods B2B can invoke the service in one of the following ways: Asynchronous Synchronous Reliable (default) If you have a valid IBM webMethods Cloud Container subscription, see Working with IBM webMethods Cloud Container to configure the processing rule to run services on IBM webMethods Cloud Container. For detailed information on the signature to use for calling a Flow service in IBM webMethods Integration, see Service Signature for Calling a Flow service in IBM webMethods Integration. See webMethods.io B2B Connectors for a tutorial on the various connectors you can invoke on IBM webMethods Integration.
    Send an email alert	Send an email alert to the intended recipients. Provide the following details: Email to. Specify the recipient of the email. Select one of the following values for the email recipient: Enterprise. Send an email alert to the enterprise. Sender. Send an email alert to the sending partner. Receiver. Send an email alert to the receiving partner. Specific email addresses. Send an email to a specific email address. A maximum of 128 email addresses can be added. The maximum character limit for an email address is 256 characters. Contact type. Specify the type of contact. It can either be technical or administrative. This option does not appear if you add multiple email addresses. Ensure that you have already defined the contact type in the enterprise profile or the partner profile. Subject. Type the email subject. The maximum character limit is 256 characters. Mail body. Type the email content. The maximum character limit is 4096 characters. If you want to make the body of the email message dynamic, you can include information from the pipeline in the mail body using output template tags. The pipeline contains variables that can be used to dynamically populate the values. In addition, if the processing rule invokes a service endpoint that executes synchronously, the pipeline would also contain any information that the service places in the pipeline. For example, you might want the message to specify the type of document that was received and the sender of the document. Or you might want to include a hyperlink that allows the recipient of the email message to view the document. For information on the pipeline variables see Using pipeline variables and for the template tag to use while drafting the email, see Template Tag and Description. Note The email body supports only plain-text and the % character is reserved for the template tags. The % character therefore is not allowed in the mail body. The Activity Log captures the email alert that is sent as part of this action.
    Change user Status	Specify the user status you want to see in the transaction when the processing rule corresponding to the business document is triggered. The allowed character limit is 255.
    Deliver document	IBM webMethods B2B checks the receiver's profile and uses the delivery method that is identified in the profile as the preferred outbound channel.

12. On the Processing rule page, click the newly created processing rule to select it.

13. On the header bar, activate the processing rule.

Changing the Sequence of a Processing Rule

Arrange the rules in the sequence you require so that the processing rules that have specific criteria listed above rules with general criteria. Also, the Default rule does not ignore any document, and IBM webMethods B2B uses it to match any document that does not match any other processing rule you defined.

To change the sequence of a processing rule

1. In IBM webMethods B2B, go to Rules > Processing rules.

2. Select the processing rule.

   The selected row is highlighted as shown in this example:

3. Move the selected processing rule up or down in the processing sequence:

• To move up, click to decrease the sequence number of the processing rule.

Using the example of the Steering supplier 2 rule in the image in the previous step, moving up means that the processing rule at sequence 11, changes to position 10. Subsequently, an inbound document first tries to match with Steering supplier rule before trying to match with the Tyre supplier rule.

• To move down, click to increase the sequence number of the processing rule.

Using the example of the Steering supplier 2 rule in the image in the previous step, moving down means that the processing rule at sequence 11, changes to position 12. Subsequently, an inbound document first tries to match with Seat supplier rule before trying to match with the Steering supplier rule.

Tip
If you have a large list of processing rules, click to set a target sequence number to move a processing to a specific position and click Move.



Note
When you change the sequence of a single processing rule, the entire processing rule list gets re-ordered to accommodate the change. Therefore, changing the sequence of a processing rule does not lead to a change in its last modified time.

What are Native Processing Rules?

IBM webMethods B2B has a set of native processing rules to ensure the intended functions and flows for processing specific set of business documents. Therefore, you cannot delete or modify a native processing rule. However, you can change the sequence of the native processing rules and activate or deactivate them for to make IBM webMethods B2B use the processing rules you create instead of using the native to process inbound documents.

The native processing rules in IBM webMethods B2B are:

For details on a default processing rule, see How Does a Default Processing Rule Work?

How Does a Default Processing Rule Work?

The Default processing rule, also known as Default rule, matches with an inbound document having:

• Any known or unknown sender
• Any known or unknown receiver
• Any known or unknown type of business document
• Any user status
• A document that may have errors

Pre-processing actions in the default processing rule indicate that IBM webMethods B2B must use the settings in the document. The Default rule is not editable.

Any document that IBM webMethods B2B receives, therefore meets the criteria of the Default rule.

Unknown Document and Unknown Partners

If a document does not match any of the supported business documents or if it matches with multiple types of business documents, the document is considered to be of an unknown document.

If a document was sent by one of your partners, but IBM webMethods B2B cannot determine the sender (for example, the document is unknown and the document sender attribute could not be extracted), IBM webMethods B2B considers the sender as an Unknown partner.

However, you can also create a processing rule above the default processing rule for IBM webMethods B2B to process all the inbound document that are of Unknown type.

To search for documents with Unknown partners, search for unknown. Search is not case-sensitive.

Service Signature for Calling a Flow Service in IBM webMethods Integration

A signature is an agreement between IBM webMethods B2B and IBM webMethods Integration. After you call an integration on IBM webMethods Integration, IBM webMethods B2B receives the results of the service execution and displays the information in the form of tasks in case of Reliable execution mode, and also as an entry in the Course of transaction section of the corresponding transaction.

Input Request

The input parameters for the service are:

Output Response

The output received from IBM webMethods Integration must adhere to the following output signature:

Depending on the response received from IBM webMethods Integration after the service is executed, appropriate information is displayed in IBM webMethods B2B. Ensure that you use the setHTTPResponse flow function in IBM webMethods Integration to set the HTTP status code for IBM webMethods B2B to interpret the status of the transaction.

The response can only be one of the following objects (error or response):

• response: HTTP status code range for success scenarios is 200-299.
• error: Use an appropriate HTTP status code to indicate how the error should be interpreted in IBM webMethods B2B using the setHTTPResponse flow function. For example, if you are accessing an unauthorized resource, use HTTP status code 401 for IBM webMethods B2B to interpret it as an unauthorized request.

Example of Request Payload

Example of the Flow Service request during the Call an Integration action in the processing rule, for an XML payload:

{
"metadata": {
  "sender": "Acme Corporation",
  "receiver": "IBM",
  "documentType": "PurchaseOrderRequest",
  "documentId": "53o5dn00ec9rmuok00000070",
  "userStatus": "IGNORED",
  "groupId": null,
  "conversationID": null,
  "attributes": {
     "country": "UNITED STATES"
  }
},

 "request": {
  "largeDoc": false,    
  "content": "<encoded content>",
  "type": "1",
  "encoding": "UTF8",
  "contentPartNames": [
     "xmldata"
  ]
   }
}

​

Example of Response Payload

Example of the Flow Service response to signal successful execution:

{
   "response": {
      "content": "<encoded content>",
      "type": "text",
      "encoding": "UTF-8"
   }
}

Example of the Flow Service response to signal execution failure:

{
    "error": {
        "code": "USER_STATUS_FAILED",
        "message": "Failed to update user status for transaction 53o5dn00ec9rmuok00000070"
    }
}

How Do I Use the Pipeline Variable Values?

You can use the tags to populate values of pipeline variables to generate email content dynamically during runtime.

For example, if the document type is purchase order, the sender’s corporation name is XYZ Steel Company, and the organizational unit is Alloys Division, the above sample message body would be rendered as follows:

B2B received a purchase order document from XYZ Steel Company– Alloys Division. You can view the document at http://xyzcompany/saas/webmethods-b2b/#/transactions/55mffm00eb0pdptc000000c1/summary/live

For a detailed list of tags that you can use, see Template Tag and Description.

You can use the following pipeline variables in your email body. The variables are case-sensitive.

List of Template Tags and their Descriptions

You can use tags to dynamically load the values of pipeline variables in emails.

Tags are case sensitive (for example, %value%, not %VALUE% or %Value%).

All text between %…% symbols in a tag must appear in one line (without line breaks).

%value%

Use the %value% tag to insert the value of a specified variable in an email.

Syntax

%value \[Variable\] \[option option option...\]%

Arguments

Variable specifies the name of the variable whose value you want to insert in the code. You may specify the name of a variable that exists in the pipeline or the following keywords or reserved words:

Options

You can use any of the following options with this tag. To specify multiple options, separate the options with spaces.

Effect On Scope
None

%loop%

Use the %loop% tag to repeat a block of code once for each element in a specified array (document list) or for each key in a document.

Syntax

%loop [Variable] [option option
option...]%
   Block of Code
%end%

Notes

Omit the variable name from the %value% tag if it is used in the body of a loop for a String table or a document. When the variable name is omitted, the server inserts the value of the current element at run time.

For readability, you can use %end% to denote the end of a %loop% block.

A set of errors (logged in the activity log) that are associated with a business document are sorted by the entry class (entryClass) variable. The exact keys for this variable vary from document to document. Each key will be an entry class (also known as an activity class). For example: General, Delivery, Saving, Recognition, Processing, Validation, Verification.

Use the %loop% and %end% tag to get the transaction brief and full error message details of each entryClass. There are different entryClass types: General, Delivery, Envelope, Saving, Recognition, Processing, Validation, Verification. You can use these entryClass types to get the error message details.

Syntax for using entryClass

%loop bizdoc/Errors/<entryClass>%
  %value BriefMessage% %value FullMessage%
%end%

In a transaction, each error message gets logged in the entryClass type. For example, Recognition is one of the entryClass type. There can be mutiple recognition errors in a transaction. You can get each error message details using the %loop% tag.

Example:

%loop bizdoc/Errors/Recognition%
  %value BriefMessage% %value FullMessage%
%end%

Checking for Duplicate Documents by Invoking a Flow Service in IBM webMethods Integration

You must create a FlowService in IBM webMethods Integration to perform a customized duplicate check.

A signature is an agreement between IBM webMethods B2B and IBM webMethods Integration. After you call an integration on IBM webMethods Integration, IBM webMethods B2B receives the results of service execution and identifies if the document is duplicate or not. The result appears as an entry in the Course of transaction section of the corresponding transaction.

The FlowService that you create must have the following service signature:

Input Request

The input parameters for the service are:

Output Response

The output received from IBM webMethods Integration must adhere to the following output signature:

Depending on the response received from IBM webMethods Integration after the service has run, IBM webMethods B2B identifies whether the document is duplicate.

Example of Duplicate Check FlowService Request Payload

Example of the Flow Service request during the Call an Integration action in the processing rule, for an XML payload:

{
"metadata": {
  "sender": "Acme Corporation",
  "receiver": "IBM",
  "documentType": "PurchaseOrderRequest",
  "documentId":
  "53o5dn00ec9rmuok00000070",
  "userStatus": "IGNORED",
  "groupId": null,
  "conversationID": null,
  "attributes": {
     "country": "UNITED STATES"
  }
},
  "request": {
  "content": "<encoded content>",
  "type": "1",
  "encoding": "UTF8",
  "contentPartNames": [
     "xmldata"
  ]
    }
}

Example of FlowService Response Payload

Example of the Flow Service response to signal successful execution:

{
"response": {
   "duplicate": "true",
  }
}