Recently we discussed how to explain the value of CEP to the Enterprise and how CEP relates to Enterprise Architecture. Enterprise Architects don’t always take the “event” viewpoint, and instead focus on the process or value chains in the business. However, these high level processes and value chain links can benefit from, or use, real-time event processing, and analysing these events can be very useful for each step, department or service in understanding what services and technologies apply.
So, my challenge for Enterprise Architects is to look at their high-level business process or value chain, and consider for each step where an event viewpoint and real-time business event handling can provide some benefit. [And if you need help, drop me a line!]
I was reminded by the link between CEP and EA when I got an invitation to the Forrester EA event next month. Forrester analysts Mike Gualtieri and John Rymer are presenting on what they are calling the “next big architecture movement”, a.k.a. the “Business Event Architecture”. Note this is nothing to do with architecting TIBCO BusinessEvents in enterprises, although I would expect John and Mike to pass reference to some TIBCO use cases here. Of course “Business Event Architecture” can be abbreviated to a TLA that must bring a wry smile to the folks at Oracle. From what I can see this is basically the “event viewpoint” and EDA (i.e. how CEP combines with SOA, BPM and business decisions).
…another architecture movement arrives to rock your world: business event architecture (BEA). Enterprise architects can use BEA to make business capabilities more responsive to change. BEA is not just about event processing platforms – it is a larger architecture paradigm that unifies service-oriented architecture (SOA) with other flexible platforms such as business rules management systems (BRMS) and business process management (BPM).
* Extraordinary business capabilities start with business events.
* How business event architectures can result in better business capabilities and faster change.
* Business event architectures require multiple technology platforms: complex event processing, SOA, BPM, BRMS, and analytics.
In another session, Mike Gualtieri is talking about Business Decision Architectures and their need for event processing:
Event processing is primed for major acceleration in adoption and integration into your Digital Business Architecture.
So no surprise to see that the prime sponsor for this event is a CEP vendor (rather than a traditional EA vendor); also one of the speakers for Oracle’s EA group is also a name folks will recognise from a past CEP startup.
Looks like the CEP message is, slowly, gaining pace!
[Disclosure: TIBCO is neither sponsoring nor presenting at the Forrester Enterprise Architecture event mentioned here].
