Integration of third-party applications and web clients by means of an enterprise layer

Abstract

This case study presents an experience report on an Enterprise Modelling and Application Integration project for a young company, starting in the telecommunications business area. The company positions itself as abroadband application provider for the SME market. Whereas its original information infrastructure consisted of a number of stand-alone business and operational support system (BSS/OSS) applications, the project's aim was to define and implement an Enterprise Layer, serving as an integration layer on top of which these existing BSS/OSSs would function independently and in parallel. This integration approach was to be nonintrusive and was to use the business applications as-is. The scope of the case entails the conception of a unifying Enterprise Model and the formulation of an implementation architecture for the Enterprise Layer, based on the Enterprise Java Beans framework.