What is BTSG NoS Addin purpose and what features are available? (Part 5)

In my last posts, I’ve described some of the features of the BTSG NoS Addin. This is the final post about the overview of all features available with this Visual Studio Addin and how you can use them.

Test Pipeline

There are many ways to test BizTalk pipelines: by using the BizTalk Pipeline Framework to create unit testing, by using the Pipeline.exe tool, or by implementing them in “for real” BizTalk messaging scenarios. But there isn’t, for real, an easy build support feature in Visual Studio to test our custom pipelines.

Once again, BizTalk NoS Addin will provide that for you. This operation will test our custom pipeline directly from Visual Studio by simply right-clicking and selecting Test Pipeline:

• Visual Studio will open a window for you to select the instance of the message you want to try against the pipeline.

• And will show the pipeline results directly in VS IE.

Test Pipeline Component

As with the previous one, testing or debugging a custom pipeline component can be challenging, and most of the time you will need to create and test them by implementing and configuring a BizTalk messaging scenario, then attaching the BizTalk process in Visual Studio to debug the components.

You will now be able to debug your pipeline component, attaching an external process from VS, without caring about the BizTalk environment, by:

• Right-click on the pipeline that contains the custom pipeline component that you want to try, and select the option Test Pipeline Component:

• A window will show that will describe all the steps necessary for you to configure your testing scenario and debug the custom pipeline component.

• The first thing you need to do is select an instance of a message that you want to try against the custom pipeline component, by clicking on the added wheel on the left:

• A window will prompt to select an instance of the message.

• The second step is to set a breakpoint in your custom pipeline component and attach the BTSG TestPipeline process with the Visual Studio Debugger by:
  • On the Visual Studio Debug menu, select Attach to Process.

• Select the BTSG.TestPipeline.exe process (the title will also contain the name of our pipeline) and click Attach.

• For the third and final step, you will need to go to the BTSG window to configure your testing scenario and debug the custom pipeline component, to submit the selected message instance to debug it against the custom pipeline component, by clicking on the submit wheel on the right side:

And you be able to start to debug your custom pipeline component code.

Heuristics

Heuristics are basically the same as the above dependency features (internal and external), but more useful during refactoring or before making an update to an artifact. For example, you need to modify an artifact and want to know the impact of the update on the entire solution.

Another extreme situation could be: I want to know where this property schema or schema could be used, and this is not so simple to determine because a property schema or schema could be used in a lot of different ways through its root nodes.

Heuristic Internal Propagation

This feature is essentially the same as Internal Dependencies, except that it also includes sub-level dependencies, i.e., sub-artifacts.

You can access these features by:

• Right-click in your resource (file) name and select the Heuristic Internal Propagation option.

Heuristic External Propagation

This feature is basically the same as External Dependencies, except that it also includes sub-levels of dependencies, i.e., sub-artifacts.

You can access these features by:

• Right-click in your resource (file) name and select the Heuristic External Propagation option.

Heuristic Circular Propagation

This feature combines the two above heuristic operations (internal and external propagation) into a single operation.

You can access these features by:

• Right-click in your resource (file) name and select the Heuristic Circular Propagation option.

Heuristic Anchoring Dependencies

Looking for all files in the solution for all artifacts that could be associated with the artifact selected.

You can access these features by:

• Right-click in your resource (file) name and select the Heuristic Anchoring Dependencies option.

Heuristic Similarity Dependencies

Looking for all files in the solution for all artifacts that could be associated (same solution domain, for example, are using the same namespace) in any possible option, with the artifact selected.

You can access these features by:

• Right-click in your resource (file) name and select the Heuristic Similarity Dependencies option.

Heuristic Contagion Dependencies

Looking for all files in the solution for all artifacts that could be associated with the artifact selected, in all of the possible combinations, type name, fields used, root name, and more…

You can access these features by:

• Right-click in your resource (file) name and select the Heuristic Contagion Dependencies option.

Finally, all the features are documented… And we only need to wait for the release announcement!!!!

me in writing more, consider buying (or helping to buy) a Star Wars Lego set for my son.