Microsoft BizTalk Server 2010 Unleashed Book Review

BizTalk is no small topic. To cover it all in detail in one book is one huge task. This book comes the closest to doing that I have seen so far. This is not a beginners BizTalk book. You won't find a chapter on installation and configuration, although there is a chapter on the administration console and one on deployment concepts. It digs right into the meat. It is perfect for anyone who knows a little about BizTalk and wants to get a complete picture of the BizTalk features available in BizTalk 2010. After a nice introduction and overview the authors have chapters on Schemas, Maps, Orchestrations, Pipelines, Adapters, BizTalk 2010 and WCF: Extensibility, BizTalk and Windows Azure, Business Activity Monitoring with BizTalk BAM, The Business Rules Framework, Rule-Based Programming, ESB with BizTalk Server, Administration Console Concepts, Deployment Concepts, BizTalk RFID, and BizTalk RFID Mobile. Over the years I have worked with BizTalk at different levels. I have also worked just with BAM on some projects. My current company will probably skip going to BizTalk 2010 since they just recently upgraded to 2009. Personally I don't want to skip getting familiar with a version of BizTalk. My goal with this book was to get a refresher on BizTalk and an introduction to the new 2010 features. This book definitely accomplished that goal for me. Each chapter does a thorough job of hitting all the related points. For example the Adapter chapter discusses Native Adapters, Line-of-Business Adapters, BizTalk Adapter Pack, Host Adapters, and Third-Party and Custom Adapters. Coverage includes FTP Adapter, HTTP Adapter, MQ Series Adapter, MSMQ Adapter, POP3 Adapter, SMTP Adapter, SharePoint Services Adapter, WCF Adapters, and SQL Server Adapter. The biggest let down with the book is that there is no accompanying download. With the amount if code samples throughout the book the authors should have put in the effort to provide one. In my search for one I saw one of the authors promised it, but there has been none produced to date. The biggest highlight is the coverage of the Business Rules Engine. The book has 172 pages of premium Business Rules Engine coverage. This is not common. Most BizTalk books have a very little detail on the Business Rules Engine. Although there are multiple authors on the book it doesn't read like it. All of them did a great job of writing in a style that makes the topics at hand easy to understand. All in all I highly recommend this book to anyone who wants the complete picture of all the features BizTalk 2010 has to offer.

Microsoft BizTalk Server 2010 Unleashed