Enterprise systems integration (ESI) is a complex topic because of its broad scope and many dimensions, perspectives, and challenges. This book addresses this topic from three important angles: process, application, and service-oriented architecture (SOA) perspectives. A variety of common tools and technologies are now available at a high level of maturity, to integrate an enterprise at different layers. However, ESI is still an evolving field. This book addresses some of the common integration concepts, solutions, tools, and technologies for integration in detail.

The book is divided into five major parts: “Introduction,” “Messaging,” “Adapters,” “Orchestrations,” and “Processes.” All of these topics are critical for understanding the holistic view of ESI. In the introduction, the author provides a very comprehensive background of the evolution of enterprise systems and the Microsoft BizTalk Server. The messaging section reviews messaging concepts, including the Java message service (JMS), Microsoft message queuing (MSMQ), and message brokers. The author explains the main concepts, with examples, at the level of an average integration developer. Most of these concepts are relevant to systems integration. In the context of providing connectivity between the disparate systems, the adapters section is also quite relevant. The author explains the data, application, and web services in detail. Since no discussion of integration can be complete without touching on it, Part 4 focuses on orchestration. This section deals with issues like services/SOA, orchestration flow, exception handling/transactions, and orchestration with the business process execution language (BPEL). All of these topics are handled in sufficient depth. Part 5, the final section, exclusively focuses on the processes that are the core theme of integration in this book. Here, Ferreira discusses issues like process modeling with business process model and notation (BPMN), exception handling and transactions, compensation besides security, electronic data interchange (EDI), and choreography modeling, all with a number of examples. All of these topics are relevant and presented at the right level of detail.

The author has done a very good job of compiling and structuring the major systems integration-related concepts into an almost 400-page book. Although the topic is pretty broad, the author has divided it into very logical interrelated parts, which provide a comprehensive view of the material covered in each chapter. Each part has examples and conclusion sections, along with an additional section for all the cited references. The material covered is fresh and reasonably addresses the state of the art in the technologies, challenges, and solutions in the ESI field.

That being said, it would have been better if the author had reviewed some other integration tools in chapter 1 alongside BizTalk, like the IBM or Oracle integration suites of products, including WebSphere Enterprise Service Bus, business process management (BPM), IBM Integration Bus V9 (IIB9), Lombardi, and others. IBM, Oracle, and others are the leading tool vendors. This kind of discussion may have added more perspective for the novice integration developer about the main players in the industry. I also feel that it would have been valuable to have another chapter with a simple industry use case demonstrating some of the concepts provided in the book.

Overall, the book is timely and deals with the topic of systems integration very nicely. I would strongly recommend it to the integration developer/designer/architect communities, process managers, and undergraduate and graduate students in the field of information technology.