The services of a transaction processing system Services for systems administration and application

runtime environment include the following: development are described in subsequent sections.
Scheduling and load balancing - Controlling the TX Series for Multiplatform - TX Series for Multi
rate and order in which tasks are processed to give platform's is a transaction processing system that
higher-priority tasks the best response times and to provides the transaction processing facilities that
adapt to the availability of application servers and enable application programs to be implemented as
other system resources. transactions. The work of many users can be
Managing system resources - Maintaining a pool processed at the same time, by a single server or by
of operating system resources to be used for multiple servers. To users, TX Series for
transaction processing, loading application Multiplatform provides seemingly dedicated
programs, and acquiring and releasing storage. processing of their work, with the security of access,
Monitoring - Monitoring the progress of tasks, reliability of data update, and other benefits that
suspending those waiting for input, adjusting task transactions provide. It hides the complexity of the
priorities, and resolving problems. facilities from user applications by providing standard
Managing data - Obtaining required data needed by APIs.
tasks, coordinating resource managers (such as file III. CHARACTERIZATION OF A BUSINESS
servers and database managers), locking data for TRANSACTION PROCESSING SYSTEM
update, and logging changes. A business transaction is some good or service (or
Managing communications - Monitoring combination) provided by the business to its
communications with users and between servers and customer(s) as part of this value proposition.
other systems, starting communications sessions as A business Transaction Processing System is a
needed, managing system that supports a business in the delivery of its
data handling and conversion, and routing data to business transactions.
the right destination. A business transaction may be as short as a phone
Time management - Managing transaction call to the bank for an account balance or as long as
processing in relation to the passage of time, starting a mortgage (from the initial mortgage application to
tasks at predefined times, logging the date and time final satisfaction being sent after the last payment)
of events onto disk, and regularly controlling part of and perhaps even as long as the lifelong relationship
the business system to provide degrees of with a bank (covering multiple accounts used for
automation. different purposes).
Business transactions may have hierarchical Often, the traditional transactions execute in different
relationships environments and it becomes difficult to connect all
(such as the relationships between the business of the pieces back to the original customer need that
transactions represented by a check to the business started the whole process.
transaction represented by a bank account). A traditional transaction has approximately the same
Each type of business transaction may have multiple relationship to a business transaction that a method
states before it is completed. At each stage in its has to an object. Just as a method may transition an
lifecycle it may generate various measurements object from one valid state to another.
(financial or otherwise) that may be used by B. WorkFlow
management / stockholders / regulators to monitor ABTPS (Business Transaction Processing
and/or control the business. System) should have the ability to process
A. Long Running Transactions - The business workflows. Each state of the business transaction
transactions that traditional transactions that are can be represented by a step in the workflow. Each
handled by TP monitors such as CICS step in the work flow may be composed of the
following phases:
TP monitors - Transaction Processing - 1. Work Planning - The periodic process of planning
● Initially developed as multi-threaded servers to for future work.
support This often involves review of historical work levels
large number of terminals from single process and/or the results of Work Plans from "upstream"
● Provide infrastructure for building and processing areas that generate work for this
administering complex transactions processing processing area.
systems with large number of clients and 2. Work Receiving and Arrival Reporting - The
multiple servers process of receiving and getting control over newly
CICS-Customer Information Control System arrived work. This often includes notifications to
They have a long lifetime (may even be days or processors of work waiting processing.
years) and multiple interactions with users over their 3. Work Monitoring - Review all available work,
lifetime. The traditional transactions only cover a prioritization and scheduling the work to be done.
small part of the life of these transactions and 4. Work Processing and Recording - Doing the
multiple traditional transactions are often required in work and recording the results of the work.
order to complete a single business transaction.
5. Work Routing - Based on the change in state to The workflow engine should be responsible for doing
the work, pass the work along to the next stage in all of steps defined above except for Work
the processing. Processing and Recording which is unique to each
6. Work Evaluation - On a periodic basis, analyze step in each business transaction
the work. The information from this step is often the It is even possible to reuse Work Processing
input to the Work Planning phase programs
C. Accounting associated with authorization in multiple business
Accounting information is only one type of transactions. However, there are three functions that
information to be collected by the workflow look like responsibilities of the workflow engine that
processing. Since internal and external financial often require detailed knowledge of the business
reporting is often used to monitor and control a transactions. This breaks the encapsulation of the
business, collecting this information is important. business transactions.
However, there are many business transactions that G. Authorization Rule Dependence on Business
are not directly recorded in the financial reporting Transaction Data
systems (i.e. the number of calls to the "banking by The authorization rules often vary based on the
phone" unit that did not get through to a bank current state of the business transaction. It is difficult
employee) that may generate useful information for to write a generic authorization processor without
internal reporting purposes. detailed knowledge of each business transaction.
D. Authorization H. Routing
Just as accounting records what happens after the It is often possible to route a business transaction to
transaction is processed, a large part of business one of many steps depending on the results of the
transactions involve authorizing each transaction Work Processing in this step. The routing rules often
before the real processing is done. vary based on the current state of the business
E. Queue Management transaction. It is difficult to write a generic routing
In order to decouple the workflow steps from one engine without detailed knowledge of each business
another it is usually necessary to add queues transaction.
between steps. A good workflow engine should allow I. Work Monitoring
the users to monitor queues in order to shift When human beings are the business transaction
processing resources as necessary. processors at some point in the Work Processing
F. Difficult Problems they often need the ability to select work based on
varying criteria.