Is it necessary to host the Adapter Service of BizTalk Services on runtime?

Question

I have a question about the BizTalk Adapter Service for BizTalk Services. I know that the adapter runs in IIS - I would like to know if that is only necessary for development or for run-time too?

Because I would like to use BizTalk Services to insert XML messages into an Azure SQL: Using Azure BizTalk Services to Insert XML Messages into an Azure SQL Server

Would I need to provide a server just for hosting the adapter? If so, that wouldn't make much sense to me

Answer 1

roxor, I believe that you are correct in the suspicion that you need to host the adapter service and I agree that it makes no sense. I simply do not think this is a scenario currently 'properly' covered by BizTalk Services.

The adapter service has been introduced to support integration with several on-premises systems, SQL Server amongst them -

The BizTalk Adapter Service feature allows an application in the cloud to communicate with a Line-of-Business (LOB) system on-premise, in your network, behind your firewall. Using the LOB adapters in the BizTalk Adapter Pack (BAP), a BizTalk Adapter Service application can execute LOB operations to the following on-premise LOB systems: • Microsoft SQL Server

• Oracle Database

• Oracle E-Business Suite

• SAP

• Siebel eBusiness Applications

(http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/windowsazure/hh689889.aspx)

It does that by utilising Windows Azure Service Bus' Relay service. I don't think that Windows Azure SQL Database natively fits the model and although I can see how it can be done it does seem very awkward and quite pointless. In my humble opinion this article shouldn't have been published.

I would imagine that integration with SQL Database would be added to WABS natively eventually, until then, if it was down to me, I'd front it with a web service. Makes sense architecturally anyway.

Answer 2

yes Adapter service is required during runtime .

the role of Adapter service is to pick the message from service bus relay and send it to Azure SQL DB .

i am checking how it works if Adapter service is in stop state .

you can refer the article for more knowledge of BiztalK adapter Service http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/windowsazure/hh689786.aspx

Regards Mohit Gupta