BizTalk Server's Architecture

BizTalk Server has two major components, a messaging engine and an orchestration engine.

The BizTalk Server messaging engine (left) moves business documents as messages between applications being integrated. The path the messaging engine uses to move the business documents runs as follows:

Receive functions enable BizTalk Server to accept documents from a source application for processing through particular network protocols, including Hypertext Transfer Protocol, or through other mechanisms, including placing documents in a specific file system directory, placing documents in a Microsoft Message Queue (MSMQ), or using a COM interface to get documents from e-mail, an Active Server Pages, or a COM-enabled application.

Channels convert documents from the source application’s data format to the format required by the target application, and log information about the documents into BizTalk Server.

Message ports send documents to target applications. Ports typically use adapters (formerly called Application Integration Components, or AICs), software components that deliver business documents to a particular class of application or (for example) place the documents into a MSMQ queue. More than 300 adapters are available to connect to target applications, such as SAP, and applications that use the IBM MQSeries message queuing technology.