How To Boost Message Transformations Using the XslCompiledTransform class Extended

Problem Statement

Some of you posted the following feedback regarding my post How To Boost Message Transformations Using the XslCompiledTransform class:

"Very nice post. I just have a question. How would you handle multiple input messages in a map? I have a map that has 2 input source messages that i would like to unit test. The BTS expression shape has transform(outmsg) = map(msg1, msg2), but i have not yet found a way to do it in a C# class."

Solution 

Well, before answering to this question, I'll briefly explain how BizTalk Server handles maps with multiple input messages. BizTalk Server uses a trick to manage this situation. In fact, when you create a transformation map with multiple source document, BizTalk uses an envelope to wrap the individual input messages. For those of you who love to disassemble BizTalk code with Reflector, the envelope is created at runtime by the private class called CompositeStreamReader that can be found within the assembly Microsoft.XLANGs.Engine. In particular, the ConstructCompositeOutline method uses the code reported in the table below

public void ConstructCompositeOutline(){ ... XmlTextWriter writer = new XmlTextWriter(this.outlineStream, ...); writer.WriteStartElement("Root", "https://schemas.microsoft.com/BizTalk/2003/aggschema"); for (int i = 0; i < this.readerCount; i++) { writer.WriteStartElement("InputMessagePart_" + i.ToString(), ""); writer.WriteComment("_"); writer.WriteEndElement(); } writer.WriteEndElement(); writer.Flush(); ...}

 

to create an envelope which targetNamespace is equal to 'https://schemas.microsoft.com/BizTalk/2003/aggschema' and that contains as many InputMessagePart elements as the incoming documents to the map.

<ns0:Root xmlns:ns0='https://schemas.microsoft.com/BizTalk/2003/aggschema'> <InputMessagePart_0> - </InputMessagePart_0> <InputMessagePart_1> - </InputMessagePart_1></ns0:Root>

 

Therefore, I decided to extend the code of my classes XslCompiledTransformHelper and XslTransformHelper to handle the case of maps with multiple input messages. In particular, I developed a new class called CompositeStream to wrap an array of Stream objects, one for each input message to the map, an return the above envelope. The implementation of this custom class is quite smart, because instead of copying the bytes of the input streams within a new buffer or a new stream, the Read method just makes up the content of the envelope with the data of the inbound streams to return a composite message with the format expected by the map. When the inbound streams are significantly large,  this approach allows saving time and memory for copying data from the inbound streams to a new object, regardless if this latter is a buffer or a stream. The code of the CompositeStream class is shown in the table below:

CompositeStream Class

 

#region Copyright//-------------------------------------------------// Author: Paolo Salvatori// Email: paolos@microsoft.com// History: 2010-04-07 Created//-------------------------------------------------#endregion#region Using Referencesusing System;using System.IO;using System.Text;using System.Collections.Generic;using System.Configuration;using System.Xml;using System.Xml.Xsl;using System.Diagnostics;using Microsoft.XLANGs.BaseTypes;using Microsoft.XLANGs.Core;using Microsoft.BizTalk.Streaming;using Microsoft.BizTalk.CAT.Samples.DynamicTransforms.Helpers.Properties;#endregionnamespace Microsoft.BizTalk.CAT.Samples.DynamicTransforms.Helpers{ public class CompositeStream : Stream { #region Private Types enum State { Start, Overflow, Stream, End } #endregion #region Private Constants private const string DefaultPrefix = "babo"; private const string StartRoot = "<{0}:Root xmlns:{0}='https://schemas.microsoft.com/BizTalk/2003/aggschema'>"; private const string EndRoot = "</{0}:Root>"; private const string StartInputMessagePart = "<InputMessagePart_{0}>"; private const string EndInputMessagePart = "</InputMessagePart_{0}>"; #endregion #region Private Fields private int currentStream = 0; private int currentIndex = 0; private string prefix; private State state; private byte[] overflowBuffer; private Stream[] streams; private bool endOfDocument = false; #endregion #region Public Constructors public CompositeStream(Stream[] streams) { this.prefix = DefaultPrefix; this.streams = streams; this.state = State.Start; } public CompositeStream(Stream[] streams, string prefix) { this.prefix = prefix; this.streams = streams; this.state = State.Start; } #endregion #region Public Properties public override bool CanRead { get { return true; } } public override bool CanSeek { get { return true; } } public override bool CanTimeout { get { return false; } } public override bool CanWrite { get { return false; } } public override long Length { get { int prefixLength = prefix.Length; long length = 76 + 3 * prefixLength; if (streams != null && streams.Length > 0) { string index; for (int i = 0; i < streams.Length; i++) { if (streams[i].CanSeek) { index = i.ToString(); length += streams[i].Length + 39 + 2 * index.Length; } else { throw new NotImplementedException(); } } } return length; } } public override long Position { get { if (state == State.Start) { return 0L; } else { throw new NotImplementedException(); } } set { if (value == 0L) { ResetStream(); } else { throw new NotImplementedException(); } } } #endregion #region Public Methods public override int Read(byte[] buffer, int offset, int count) { int bytesWritten = 0; int bytesRead = 0; int length = 0; byte[] localBuffer; StringBuilder builder; if (state == State.End) { return 0; } while (bytesWritten < count && state != State.End) { switch (state) { case State.Start: builder = new StringBuilder(128); builder.AppendFormat(StartRoot, prefix); if (streams != null && streams.Length > 0) { builder.AppendFormat(StartInputMessagePart, currentStream); } localBuffer = Encoding.UTF8.GetBytes(builder.ToString()); if (localBuffer.Length <= count) { Array.Copy(localBuffer, 0, buffer, offset, localBuffer.Length); bytesWritten += localBuffer.Length; offset += bytesWritten; state = State.Stream; } else { Array.Copy(localBuffer, 0, buffer, offset, count); overflowBuffer = localBuffer; currentIndex = count; state = State.Overflow; return count; } break; case State.Overflow: length = overflowBuffer.Length - currentIndex; if (length <= count) { Array.Copy(overflowBuffer, currentIndex, buffer, offset, length); bytesWritten += length; offset += length; overflowBuffer = null; currentIndex = 0; if (endOfDocument) { state = State.End; } else { state = State.Stream; } } else { Array.Copy(overflowBuffer, currentIndex, buffer, offset, count); currentIndex += count; return count; } break; case State.Stream: length = count - bytesWritten; bytesRead = streams[currentStream].Read(buffer, offset, length); bytesWritten += bytesRead; offset += bytesRead; if (bytesWritten < count) { builder = new StringBuilder(128); builder.AppendFormat(EndInputMessagePart, currentStream); currentStream++; if (currentStream < streams.Length) { builder.AppendFormat(StartInputMessagePart, currentStream); localBuffer = Encoding.UTF8.GetBytes(builder.ToString()); } else { builder.AppendFormat(EndRoot, prefix); localBuffer = Encoding.UTF8.GetBytes(builder.ToString()); endOfDocument = true; } if (localBuffer.Length <= count - bytesWritten) { Array.Copy(localBuffer, 0, buffer, offset, localBuffer.Length); bytesWritten += localBuffer.Length; offset += localBuffer.Length; if (endOfDocument) { if (bytesWritten <= count) { state = State.End; } return bytesWritten; } break; } else { length = count - bytesWritten; Array.Copy(localBuffer, 0, buffer, offset, length); overflowBuffer = localBuffer; currentIndex = length; state = State.Overflow; return count; } } else { return count; } break; } } return bytesWritten; } public override IAsyncResult BeginRead(byte[] buffer, int offset, int count, AsyncCallback callback, object state) { return base.BeginRead(buffer, offset, count, callback, state); } public override IAsyncResult BeginWrite(byte[] buffer, int offset, int count, AsyncCallback callback, object state) { return base.BeginWrite(buffer, offset, count, callback, state); } public override void Write(byte[] buffer, int offset, int count) { throw new NotImplementedException(); } public override void SetLength(long value) { throw new NotImplementedException(); } public override long Seek(long offset, SeekOrigin origin) { if (offset == 0 && origin == SeekOrigin.Begin) { ResetStream(); } else { throw new NotImplementedException(); } return 0; } public override void Flush() { throw new NotImplementedException(); } #endregion #region Private Methods private void ResetStream() { for (int i = 0; i < streams.Length; i++) { if (streams[i].CanSeek) { streams[i].Seek(0, SeekOrigin.Begin); } else { throw new NotImplementedException(); } } state = State.Start; endOfDocument = false; currentStream = 0; currentIndex = 0; } #endregion }}

 

Then I extended the XslCompiledTransformHelper class with a set of new methods that accept as parameter an array of objects of type Stream or XLANGMessage and use an instance of the CompositeStream class to apply a transformation map to these latter.

XslCompiledTransformHelper Class

#region Copyright//-------------------------------------------------// Author: Paolo Salvatori// Email: paolos@microsoft.com// History: 2010-01-26 Created//-------------------------------------------------#endregion#region Using Referencesusing System;using System.IO;using System.Text;using System.Collections.Generic;using System.Configuration;using System.Xml;using System.Xml.Xsl;using System.Xml.XPath;using System.Diagnostics;using Microsoft.XLANGs.BaseTypes;using Microsoft.XLANGs.Core;using Microsoft.BizTalk.Streaming;using Microsoft.BizTalk.CAT.Samples.DynamicTransforms.Helpers.Properties;#endregionnamespace Microsoft.BizTalk.CAT.Samples.DynamicTransforms.Helpers{ public class XslCompiledTransformHelper { ... public static XLANGMessage Transform(XLANGMessage[] messageArray, int[] partIndexArray, string mapFullyQualifiedName, string messageName, string partName, bool debug, int bufferSize, int thresholdSize) { try { if (messageArray != null && messageArray.Length > 0) { Stream[] streamArray = new Stream[messageArray.Length]; for (int i = 0; i < messageArray.Length; i++) { streamArray[i] = messageArray[i][partIndexArray[i]].RetrieveAs(typeof(Stream)) as Stream; } Stream response = Transform(streamArray, mapFullyQualifiedName, debug, bufferSize, thresholdSize); CustomBTXMessage customBTXMessage = null; customBTXMessage = new CustomBTXMessage(messageName, Service.RootService.XlangStore.OwningContext); customBTXMessage.AddPart(string.Empty, partName); customBTXMessage[0].LoadFrom(response); return customBTXMessage.GetMessageWrapperForUserCode(); } } catch (Exception ex) { ExceptionHelper.HandleException(Resources.XslCompiledTransformHelper, ex); TraceHelper.WriteLineIf(debug, null, ex.Message, EventLogEntryType.Error); throw; } finally { if (messageArray != null && messageArray.Length > 0) { for (int i = 0; i < messageArray.Length; i++) { if (messageArray[i] != null) { messageArray[i].Dispose(); } } } } return null; } public static Stream Transform(Stream[] streamArray, string mapFullyQualifiedName) { return Transform(streamArray, mapFullyQualifiedName, false, DefaultBufferSize, DefaultThresholdSize); } public static Stream Transform(Stream[] streamArray, string mapFullyQualifiedName, bool debug) { return Transform(streamArray, mapFullyQualifiedName, debug, DefaultBufferSize, DefaultThresholdSize); } public static Stream Transform(Stream[] streamArray, string mapFullyQualifiedName, bool debug, int bufferSize, int thresholdSize) { try { MapInfo mapInfo = GetMapInfo(mapFullyQualifiedName, debug); if (mapInfo != null) { CompositeStream compositeStream = null; try { VirtualStream virtualStream = new VirtualStream(bufferSize, thresholdSize); compositeStream = new CompositeStream(streamArray); XmlTextReader reader = new XmlTextReader(compositeStream); mapInfo.Xsl.Transform(reader, mapInfo.Arguments, virtualStream); virtualStream.Seek(0, SeekOrigin.Begin); return virtualStream; } finally { if (compositeStream != null) { compositeStream.Close(); } } } } catch (Exception ex) { ExceptionHelper.HandleException(Resources.XslCompiledTransformHelper, ex); TraceHelper.WriteLineIf(debug, null, ex.Message, EventLogEntryType.Error); throw; } return null; } ... }}

 

In a similar way, I extended the XslTransformHelper class to support maps with multiple input documents. For brevity, I omitted the code of this latter, but you can download the new version of both classes here.

Test

To test the new methods exposed by the classes XslCompiledTransformHelper and XslTransformHelper, I created three XML schemas:

• Credentials
• Address
• Customer

In particular, the Credentials and Address schemas define two complex types used to build the Customer schema. Then I created a transformation map (see the picture below) called AddressAndCredentialsToCustomer that accepts 2 input messages, the first of type Credentials and the second of type Address, and returns a document of type Customer.

Finally I created 2 Unit Test methods called:

• TestXslTransformHelperWithMultipleInputs
• TestXslCompiledTransformHelperWithMultipleInputs

to test the CompositeStream and the new methods exposed by the the classes XslCompiledTransformHelper and XslTransformHelper. You can change the entries contained in the appSettings section of the App.Config file within the UnitAndLoadTests project to test the 2 classes against your documents and multi-input-message maps.

Conclusions

I updated the original post to reflect the extensions I made. Here you can find a new version of my helper classes and the artifacts (schemas, maps, unit tests) I used to test them.

Note: I spent less than one day to write and test the new code. In particular, I conducted a basic code coverage of the CompositeStream class, but I didn’t test it with more than 2 streams or with large messages. If you find any error, please send me a repro and I’ll do my best, time permitting, to fix the code as soon as possible. Instead, should you find an error in my code and decide to sort it out by yourselves, please let me have the fixed version. ;-)

Comments

• Anonymous
  April 14, 2010
  How would I go about using this approch in an orchestration? I guess I could still use the Transform method with multiple XLANGMessages as an input, but would you recommend using the "envelope approch" instead? //Mikael

• Anonymous
  April 14, 2010
  The comment has been removed

• Anonymous
  February 14, 2012
  It would be interesting to see how it is used in an  orchestration since you can't use arrays in expression shapes. I am working on trying to get it to work within an orchestration at the moment. If anyone has any insight on this let me know. Currently I am using a helper class that has a List<Stream> member and you can call a .Add method to load it. It is not working yet but i'm still trying...

• Anonymous
  February 14, 2012
  The comment has been removed

• Anonymous
  February 14, 2012
  For anyone interested here is how I did it: Made an array helper class: using System; using System.Collections.Generic; using System.Linq; using System.Text; using Microsoft.XLANGs.BaseTypes; namespace OrchestrationArray {    [Serializable]    public class XLangArray    {        private List<XLANGMessage> _XlangArray;        public XLangArray()        {            _XlangArray = new List<XLANGMessage>();        }        public void Add(XLANGMessage message)        {            _XlangArray.Add(message);        }        public void Remove(XLANGMessage message)        {            _XlangArray.Remove(message);        }        public XLANGMessage[] ToArray()        {            return _XlangArray.ToArray();        }        public XLANGMessage GetMessage(int index)        {            XLANGMessage outMessage = null;            if (_XlangArray.Count > index)                outMessage = _XlangArray[index];            return outMessage;        }    } } Next I made an overloaded Transform method:        public static XLANGMessage Transform(XLANGMessage[] messageArray,                                     string mapFullyQualifiedName,                                     string messageName)        {            try            {                if (messageArray != null &&                    messageArray.Length > 0)                {                    Stream[] streamArray = new Stream[messageArray.Length];                    for (int i = 0; i < messageArray.Length; i++)                    {                        streamArray[i] = messageArray[i][0].RetrieveAs(typeof(Stream)) as Stream;                    }                    Stream response = Transform(streamArray, mapFullyQualifiedName);                    CustomBTXMessage customBTXMessage = null;                    customBTXMessage = new CustomBTXMessage(messageName, Service.RootService.XlangStore.OwningContext);                    customBTXMessage.AddPart(string.Empty, DefaultPartName);                    customBTXMessage[0].LoadFrom(response);                    return customBTXMessage.GetMessageWrapperForUserCode();                }            }            catch (Exception ex)            {                ExceptionHelper.HandleException(Resources.XslCompiledTransformHelper, ex);                TraceHelper.WriteLineIf(false,                                        null,                                        ex.Message,                                        EventLogEntryType.Error);                throw;            }            finally            {                if (messageArray != null &&                    messageArray.Length > 0)                {                    for (int i = 0; i < messageArray.Length; i++)                    {                        if (messageArray[i] != null)                        {                            messageArray[i].Dispose();                        }                    }                }            }            return null;        } Then the call in the expression shape: xlangArray = new OrchestrationArray.XLangArray(); xlangArray.Add(IncOne); xlangArray.Add(IncTwo); xlangArray.Add(IncThree); xmlDoc =  DynamicTransform.Helper.XslCompiledTransformHelper.Transform(xlangArray.ToArray(), "DynamicTransforms.Tester.DynamicTransformTestMap.btm, DynamicTransforms.Tester, Version=1.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=9f6d10e34eb13806", "DynamicTest"); Thank you Paolo for your great work and your help.

• Anonymous
  February 14, 2012
  Thanks Todd for your prompt solution and above all for making your code available to other developers! Ciao, Paolo

• Anonymous
  October 28, 2013
  Hi Todd, I followed your steps but in orchestration xmlDoc =  DynamicTransform.Helper.XslCompiledTransformHelper.Transform(xlangArray.ToArray(), "DynamicTransforms.Tester.DynamicTransformTestMap.btm, DynamicTransforms.Tester, Version=1.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=9f6d10e34eb13806", "DynamicTest"); , i am getting error like cannot implicity convert microsoft.xlangs.basetypes.xlangmessage[] to microsoft.xlangs.basetypes.xlangmessage Please help me out

• Anonymous
  October 28, 2013
  Todd? My name is Paolo, not Todd. If you are using BizTalk Server 2013, my solution is no more necessary as the product Group decided (on my suggestion) to use XslCompiledTransform for document mapping. Unfortunately, I don't have bandwidth to investigate the problem. Could you just debug through my code and find the problem by yourself. The problem could be due to the fact that you invoking the wrong method overload or passing wrong arguments, or maybe my code contains some defects in a path I didn't test. Thanks! Ciao Paolo

• Anonymous
  December 17, 2014
  Hi Paolo, i am running into the following exception when calling a  map that has 2 input source messages from the orchestration, after debugging we found out that the XpathMutatorStream's CanSeek property is not set to true as a result the code in the "Length" property is throwing the not implemented exception, can you please help in guiding us to resolve this issue ? System.NotImplementedException: The method or operation is not implemented.    at Microsoft.BizTalk.CAT.Samples.DynamicTransforms.Helpers.CompositeStream.get_Length()    at System.Xml.XmlTextReaderImpl.InitStreamInput(Uri baseUri, String baseUriStr, Stream stream, Byte[] bytes, Int32 byteCount, Encoding encoding)    at System.Xml.XmlTextReaderImpl..ctor(String url, Stream input, XmlNameTable nt)    at System.Xml.XmlTextReader..ctor(Stream input)    at Microsoft.BizTalk.CAT.Samples.DynamicTransforms.Helpers.XslCompiledTransformHelper.Transform(Stream[] streamArray, String mapFullyQualifiedName, Boolean debug, Int32 bufferSize, Int32 thresholdSize)    at Microsoft.BizTalk.CAT.Samples.DynamicTransforms.Helpers.XslCompiledTransformHelper.Transform(Stream[] streamArray, String mapFullyQualifiedName)    at Microsoft.BizTalk.CAT.Samples.DynamicTransforms.Helpers.XslCompiledTransformHelper.Transform(XLANGMessage[] messageArray, String mapFullyQualifiedName, String messageName)    at DynamicMapping.CustomerLookup.segment2(StopConditions stopOn)    at Microsoft.XLANGs.Core.SegmentScheduler.RunASegment(Segment s, StopConditions stopCond, Exception& exp)

• Anonymous
  December 17, 2014
  Hi Nen Starting from BizTalk Server 2013, XslCompiledTransform-based mapping has been included in the product, so you don't need my solution anymore ;) Ciao Paolo

• Anonymous
  December 21, 2014
  HI Paolo, i forgot to mention that we are using BTS 2010 and we dont have funding to update to 2013 :( unfortunately and your solution is the best our there. Thanks -Madhu

• Anonymous
  December 21, 2014
  Hi Nen what kind of stream are you passing to the CompositeStream? I reviewed the class and found the following code for the Lenght property: {            get            {                int prefixLength = prefix.Length;                long length = 76 + 3 * prefixLength;                if (streams != null &&                    streams.Length > 0)                {                    string index;                    for (int i = 0; i < streams.Length; i++)                    {                        if (streams[i].CanSeek)                        {                            index = i.ToString();                            length += streams[i].Length + 39 + 2 * index.Length;                        }                        else                        {                            throw new NotImplementedException();                        }                    }                }                return length;            }        } As you can see, it raises a NotImplementedException when one of the streams in the array is not seekable. You could try to replace the non-seekable stream (outside of my code oreventually in my code in place of the throw new NotImplementedException() statement) with a seekable stream (CanSeek == true)? For example, with a new MemoryStream(stream)? Ciao Paolo

• Anonymous
  December 25, 2014
  Paolo, Great idea that worked, i copied the biztalk message stream in to an memory stream and i now have the transform working, however when creating the XLANG message with the following code    CustomBTXMessage customBTXMessage = null;                    customBTXMessage = new CustomBTXMessage(messageName, Service.RootService.XlangStore.OwningContext);                    customBTXMessage.AddPart(string.Empty, partName);                    customBTXMessage[0].LoadFrom(response);                    return customBTXMessage.GetMessageWrapperForUserCode(); i get the following exception System.NullReferenceException: Object reference not set to an instance of an object.    at Microsoft.XLANGs.Core.XMessage.Dispose()    at Microsoft.XLANGs.Core.XMessage.Release()    at Microsoft.XLANGs.Core.ReferencedMessages.Remove(XMessage msg)    at DynamicMapping.CustomerLookup.segment2(StopConditions stopOn)    at Microsoft.XLANGs.Core.SegmentScheduler.RunASegment(Segment s, StopConditions stopCond, Exception& exp)