White Paper ILOG JRules: Leading the Way in Business Rule Management Systems ILOG JRules: Leading the Way in Business Rule Management Systems White Paper © ILOG, March 2005 – Do not duplicate without permission. ILOG, CPLEX and their respective logotypes are registered trademarks. All other company and product names are trademarks or registered trademarks of their respective holders. The material presented in this document is summary in nature, subject to change, not contractual and intended for general information only and does not constitute a representation. ILOG Business Rules ILOG JRules Contents Audience ................................................................................................................................ 4 Applicable ILOG JRules Versions....................................................................................... 4 Introduction........................................................................................................................... 5 The Five Strengths ................................................................................................................ 5 Strength 1: Comprehensive Feature Set............................................................................. 6 Tools................................................................................................................................... 6 Rule Languages ................................................................................................................ 7 Repository ......................................................................................................................... 8 BRE Server......................................................................................................................... 8 Rule Engine....................................................................................................................... 9 Strength 2: Reliability .........................................................................................................10 Rule execution speed..................................................................................................... 10 A Scalable BRMS ............................................................................................................ 11 Dedication to standards ................................................................................................ 11 Strength 3: Customizability and Extensibility ................................................................ 13 Customization services.................................................................................................. 13 Extension services .......................................................................................................... 13 Strength 4: Track Record.................................................................................................... 14 Stability of ILOG ............................................................................................................ 14 “Blue Chip” references .................................................................................................. 14 Growing customer base................................................................................................. 14 Strength 5: Complete Offering .......................................................................................... 15 Conclusion ........................................................................................................................... 15 Additional Resources ......................................................................................................... 15 © 2004 ILOG S.A. All rights reserved. - 3 - ILOG Business Rules ILOG JRules Audience This document is intended for those who wish to learn more about business rule management and business rule management systems, and to understand why JRules is the leading BRMS available. Applicable ILOG JRules Versions This document covers ILOG JRules 5.0.x © 2004 ILOG S.A. All rights reserved. - 4 - ILOG Business Rules ILOG JRules Introduction ILOG has worked for many years to make ILOG JRules the market-leading business rule management system (BRMS). JRules makes business rule management practical by providing innovative tools to author, deploy and manage business rules across the enterprise. This is why it has become an essential part of the IT infrastructures of hundreds of businesses worldwide, and the list of customers continues to grow with each passing quarter. ILOG JRules’ reputation has resulted in the BRMS’s inclusion in the SD Times 100 and the Crossroads A-List. It has received the Intelligent Enterprise Editor’s Choice Award and Software Development magazine’s Productivity Award, among other top industry honors. Major IT research firms recognize ILOG JRules as a market leader. Gartner has listed it in the Magic Quadrant for Business Rule Engines in every version of the Magic Quadrant, and Giga, Butler Group and Bloor Research all recommend ILOG JRules specifically for business rule management. IDC identifies ILOG as the overall leader in market share for the BRMS market. Why does ILOG JRules hold this commanding position among business rule management systems? Put simply, ILOG JRules has strengths that – taken together – are unsurpassed in the marketplace. The Five Strengths ILOG JRules’ strengths begin with its comprehensive feature set. ILOG JRules provides tools and rule languages that help policy managers, business analysts and developers author, deploy and manage business rules. It also includes a repository to store and protect business rules, a powerful rule engine to execute rules, and an extensive Java library to define and extend rule execution and management environments. Another major strength is ILOG JRules reliability. The combination of high performance and robustness make the product’s rule engine the one to depend on with mission-critical business applications, regardless of the throughput requirements. All the components in ILOG JRules are based on the latest standards for J2EE, XML, Web services and even rule engines (e.g., JSR94). It is designed to fit into a modern computing environment seamlessly and efficiently, so there is no need for a custom or proprietary interface or adapter. © 2004 ILOG S.A. All rights reserved. - 5 - ILOG Business Rules ILOG JRules ILOG JRules is customizable and extensible to an unprecedented degree. Practically every feature provided “out of the box” can be customized. The tools, repository and engine are all supported with rich APIs, and frameworks that enable their extension programmatically. ILOG JRules has achieved an impressive track record over the last several years. A contributing factor is the stability of its maker -- ILOG --both from a financial and an organizational standpoint. There are also its blue-chip references. ILOG JRules is employed across the enterprise at leading companies around the world in finance, government, telecommunications, insurance, e-businesses and manufacturing. And this list is growing fast. ILOG JRules’ fifth major strength is its complete offering. ILOG JRules is not just software and documentation, although the software is award winning, and its documentation comprehensive and educational. ILOG provides maintenance services and technical support, classroom and onsite training, solution frameworks and product consulting. ILOG provides all the software and services needed to successfully apply business rule management. Strength 1: Comprehensive Feature Set ILOG JRules provides tools and rule languages that help policy managers, business analysts and developers author, deploy, and manage business rules. It also includes a repository to store and protect business rules; a powerful rule engine to execute rules; and an extensive Java library to define and extend the rule execution and management environments. Each of these major component areas is rich with features. Tools Feature Description Orchestrate the execution of rule packages Ruleflow using UML Author and maintain rules as decision Decision Table Editor tables Decision Table Designer Make templates for decision tables Author and maintain rules as decision Decision Tree Editor trees Decision Tree Designer Make templates for decision trees Graphical Business Object Model Diagram objects manipulated by rules Editor using UML © 2004 ILOG S.A. All rights reserved. - 6 - ILOG Business Rules ILOG JRules Consistency Checking Identify broken or redundant rules Rule Validation Automatically check rule syntax Search for and update anything in the Query repository Work with only the tools you need; hide Plug-In Architecture the ones you don’t need Browse and select rules, templates, queries, Repository Explorer decision tables, Ruleflow and more Browse and select objects manipulated by Business Object Model Explorer rules Template Designer Create rule templates Author, read and update template-based Template Editor rules Author, read and update rules on your Syntactic Rule Editor desktop Author, read and update rules through a Web Rule Editor Web browser Property Sheet View and edit rule properties Evaluate the runtime performance of a rule Profiler set Debug rules, decision tables and Ruleflow Debugger as they are executed by the rule engine Tracer Monitor execution events as they occur Rule Languages Feature Description Author rules using natural language Business Action Language (BAL) syntax Author rules using Java- or XML-like ILOG Rule Language (IRL) syntax