Could E1 Orchestrator replace JDE WebServices?

Exciting times at JD Edwards. The innovations keep coming, delivering real business value for JDE clients. While the JD Edwards EnterpriseOne Orchestrator has been around for a few years, originally designed and licensed for the Internet of Things (IoT), the capabilities of the modern Orchestrator solution have been greatly enhanced.

The Tools release 9.2.1.4 for E1 highlighted some changes to the product formerly known as ‘Internet of Things Orchestrator’. The first piece of great news for anyone considering investing resources in Orchestrator is that it is now included with JD Edwards EnterpriseOne Core Tools and is available for all E1 users.

Key Features of JD Edwards EnterpriseOne Orchestrator

1. Form Services: invoke any series of JDE applications; with Orchestrator you can include multiple applications calls in the same Form Service
2. Data Service: query data from any table or business view; aggregate data from any table or business view
3. Connectors: the ability to call any external RESTful endpoint
4. Watchlist Service: Orchestrator allows you to run any watchlist remotely
5. Notification Service: send emails using JDE email configuration
6. Scripting: uses Groovy scripts to extend the Orchestrator functions

Business Benefits of EnterpriseOne Orchestrator

• IoT: An interface between IoT devices and JD Edwards EnterpriseOne applications
• REST Integration: An inbound/outbound, REST-based integration platform to Oracle Cloud services and third-party systems
• Data Integrity: A guardian over your data for accuracy, currency, and consistency
• Bot: A “bot” for automating tedious, error-prone processes
• Notifications: A notification engine that ensures you never miss important updates

Our Favorite JDE Orchestrator Features 

• Using a very intuitive Orchestrator Studio, you can easily create your ‘orchestration’. No development is needed; an empowering feature for business users.
• A nice plus is that Orchestrator objects are User Defined Objects (UDOs) so they follow the same consistent way for creating/sharing/promoting them.
• Without Orchestrator, you need to update the exchange rates in JDE every week. With Orchestrator, you could create an orchestration for that. Get the rates from an external REST API (for ex : fixer.io) and update JD Edwards! 1 connector, 1 Form Service call and that's done.

Can E1 Orchestrator replace WebServices?

With all those awesome features, E1 Orchestrator is ready to be part of your integration projects. The real question is could it replace SOAP WebServices and become the main interface between JD Edwards and third-party applications, such as Cloud, Mobile & IoT? Though we can see it happening soon, it’s not likely today.

The WebServices call business functions directly & hence are faster than Form Services and support more workload. However, that's not the end of it; what if the orchestrations could be scheduled? Send notifications to users directly through the JDE Web UI? Connect to other databases? The possibilities are endless!