The highlights include bundling several supply chain data formats that formerly came a la carte, a new branch office edition, and a new edition with best practices and patterns for Microsoft business partners aiming to dip their toes in SOA.
The supply chain enhancements package four key data formats, including HL6, HIPAA, Swift, RosettaNet, which were previously available only as add-on accelerators or adapters.
Now they are bundled with the core product. And BizTalk Server 2006 r2 will also include some RFID processing features and support of ANSI and Edifact EDI (Electronic Data Interchange) in the core product.
In a similar vein, Microsoft is introducing a sized-down branch office edition for organizations, such as retailers or banks, that have extensive brick and mortar store networks and wish to provide a simplified tool for connecting to headquarters or regional office systems.
Branch Office Edition will obviously cover only a subset of BizTalk Enterprise features. While Microsoft provided little detail here, in essence it will include features like event queues and host (mainframe) integration.
Finally, Microsoft is introducing a SOA and Business Process Pack, which will be a six-month discounted promotion, that will bundle R2 with SharePoint Server 2006, Visual Studio Team Systems (VSTS), SQL Server 2005, and the Microsoft .NET Framework.
Combining the products typically used for SOA and BPM projects, the edition will also include collected patterns and best practices to give partners a head start in service- or BPM-enabling their offerings.
