Expose web service as rest api

[pavanikoduri]

Hi,

I need help to expose the WSDL soap Webservice as rest API to use this in chatbots to call the BP process, so please guide me how to do this?

Thanks Pavani

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pavani koduri
RPA Consulatant
Pearson
Europe/London
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[Jay]

I'm looking for the same thing, did you have any luck @pavanikoduri?​

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Jay
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[ewilson]

Blue Prism does not support exposing processes/VBOs as RESTful services. We only support exposing them as SOAP web services at this time.

As a workaround, you could place an API gateway like AWS, Azure, IBM Strong Loop, etc in between your client and your Blue Prism installation. Then you would make a REST request to the gateway and it would translate that to SOAP and forward it to BP. It would handle the reverse translation when BP responds too.

There's also an option where you can take the SOAP envelope of a regular SOAP request and simply wrap it in the body of an HTTP POST. It's not truly RESTful, but it's close. There's an example of how to do this on Postman's site.

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Eric Wilson
Director, Partner Integrations for Digital Exchange
Blue Prism
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[DavidRubiano]

Hi Eric, 

I was wondering if the below scenario can be handled by Blue Prism in a smart way: 

We are currently using an IT Service Management tool that end-users create tickets, when these thickets are created, I would like them to trigger an Blue Prism Process using an API that the ITSM is using (using REST, and as you're description above it's doable). 

The BP Process will add the items to a specific Work Queue. When an item is added to the queue, Blue Prism will trigger a schedule (or some tasks, login, execute processes, logout) Is this possible without having a client running? Can the Blue Prism Application Server trigger a client to boot up and run the process?  

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David Rubiano
Senior Consultant
Capgemini
Europe/Stockholm
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[ManishRawat]

Hi Eric,

If I understood your problem correctly, you have the below requirements:

1. Add the Item in Blue Prism work queue as soon as the tickets are submitted at the ITSM.
2. Run the process according to the request added into the queue, as soon as the request is added.

The above requirements can be fulfilled by following the below approach:

1. Create a VBO in BP and expose it as web service, which can be called by the ITSM Tool as soon as the the tickets are created - This VBO will just create an entry in your Work Queue.
2. Make sure that the queue is Active Queue - and create the resource pool and a wrapper process which will be run as soon as the Queue has any pending items in the queue, now depending upon the request type you can code your Process to follow one of the other path as mentioned (or some tasks, login, execute processes, logout).

This will keep it as real time as possible.

NOTE: I would suggest to use the VBO for web services to be created with exposure type as Background, and the actual application VBO to be created with exposure type as Foreground so you can utilizes the same resources for Web service and Actual process run both.

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Manish Rawat
Project Manager
Mercer
New Delhi
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[DavidLara]

Hello Eric,

I went ahead and did it with PostMan, following the example you gave us, and it worked perfectly fine.. I was able to trigger the exposed process with the API call.. Thank you for that
Could you please enlight me with how can we translate this into the BluePrism Web API Service? Not sure how to do it inside BP.
I really appreciate your help on this one @ewilson 

Have a great day,​

*Edit:  To give more background, I tried filling out the information the exact same way in BluePrism Web API Services, I added the headers and all that specified. The only difference between the link on Postman and BP WS, is that in BluePrism I don't find the way to specify that the code is in raw-xml format.. Is that what it's preventing me to make it work?

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David Lara
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[ewilson]

Hi @David Lara,

So you're trying to use a Blue Prism digital worker (aka process) to trigger another Blue Prism digital worker using a REST request?​ The Web API Service feature of Blue Prism is simply a mechanism that allows Blue Prism to easily call RESTful APIs on other platforms (ex. Blue Prism calling ServiceNow using their RESTful API).

I'm not sure I see the benefit of trying to have Blue Prism call itself, via REST, when you have the built-in Process stage and AutomateC.

Am I missing something?

Cheers,

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Eric Wilson
Director, Integrations and Enablement
Blue Prism Digital Exchange
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[DavidLara]

Hi @ewilson,

What I'm doing here is automate the Credentials Update. The thing is that we have multiple environments, DEV/QA/PROD
The main process will be running in PROD environment. I got a secondary process that is the one in charge of actually updating the Blue Prism Credentials Manager (Using Credentials VBO). What I require is that once the main process finishes, it can trigger the secondary process both in DEV and QA environments.
I see no other way of communicating PROD with DEV or QA..

Thank you for your help Eric, I really appreciate it
Have a great day,

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David Lara
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[ewilson]

@David Lara,

OK. I understand. So this is all BP-to-BP communication? Is there a specific reason you're adding REST into the mix? Because you could just expose the processes in QA and DEV as SOAP web services and then have the PROD process call them directly. Or have the PROD process call an exposed VBO in each environment and add a work item to a queue within each environment. Then a process can be run on a schedule to address the work item.

Cheers,


  ​

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Eric Wilson
Director, Integrations and Enablement
Blue Prism Digital Exchange
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[DavidLara]

Hello @ewilson, thank you for your help

Yes, it is all BP-BP communication, from PROD to DEV&QA. I was adding it, since I didn't knew about another way to call you one Process in DEV/QA from a running process in PROD. No specific reason
I already got the process exposed as SOAP Web Service​ in both DEV/QA, How am I able to make the process call them directly?

I tried going through that second way, but our Application Manager didn't loved the idea of having a schedule in DEV or QA. That's why I was searching for other ways, if the first one you commented: "just expose the processes in QA and DEV as SOAP web services and then have the PROD process call them directly."  works, it will be the best approach to get there 

Once again, thank you for your help Eric,

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David Lara
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