BPEL process

A BPEL process implements a potentially long-running service through the use of more elementary services. A BPEL process created in the process editor can perform the following things:

• Describe the orchestration of other services using control flow graphs
• Use variables to keep the process state
• Use sophisticated error handling through fault handling
• Support asynchronous events
• Correlate inbound requests with the right instance of a particular process
• Provide extended transactions through sophisticated compensation support

In addition to these standard BPEL items, there are extensions to BPEL to include people into a process with human task support. For example, you could use a human task extension to add the requirement that a person must approve a loan.