BPEL4WS unit testing: framework and implementation

The business process execution language for Web services (BPEL4WS) offers a new standards-based approach to building flexible business processes by orchestrating multiple Web services. Unit testing is critical to guarantee the creation of correct and reliable BPEL4WS business processes. Yet this is a topic that is still to be explored, both in research and industry. Lack of unit test tooling support has affected BPEL4WS process development in terms of quality and efficiency. This paper proposes a BPEL4WS unit test framework, which includes a BPEL4WS process composition model, a test architecture, a lifecycle management schema and a test design outline. An example implementation of the framework illustrates the whole approach. By adopting this test framework, the experience of developing, testing and debugging a BPEL4WS processes will be greatly improved.