INTEGRATE 2024: What’s New in Integration

INTEGRATE 2024, the annual meeting of Microsoft integration professionals organized by Kovai, took place in London at the beginning of June. Cellenza attended this conference, as it does every year, where Microsoft announces the latest advances and upcoming trends in integration, particularly their Azure AIS (Azure Integration Service). Let’s look at the major new features announced this year, whether in GA (General Availability) or preview.

Azure Logic Apps

As in previous years, Azure Logic Apps (especially Standard) continues to go from strength to strength with even more exciting new features.

.NET 8 Custom Code & C# Inline Scripting

Support for .NET 8 custom code in Logic Apps Standard and the introduction of inline C# scripting enable developers to combine pro-code and low-code approaches. This flexibility means simple logic can be handled with inline code, while more complex tasks can be handled with custom .NET code, allowing developers to use the best tool.

First-Party Testing Framework

Until now, testing in Logic Apps has been complicated, especially for non-regression scenarios. This new framework makes testing much easier. This feature allows you to configure unit tests to run in specific scenarios, decoupling them from live environments and making repeated testing easier.

Better EDI Integration (Built-In)

These enhancements are now generally available. They improve performance and make it easier to manage larger payloads. They also add new frameworks that make it faster to set up complex workflows.

Hybrid Deployment Models

Logic Apps can now run on-premise, in the cloud, or in hybrid environments, providing the same fluid experience. It can also now be deployed on any Kubernetes cluster using Azure Arc, enabling on-premises hosting with management from the cloud. This flexibility is an advantage when it comes to meeting regulatory requirements.

In addition, as part of the BizTalk to AIS migration, Logic Apps now has access to a new flagship BizTalk feature. BRE (Business Rule Engine) is currently available in preview.

Service Bus & Event Grid

Azure’s message broker and eventing services are not forgotten, with some major new features:

• Georeferencing in Service Bus & Event Hub: This new feature allows data to be replicated across multiple regions with a Recovery Point Objective (RPO) of zero.
• EventGrid supports the Message Queuing Telemetry Transport (MQTT) protocol and pull delivery.
• Event Hub is now fully compatible with Advanced Message Queuing Protocol (AMQP) & Kafka.
• Service Bus now includes batch message recovery and Chaos Studio integration, providing new ways to test system resilience and improve message management.

In addition, these services will enable the use of Transport Layer Security (TLS) 1.3 by October 31, 2024, phasing out support for TLS 1.0 and 1.1 protocols to improve security.

API Center & API Management

There were also some exciting announcements in the world of APIs. For example, the API Center service has moved to General Availability. This service provides a central hub for API inventory, governance, and discovery.

It’s worth noting that this service does not overlap with Azure API Management. Its goal is to improve collaboration between development teams, standardize API management practices, and ensure easy API documentation and discovery. It also enables you to centralize the management and governance of all your APIs.

In addition, workspaces in Azure API Management are now available in General Availability, each with its own dedicated, isolated compute. This feature centralizes API management governance while giving individual API development teams the freedom to work within their own workspaces.

AI in integration

The integration sector is not immune to the wave of artificial intelligence (AI) sweeping across our professions.

Microsoft has invested in generative AI by adding features that make integrating AI easier and faster, particularly in the Azure APIM and Logic Apps services, which integrate with the Azure OpenAI and Azure AI Search services. These new features also include help with writing policies in Azure APIM and understanding workflow in a Logic App. We’re looking forward to testing these features and seeing how they develop in the future.

Integrate 2024 Highlights

Finally, the 2024 INTEGRATE event was also an opportunity for Microsoft to announce new trends and their vision for the future of API integration and management. In particular, Azure Logic Apps, their workflow management component, has been enhanced to facilitate future migrations from BizTalk. We also noted significant improvements to Azure messaging services that address increasingly complicated enterprise-level needs, and substantial investments in AI.

As these technologies evolve, we stay abreast of and adapt to these new practices to better meet our customers’ needs.

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