InformationWeek

No--and yes. No, considering that Internet access is a low-budget production when compared with what it takes to build an enterprise resource planning system. And yes, a lot of work still has to be done behind the scenes to get data from ERP and other enterprise systems extracted, integrated, and parked on a Web server where a global audience of browsers can enjoy the show.

"The Web is what gets everyone excited, but it's really just the tip of the iceberg," says Scott McLeod, a senior analyst at Hurwitz Group. "To do a good job on the Web, you first have to achieve better integration with your enterprise applications."

Once companies build their ERP, customer-relationship management, and human-resource systems, many find it's not too difficult to present that data in a standard Web format such as HTML, PDF, or the Extensible Markup Language. That data then becomes easily accessible to internal intranet users, mobile professionals, and outside customers and suppliers.

Tosco Corp., one of the largest independent petroleum refiners and retailers in the country, is a case in point. The $15 billion company in Stamford, Conn., started building its Oracle ERP system, which covers everything from the buying and selling of crude oil on the open market to the sale of refined gasoline products to customers, in late 1993. The formal rollout began 18 months later, and by last April it was in full production mode.

"The goal was to take a number of disparate systems and make one large, integrated system that would provide a single, continuous information flow from what the first person does to what the last person does," says Joe Guidera, senior business analyst at Tosco's Linden, N.J., facility.

As part of its ERP implementation, Tosco used AppWorx Corp.'s process-scheduling and output-management tool. The product manages and schedules tasks and processes across Tosco's various applications and platforms, including IBM's RS/6000, Microsoft's Windows NT and a variety of Unix boxes, tracking and cataloging where various data files reside.

"AppWorx provides a means for us to trigger processes within and between applications on an event-driven or time-driven basis," Guidera says. Such events might include sending a bill of lading to a remote transportation terminal over the company's frame-relay network or creating an invoice and getting it to both the customer and accounts receivable.

While AppWorx originally may have been implemented for its ability to launch tasks and track file locations, it now plays an important role in the company's effort to make ERP data accessible over the Web. "One of the things that AppWorx does is manage output," says Guidera. "It knows about all the reports we generate: what they're called, where they are, how big they are, how long they're supposed to be kept, and so on." This information, it turns out, is critical for giving internal users remote access to reports via the Web.

Here's an example of how the system works: Tosco salespeople dial in to the company network from the road via a toll-free number. Using their notebook's browser, they can look over an intranet Web page running on a Netscape Web server and select a report. Once they select a report, AppWorx redirects them to one of three load-balanced Windows NT machines dedicated to generating ERP reports. That server then presents the report to the browser in HTML, PDF, or plain text format. Guidera says PDF is the format of choice, because it most closely resembles the reports' original formatting.

The beauty of this approach is that Tosco's only costs were those associated with having its technical staff configure the existing software and servers. AppWorx, the intranet server, and the NT report and output servers were already in place.

Tosco's approach also eliminates the need to replicate report content on the Netscape Web server. AppWorx simply directs users to the NT machines that already house the company's non-Web reports. It's a small matter for those machines to convert the reports to PDF and make them available to remote browsers via their self-contained Web servers.

Tosco is also leveraging ERP information resources to present select customers with browsable, secure extranet Web pages. "The objective there is to give buyers online access to information such as pricing," Guidera says. "We also want to supply that data in a way that they can incorporate it into their own information systems."

To present customers with a set of pages customized to their specific needs, Tosco uses BroadVision Inc.'s site content-management software. Again, it's the AppWorx process-management engine that ensures the right data gets posted to the right customer-specific page at the right time. "AppWorx actually tells a conversion utility to transfer data from the back-end system to BroadVision, where we can make it available on a secure basis to our customers."

AppWorx also makes sure that files aren't left in place past their "freshness" date--a major concern in an industry where prices fluctuate moment to moment. "AppWorx really acts as the brains of the whole system," Guidera says. "It makes everything work reliably and consistently day after day, across multiple applications, systems, and platforms."

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