# Product Overview

# Introduction and Roadmap

The following sections describe the contents, audience for, and organization of this guide— WebLogic RFID Edge Server Product Overview.

- Document Scope and Audience
- Guide to This Document
- Related Documentation
- New Features in This Release

## Document Scope and Audience

This document provides descriptive information about WebLogic RFID Edge Server, including:

- Use cases and key benefits
- Component architecture and functional overview
- RFID concepts and terminology
- Developer and RFID resources

The intended audience is developers, system administrators, operations staff, support engineers, and other personnel with an interest in WebLogic RFID Edge Server.

## Guide to This Document

This document is organized as follows:

- This chapter, Introduction and Roadmap, describes the scope of this guide and lists related documentation.
- Understanding WebLogic RFID Edge Server, provides an overview of WebLogic RFID Edge Server.
- WebLogic RFID Edge Server Architecture, provides a functional overview of the RFID Edge Server and describes its component architecture.
- RFID Terminology, defines key terms and acronyms.

## Related Documentation

This document is a part of the WebLogic RFID Edge Server documentation set. The other documents are:

- Installing WebLogic RFID Edge Server describes how to install and configure WebLogic RFID Edge Server.
- Using the RFID Edge Server Administration Console describes how to use the RFID Administration Console to configure ECSpecs, ECReports, RFID devices, filters, and workflows.
- Using the Reader Simulator describes how to use the reader simulator software included with RFID Edge Server. The Reader Simulator minimally simulates a ThingMagic Mercury4 RFID reader.
- Programming with the ALE and ALEPC APIs describes the Application Level Events (ALE) and Application Level Events Programming Cycle (ALEPC) programming interfaces (APIs) that you use to create applications that interact with WebLogic RFID Edge Server by reading and writing electronic product code (EPC) tags.
- RFID Reader Reference describes how to configure the RFID devices supported by the RFID Edge Server.
- Workflow Reference describes how to configure and use the workflow modules included with the WebLogic RFID Edge Server.
- ALE and ALEPC Javadoc provides reference documentation for the ALE and ALEPC Java packages that are provided with the WebLogic RFID Edge Server software.

## New Features in This Release

The following new features are introduced in this release of the Edge Server:

- Prior to the version 3.0 release of the Edge Server, workflow modules were large single-focused components that addressed specific use cases. These modules are replaced by a number of small, reusable modules that provide a finer granularity and are used as application building blocks. The building blocks, referred to as Edge Flow modules, can be used to create simple or complex workflows and provide a flexibility that minimizes the need to write custom modules.
- Support for a driver development API that provides the framework to allow custom development of drivers for RFID devices.
- Support for migrating Edge Server versions 2.1 or later to Edge Server 3.0. Migrating earlier versions preserves previously configured components, such as readers, composite readers, workflows, and filters. For more information, see Running the Installation Program in Installing WebLogic RFID Edge Server.
- Support for Silent-mode installation. Silent-mode installation is a way of setting installation configurations only once and then using those configurations to duplicate the installation on many machines.