[rules-users] Is Drools appropriate for this app scenario?

[Jeffrey Schneller]

Sebastien,

I have built an e-commerce site [www.stoneside.com] with some if not all
of the things you are talking about. If you go there and design a
product you can see the rules working.

Drools is being used for:
	Pricing rules and discounts within a product.
	Rules regarding what components of a product can exist with
other components.  [the end-user is custom designing something to
purchase]
	Rules determine how to display the product as the end-user
designs their product.
	Rules generate the BOM once the user ultimately orders the
product that they designed.

All the rules are managed using excel spreadsheet templates.  We [the
developers] defined the templates and the business enters the rules into
the spreadsheet.  This has worked pretty well.  The biggest hurdle being
defining the templates correctly and populating the initial sets of
rules.  Some of the more complex products have at least 5K rules [across
all 4 areas of rules] that needed to be defined.

So, I think it is appropriate for your app scenario.  You will need to
think about what you need as rules and what those rule 'templates' need
to look like.  

Jeff



-----Original Message-----
From: rules-users-bounces at lists.jboss.org
[mailto:rules-users-bounces at lists.jboss.org] On Behalf Of Sebastien
Chevalier
Sent: Wednesday, January 26, 2011 6:28 AM
To: rules-users at lists.jboss.org
Subject: Re: [rules-users] Is Drools appropriate for this app scenario?


@plugtreelabs: First of all, thank you very much for your response and
hints. 

@all: As I'm still not quire sure how to realize my scenario:
Please, could someone provide me with some diagrams or architectural
sketches of a typical rules-based e-commerce web application? -- Or at
least
point me to online resources on that topic, especially showing the
integration of the RBMS in a web app?

This would really help me out a lot at the moment.

_Recap: 
The main goal is that endusers shall, on the one hand, define almost the
whole set of entities and rules in an initial shop
specification/configuration process, and on the other hand, this set
shall
be modifiable later on (primarily through enhancements, not
restrictions).
The entity set basically is: customer types, product categories,
products,
product packages, customer(type)-to-product(type) price assignments
(i.e.
pricing rules), and inter-product/package selection rules, ...all of
these
dynamically definable via a WebUI and in a manner appropriate for
non-technical end-users (considering declarative programming a good
approach
for this(?)). 

The most dynamic parts will be the multi-dimensional pricing tables in
terms
of (a) their schema -- when new pricing parameters (=dimensions) like
delivery distance are added -- and (b) their value contents -- when
concrete
prices change. 
Another quite dynamic part will be the inter-product selection rule
specifications from which a "smart" e-catalog will be generated for the
client-side. Such rules will state sth. like: 
"Prod A must always be ordered with Prod B", "Prod B can never be
ordered
when Package C is selected", and similar.
--

Currently, some "high-level architectural layouts" of a simple,
rules-based
e-commerce web app (Which components are necessary in which place? And
which
components are already delivered by Drools?) would be very helpful for
me.
 
Thank you very much for your help in advance.

Best regards
  Sebastien

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