Operating collaboration objects

Operating collaboration objects may include such tasks as running, pausing, stopping, and shutting down collaboration objects. For information about configuring collaboration objects, see the System Implementation Guide.

You can run, pause, stop, and shut down collaboration objects from the Web-based System Monitor.

By default, all connectors and the active collaborations appear.

This section covers the following topics:

"Collaboration object states"

Starting, stopping, and pausing collaboration objects

"Configuring collaboration run-time properties"

Collaboration object states

You can view the state of a collaboration object by logging on to the Web-based System Monitor and opening a view that contains collaboration object information. To log on to the Web-based System Monitor, follow the instructions in Logging on to the Web-based System Monitor.

The following collaboration object states are viewable from the Web-based System Monitor and the Collaboration Object menu of the System View window:

Start
Starting a collaboration object causes it to subscribe to its triggering business objects and to process them as they arrive. If you stop and then restart InterChange Server, collaboration objects in the Start state automatically start running when InterChange Server Express comes back up.

Pause
Pausing a collaboration prevents it from receiving new flow initiators. The collaboration completes all of the current processing, then enters an idle state.

A connector maintains its subscription information; therefore, it continues to send flow initiators to the connector queues. The collaboration processes these when it is resumed.

To resume collaboration execution, click Start in the Web-based System Monitor.

Stop
Stopping a collaboration causes it to unsubscribe to business objects. The collaboration completes all of the current processing, then becomes inactive. Unlike the Pause command, the Stop command causes connectors to stop sending business objects to the collaboration.

To properly stop a collaboration without losing any flows, first stop the associated connectors from polling, allow all flows to process, then stop the collaboration.

Shut Down
Shutting down a collaboration immediately ends processing of current flows. When the collaboration is restarted, the system recovers by processing those flows that were interrupted by the shut down and recovering those flows waiting in the queue. This recovery is not immediate, so prepare to wait while the system completes the recovery interval.

Statistics
When you choose Statistics, the Open Collaboration dialog box displays. Enter a collaboration name and choose Open to display statistics for that collaboration object.
Note:
When you stop or shut down a collaboration object that is part of a collaboration group, all collaborations in the group stop or shut down. If any member of a collaboration group fails to start up or has a state change failure, the collaboration group is rolled back to the initial state (deactivated or stopped).

Starting, stopping, and pausing collaboration objects

To make a collaboration object functional for the first time, you must first configure it then start it. See "Configuring collaboration run-time properties" for more information on configuring collaborations. To run, stop, and pause collaboration objects, do this:

  1. While viewing the System Overview view (see Figure 10), select a collaboration object by placing check in the box to its left.
  2. Select the Start, Pause, or Stop icon from the icon group in the upper-left corner of the view (see Figure 11).

Configuring collaboration run-time properties

This section describes some aspects of collaboration behavior that are configurable in a production environment and contains the following topics:

"Setting collaboration object general properties"

"Configuring collaborations to process concurrent event-triggered flows"

Configuring flow control for collaboration objects

For information about the following tasks, see the System Implementation Guide:

Setting collaboration object general properties

To open the Collaboration Properties window and change values for general properties of a collaboration object, do this:

  1. From System Manager, right-click a collaboration object and select Properties.
  2. In the Properties dialog box, choose the Collaboration General Properties tab. The following dialog displays:

Figure 13. Properties dialog box, Collaboration General Properties tab


The dialog box shows the template from which the collaboration object was generated and the minimum transaction level that was specified in the collaboration template.

The dialog enables you to make settings for the following:

Configuring collaborations to process concurrent event-triggered flows

Tip:
Processing concurrently triggered events in collaborations requires additional system resources. To maximize performance, ensure that system resources used to handle concurrent events are not idle. For example, do not set the value for the maximum concurrent triggered-event processing option to 10 if the collaboration queue is set to process a maximum of four events.

To set the maximum number of concurrent flows for a collaboration:

  1. From System Manager, right-click the collaboration object that you want to change, then select Properties. The Properties dialog box appears (see Figure 13).
  2. In the Collaboration General Properties tab, enter a value in the "Maximum number of concurrent events" field.
  3. Click OK to save your changes and close the window.
  4. Restart the collaboration for changes to take effect.

Configuring flow control for collaboration objects

Flow control is a configurable service that allows you to manage the flow of connector and collaboration object queues. The parameters for configuring flow control can be configured system-wide or on individual components, or both. If you configure both, the individual component configuration supersedes the system-wide configuration. For instructions on configuring flow control system-wide, seeConfiguring system-wide flow control. This section describes how to configure flow control for collaboration objects.

Note:
Configuration changes for individual connectors or collaboration objects are dynamic, meaning they do not require ICS to be rebooted. System-wide configuration changes for flow control require ICS to be rebooted.
To monitor how flow control is working in the system, you can use the default Flow Control monitor provided as part of the Web-based System Monitor, or you can create new Flow Control monitors for individual connectors or collaboration objects. For more information about monitoring flow control, see the description of the default Flow Control monitor inUsing default monitors, and the instructions on creating new monitors inCreating new monitors using the Monitor Definition Wizard. After you have all the flow control monitors created, refer to the following sections to begin monitoring flow control: Using the Web-based System Monitor and Logging on to the Web-based System Monitor.

To configure flow control for a collaboration object, do the following:

  1. In System Manger, right-click the collaboration object for which you want to create flow control, then select Properties from the drop-down menu. The Properties dialog box appears (see Figure 13).
  2. In the Collaboration General Properties tab, edit the value in the Max Event Capacity field to represent the maximum number of events you want queued for a collaboration object. The valid range of values for this property is from 1 to 2147483647.
  3. Click OK. The property is changed immediately.

Reconfiguring the timeout attribute for long-lived business processing

Long-lived business processing enables collaboration objects to be deployed as a long-lived business processes. If a collaboration object has been configured with long-lived business processing, the service call timeout values can be reconfigured during runtime. For more information about developing a collaboration object with long-lived business processing, see the Collaboration Development Guide.

To reconfigure the service call timeout values of a collaboration with long-lived business processing, do the following:

  1. From System Manager, right-click the collaboration object whose service call timeout value you want to edit, then click Properties. The Properties dialog box appears.
  2. From the Properties tab, locate the property that represents the service call timeout value you want to change, then click in the value field. When the property becomes highlighted, the value can be edited.
    Note:
    The name of the service call timeout configuration property may be something like, "CreateTimeout" or "RetreiveTimeout," but since there is no naming convention for this property, you may have to contact the person who developed the collaboration, if the name of the service call timeout configuration property is not immediately apparent.
  3. Edit the value so that it represent the number of timeout minutes allowed.
    Note:
    The Value field must contain an integer greater than 0. If it contains a 0 or is left blank, the waittime is equal to infinity. If it contains non-numerical values, it will trigger a collaboration runtime exception.
  4. Click OK. Your changes take place immediately, without the need to restart InterChange Server.

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