System Manager

The System Manager interface is derived from the Eclipse platform--an open-source integrated development environment for the creation of tools. The Eclipse platform provides tools developers with a development kit and runtime that enables the developer to write plug-ins that allow the user to work with a particular type of resource.

System Manager is installed as a plug-in that can be used in IBM branded versions of the Eclipse platform.

System Manager features

You access System Manager as an Eclipse-based perspective. The System Manager perspective provides views and editors for

Tasks in System Manager are accessible through a menu and corresponding toolbar, as well as through the System Manager view. The System Manager view, displayed in the left-hand panel of System Manager, shows a folder-style list of libraries of modular integration components (such as business object definitions, database connection pools, and collaboration templates and objects). You can perform development and configuration tasks by right-clicking on the icon for a component in a library.

Using System Manager projects

Using System Manager, you will create projects that contain the integration components that you are using for your solution. There are two types of projects in System Manager: Integration Component Library (ICL) projects, and User Projects.

One of your first tasks when developing a business process interface is to define an integration component library, which is a project that contains the components you develop. When you create the integration component library, a folder is created with the name you specify for the integration component library, and within the library folder a number of folders are created for each type of integration component (for instance, there are folders named Maps, BusinessObjects, and Connectors).

When you first install the product, a preliminary integration component library, already containing some integration components, may be provided for you. If so, the icon for the library will be visible when you run InterChange Server Express and open the System Manager display. Later, as you create or modify individual integration components, you will save them to these folders. In the tools that you use for creating or modifying integration components (such as Connector Configurator Express), you are often given a choice to save your work either to a file, or as a project. Saving your work as a project places the integration component file in the integration component library folder, and this will usually be your default choice.

You must also create projects calleduser projects. User projects are collections of shortcuts that reference the integration components that reside in the integration component library projects. You must add integration components to a user project from integration component libraries in order to deploy components to an InterChange Server instance. Besides being required to deploy components to a server, user projects are designed to allow you to functionally group components together. An integration component library is a collection of all components you might need to work with, but a user project is designed to let you group together the components you are working on for a specific interface.

You can create a user project either before or after you have created your integration component libraries. However, you must create the user project, and move the desired integration components into it, in order to deploy the components.

For detailed instructions about using System Manager, press the F1 key from within the System Manager perspective to access the System Manager context-sensitive help.

Modes of InterChange Server Express

When you work with projects and integration component libraries in System Manager, you may find it useful to change the mode in which InterChange Server Express is running.

InterChange Server Express has two modes: design mode and production mode.

In design mode, InterChange Server Express permits the repository to be in an inconsistent state--you can add components to the repository without components they depend upon already existing. For instance, if you try to import a business object definition that has a child object into the repository, but the child object does not exist yet, then an InterChange Server Express instance in production mode would cause the import to fail to protect the integrity of the repository. InterChange Server Express in design mode, however, would allow you to proceed so that you can assemble your integration components in a way that best suits your development approach.

Furthermore, compiling maps and collaboration templates when deploying a package to a design-mode server is optional. In production mode, the server automatically compiles all maps and collaboration templates. Design mode is particularly useful when you are importing components from another environment. You may not be aware of all the dependencies yourself, so being able to incrementally import components without the import operations failing due to unresolved dependencies is very helpful.

In production mode, InterChange Server Express is designed to guarantee the integrity of the repository. It will not allow you to deploy a package with unresolved dependencies to the repository, and it automatically compiles all maps and collaboration templates in the deployment package. These restrictions guarantee that the server environment is in a state in which its components can execute properly. If there were components with unresolved dependencies or uncompiled components in the server environment at runtime then any transactions that involved those components would fail. Although that is an acceptable situation in a development environment, where it is presumed that you are still creating the required components, it is not considered acceptable in a production environment, so these restrictions enforce safe deployment procedures.

For instructions on changing the mode of InterChange Server Express, see the Quick Start Guide.

Tools

You can use the provided tools to configure connectors, and create and modify business objects, maps, and relationships. The following table lists and describes some of the software tools provided.

Table 1. Tools

Tool Description
Integrated Test Environment and Test Connector Provides an environment in which you can test business integration interfaces you have developed. Provides graphical interfaces to emulate connectors, start the required components, and examine business object data.
Connector Configurator Express Used for adding application-specific properties to a connector definition, for setting property values, and for configuring the connector definition with its business objects and maps
Map Designer Express A graphical tool that specifies data transformations between application-specific and generic business objects.
Relationship Designer Express A graphical tool that defines relationships between types of objects. These relationships are important in mapping, for example, to specify the relationship between one type of business object and another.
Business Object Designer Express A forms-based interface used for creating business object definitions both manually and from Object Discovery Agents (ODAs)

Copyright IBM Corp. 2003