Robert van Molken | PaaS Community Blog

Using the ICS Connectivity Agent with an On-Premises Database by Robert van Mölken

December 6, 2016 Leave a comment

In this third article about the Connectivity Agent we deep-dive into the details. We learn how to use the ICS Connectivity Agent in combination with an on-premises database. For more information about the architecture and installation of the agent I recommend to read these two articles first. This article continuous where the previous article about the installation ended.

Taking the Agent for a test drive

Now that the Connectivity Agent is installed, registered and running we can use the Agent to create connections to our on-premises applications and create integration on top of these applications.

Preparing the connection to the on-premises database

Now that we know the Agent is running we can make a connection to the on-premises database. For this example I use the HR sample schema that is part of my database installation. Navigate to the connections page of ICS and click on the “Create new Connection” button. My instance is running the latest 16.1.3 version. The “Create Connection” dialog now at lot nicer and user friendlier.

Select the Database adapter to create a connection your database instance. the connection is named OnPremisesHRDB which creates the associated identifier ONPREMISESHRDB. Read the complete article here.

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Preparing & installing the ICS on-premises Connectivity Agent by Robert van Molken

October 29, 2016 Leave a comment

In this second article about the Connectivity Agent we deep-dive into the details. We take a look in preparing and installing the agent. This is done in combination with Integration Cloud Service. For more information about the architecture and inner workings of the agent I recommend to read this article first.

What is the Connectivity Agent?

Basically it is a gateway between cloud and on-premises. The Agent eliminates common security and complexity issues previously associated with integrating on-premises applications from outside the firewall. With the agent it is possible for example to connect with an on-premises database or ERP application using the existing JCA adapter framework.

Downloading the Connectivity Agent

There are a few steps in installing the agent. First the installer can only be downloaded from your Integration Cloud Service instance. Secondly the installer can only be run on a linux environment. Thirdly some settings can be tuned / changed after installation.

Downloading the Agent

The agent first need to be downloaded from Integration Cloud Service. Login into your ICS instance and navigate to the Agents page.

At the top-right corner the user can find the “Download Agent installer” button. When clicking on the button it will show two options; the connectivity and execution agent. This article describes the first option. The second agent is evenly interesting, because it will install an instance of Integration Cloud Service on-premises. More details on this agent at a later time. Read the complete article here.

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Agent for simplifying Integration between Cloud and On-Premises apps by Robert van Molken

September 8, 2016 Leave a comment

In the last few months I mentioned that Oracle is developing an Agent. The Agent easily integrates your on-premises application(s) with the Oracle Cloud Services. The Agent is rolling out on all production instances next week. It was publicly announced by Bruce Tierney on the 3rd of January. He is the Director of Product Marketing for Cloud Integration and SOA. You can read his announcement on the Oracle Integration blog.

In this first article about the Agent I will go into the architectural basics, which components are included and how it will connect Cloud to On-premises applications. The article is based on information I presented about during OpenWorld 2015.

Current / classic integration approach

The current approach for connecting Cloud / Internet hosted applications with On-premises applications is usually through one or more firewalls, and the use of a reverse proxy, Oracle API Gateway or OHS. For this a variety of expertise is needed for example to open up inbound ports in the firewall, expose a private SOAP/REST service and configure the network routing. The SOAP/REST service can for example be implemented with SOA Suite to for example communicate with the CRM to retrieve customer data.

Let look at the current / classic approach in the diagram below:

This is going to change a lot when using the Agent. It will simplify above diagram.

Common Cloud to On-Premises Integration Patterns

Currently there are three common patterns for Cloud to On-Premises integrations. They are 1. using messaging, 2. through a proxy and 3. using an agent. Read the complete article here.

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Content-Based Routing with Integration Cloud Service by Robert van Molken

September 7, 2016 Leave a comment

In my previous article I discussed the fall updates of Integration Cloud Service. One of the features in this update is the possibility for content-based routing within integrations. I came across this feature during UKOUG Tech 15 in the beginning of December. In an two our hands-on lab I had some time to play with the content-based routing feature. The amazing thing is that it did it all on my iPad. In this article I will describe the feature and the steps to implement a common use-case.

What does Content-Based Routing mean?

The fall updates introduced content-based routing, which essentially mean that based on a value in the payload a different flow is executed. A use-case for this type of routing is the possibility to retrieve data from a different application based on the country code. With Integration Cloud Service is as easy as adding a filter on the request operation of the source connection.

Step 1: Adding a filter to route on

The first step is adding a filter to route the request on. To demonstrate this I’m using an already existing integration. This integration receives a GET request for retrieving the information of an organization. The current integration always retrieves the organization from the US site.

To add a filter a user would click on the funnel icon. Clicking on this icon will open the Expression Builder. In the Expression Builder a user can set an expression to filter requests on. This can simply be done by drag n drop the field to filter on. Read the complete article here.

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SOA Suite 12c: In-depth look into Managed File Transfer (1/3) by Robert van Molken

May 28, 2015 Leave a comment

With the release of SOA Suite 12c a new product was revealed. The first sighting was at Oracle OpenWorld 2013. On the Fusion Middleware Demo Grounds there was a demo shown where B2B was integrated with a product called Managed File Transfer (shortened as MFT). At that same conference I gave a presentation about this product together with the product manager of MFT, Dave Berry. This blog gives an in-depth look into Managed File Transfer.

There is a growing problem with FTP in the enterprise where there is a lack of control, visibility, security and reliability. The lack of control is due to the uncontrolled proliferation of FTP servers & clients. Departments are creating stand-alone FTP servers and configuring users where needed. There is no central FTP server. Because of this there is no global visibility of the exchange of crucial data files – including customer data. It is highly possible that these FTP servers are not integrated with enterprise security standards where as FTP servers are rarely integrated with directories. Because these FTP servers run stand-alone they are a single point of failure and rarely offer HA capabilities, which effects the reliability. This can be tackled using Managed File Transfer.

Lack of control, visibility, security & reliability

What is Managed File Transfer?

MFT is a simple and secure End-to-End Managed File Gateway. At the base MFT uses an “Embedded” (S)FTP / SSH server which support HA clustering. MFT has a scalable architecture, which mean it can easily be expanded by adding another Weblogic node to the cluster. It also includes an extensible framwork for pre/post processing of files. MFT integrates with Standards Based Middleware like (S)FTP, SOA, B2B, Service Bus and Web Services. Read the complete article here.

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In-depth look into Oracle API Catalog (OAC) 12c by Robert van Molken

March 7, 2015 1 Comment

With the release of Oracle Enterprise Repository 12c another product was released. Oracle API Catalog 12c (OAC) allows you to build a catalog of your organization APIs. OAC provides a layer of visibility to those APIs so application development knows what and which one to use. OAC includes a simple metamodel for an API asset, automation to populate OAC, and the ability for users to search OAC for APIs and understand the details of the APIs to assess their fit in the user’s application.

Installation

I’m not going to bore you with the details about the installation by giving a installation guide. It took me about 40 minutes from scratch (excluding downlOERoad time). The steps are describes in the installation guide Oracle provides. OAC is part of the OER 12c installation jar, but can be licensed and installed, as an own managed domain, without licensing and installing OER.

The steps to take on high level (from scratch):

Download and install Oracle Database, Fusion Middleware Infrastructure 12c, Oracle Enterprise Repository 12c, RCU patch 18791727 and Weblogic patch 18718889 (these last two are important, else you can’t install OAC).
Run RCU (oracle_common/bin/rcu.sh|bat) and create the OAC repository
Run Weblogic Domain creation (weblogic/bin/config.sh|bat) and create a new which includes OAC.
After installation and startup of weblogic and managed service you can find the OAC console at url: http://serverhost:8111/oac

Note: if you harvesting from another weblogic server (like SOA Suite 12c), the weblogic patch should also be installed there.

Taking the first steps

When taking my first steps the official getting started guide can help you a lot. OAC has four high-level features. OAC collects services, it has a harvester which creates API assets in OAC. After harvesting you can add metadata to the API assets like description, tags and documentation. After harvesting and editing an API asset it can be published so it is visible for application development. Published APIs can be discovered and used through the API Catalog console and via the Oracle JDeveloper Oracle Enterprise Repository plug-in.

Read the complete article here.

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API Management – An Overview of API Catalog and API Manager at Fusion Middleware Partner Community Forum 2015

January 26, 2015 1 Comment

The Fusion Middleware Partner Community Forum takes place March 3rd & 4th in Budapest Hungary. During this annual conference You as an Oracle Partner can get the latest updates on the Fusion Middleware 12c solutions. “The Cloud Platform for Digital Business” will be the theme of the 20th conference. Keynotes will be delivered from Amit Zavery, Andrew Sutherland and SOA, BPM and Mobile product management including live demos. On the second day you can choose between three tracks: SOA, BPM or WebLogic and Mobile. As part of the SOA track Robert and Yogesh will present:

Oracle API Management – An Overview of API Catalog and API Manager incl. a demo

Mobile applications increasingly use Application Programming interfaces (APIs) in addition to enterprise systems of record in their development. The importance of an API economy is growing by the day. As the number of APIs produced and consumed by enterprises increases, thanks to an exponential growth of mobiles, tablets, smart devices and computing platforms, the management and visibility of these APIs becomes increasingly important.

Oracle API Catalog (OAC) and the upcoming Oracle API Manager allow organizations to easily manage their APIs and build a catalog of their APIs, powered by the industry leading Oracle Service Bus backbone (in case of API Manager), thus providing visibility and control to the enterprise and a social catalog to API consumers for application development. Come and find out more on this session, incl. the exciting demo.

Robert van Mölken

Amis

Senior Integration Specialist,

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Yogesh Sontakke

Oracle Corporation

Principal Product Manager

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For details please visit our Fusion Middleware Partner Community Forum registration page here.

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Using the MetaData Services (MDS) in a SOA environment by Robert van Molken

April 16, 2013 Leave a comment

It has been almost a year since my last post about the metadata services. I talked about how-to set up a File-based MDS and DB-based MDS. This post talks about the usage of the files, placed in the MDS, in the different components available in a SOA composite. If the MDS is a new thing for you then I advise to read my previous about this subject first.

You can spot the presence of a file that is a reference to the MDS if it uses the oramds: URI annotation. Files are no longer referenced to a hardcoded or relative file path.

To start using you’re MDS that you have set up we will create a new SOA application. Let call the application WorkflowSOAapp and create a SOA project and call it WebformService.

Use MDS resources for exposed services

After creating the new SOA project it will open the composite editor automatically. Exposed services are always created in the left swim lane. Because this project deals with a WSDL resource to expose a webservice, a Web Service component is first dragged to the left swim lane.

Drag Web Service Component to left swimlane

A dialog “Create Web Service” will open. Give the service a good name, preferred the same as the name in the WSDL (e.g. WebFormService). The next thing to do is to choose the WSDL URL. Click on the document icon at the right side of the WSDL URL input to find an existing WSDL. Read the full article here & Read part II here.