The following terms are used in this guide:
- ASI (Application-Specific Information) Meta-data tailored to a
particular application or technology. ASI exists at both the attribute
and business object level of a business object. See also Verb
ASI.
- BO (Business Object) A set of attributes that represent a
business entity (such as Employee) and an action on the data (such as a create
or update operation). Components of the WebSphere business integration
system use business objects to exchange information and trigger
actions.
- BO (Business Object) handler A connector component that
contains methods that interact with an application and that transforms request
business objects into application operations.
- COM component The connector interacts with a COM server by
processing between a business object and a COM component object. During
connector processing, a COM component, which is part of a COM application, is
represented in the connector by a proxy object. A proxy is a
Java class that represents a COM component.
- COMProxy The interface tool that allows Java programs to
communicate with ActiveX objects. This tool generates the Java proxy
objects that the connector requires to invoke COM components. The
properties, structures, and methods of a COM component are typically defined
in a type library file (.tlb, .dll,
.ole, .olb, or
.exe). Using the Java Native Interface and COM
technology, COMProxy allows a COM component to be treated just like a Java
object.
- Connection factory A special kind of proxy object that refers
to an application. If the appropriate connector properties are set, the
factory object, which is persistent for the life of the connector, can create
connections that are placed in the connection pool. The number of
connections created depends on the value specified in the PoolSize
property.
- Connection object A special kind of proxy object that is an
instance of the connection class. A connection is a reference to an
application that can contain state information. For every instance of a
connection on the adapter side, there is a corresponding object on the COM
side. Connections can be instantiated in batches, retrieved at will,
sent back to the connection pool, and be re-used by another thread.
- Connection pool A repository used to store and retrieve
connection objects.
- Foreign key A simple attribute whose value uniquely identifies
a child business object. Typically, this attribute identifies a child
business object to its parent by containing the child's primary key
value. The connector for COM uses the foreign key to specify poolable
connection objects.
- ODA (Object Discovery Agent) A tool that automatically
generates a business object definition by examining specified entities within
the application and "discovering" the elements of these entities that
correspond to business object attributes. When you install the adapter,
the ODA is automatically installed.
- Per-call object pool A programmatic entity for storing objects
that need to pass from one method to the next during a single
doVerbFor method call. Stored objects may be proxy objects
or simple attributes.
- Proxy class A Java class that represents a COM component class
in the connector. The connector creates a proxy object instance of the
proxy class name specified in the business object's ASI.
- Verb ASI (application-specific information) For a given verb,
the verb ASI specifies how the connector should process the business object
when that verb is active. It can contain the name of the method to call
to process the current request business object.
