Business object attribute properties

Business object architecture defines various properties that apply to attributes. This section describes how the connector interprets several of these properties and describes how to set them when modifying a business object.

Key property

All business objects for Portal Infranet must have at least one key attribute. For each attribute that is a key, set the Key property to True.

Note:
The connector does not support specifying an attribute that represents a child business object or an array of child business objects as a key attribute.

The key for a top-level business object is the storable object Portal Object ID (POID). A POID is a unique 64-bit identifier assigned to each Infranet database object when it is created. A POID is a unique key for an Infranet object.

A POID enables multiple instantiations of the same storable class. For example, every account object has a unique POID. A POID contains the following four components: a database number, an object type, a unique ID, and a revision number.

Key values for child business objects

An Infranet array is identified by its element ID, and the element ID is the unique key for the array. Because arrays typically correspond to child business objects, in Portal Infranet hierarchical business objects, a child business object key specifies the array element ID and the parent POID.

As a general rule, second-level child business objects simply need an attribute for the element ID. During a Create or Update operation, all the ElementId and POID values are filled in the business object.

Foreign key property

This property is used by the child business objects to relate to the parent business objects. During any verb processing, if the child is to be executed separately, the foreign key fields are populated from the parent business object. The name of which attribute from the parent business object is used is specified in the application-specific information on the foreign key attribute.

Required property

The connector does not use the Required property.

Max length property

Set the Max Length property to 255.

Default value property

The connector uses the default value of the attribute, if specified.

Copyright IBM Corp. 1997, 2003