OpenLinks has rapidly become the platform of choice for building systems that support XML Web services standards. Because of its deep support for XML technologies, we’ve also seen it used by corporations to build XML messaging solutions for transmitting Email and SMS.

Even though XML has become the universal standard for data representation, companies still write and maintain programs that transfer data between applications and systems by converting one flat file format to another and then sending the file to a receiving system. This hard-coded program has a huge associated maintenance cost because every conversation between two systems has to be coded uniquely and updated whenever a file format changes on either side. However, companies are beginning to recognise the advantage of building or buying XML messaging engines instead of continuing to hard code these integration points. 

Quick Facts

• Enables transport of data from one system to another
• System Adminstrators create OpenLinks Service Configuration Files that describe an XML file and how to map this information to an end-point e.g. another database
  • 1:1 ~ mapping of XML tags to 1 database table
  • 1:M ~ mapping of XML tags to items in mulitple database tables
  • M:M ~ mapping of multiple XML tags to items in multiple db tables / tables
• Built-in Job Scheduler to control the Job Execution for each XML data service
• On "job execution" OpenLinks provides logging for success failure analysis
• OpenLinks allows the system administrator to create data validation rules - standard and custom
• Monitoring
• OpenLinks can deal with HTML markup in the XML service
• Simplify intregation projects
• Data Intregration becomes a configuration task instead of a source code development and maintenance task
• Safe
• Stable 
• Exentable
• Any server platform or software application that enables XML can utilise this technology
• Faster time to market - good for large companies that are traditionally slow to move
• Cost effective (always cheaper than developing integration software from scratch)
• Versitile applications e.g. use for data import, firing SMS's, faxes, or creating HTML web pages.
 

Basic functions of OpenLinks(R)

Creating an XML data interface basically involves placing a layer between every system and the representation of its data and the end-point (target system). When the OpenLinks Web Service Engine processes a transaction, it first retrieves data from the source system in XML format. Next, it runs a transformation process, converting the source system’s XML format to a structure for the target system, this is performed using a OpenLinks Service Configuration File (this is also producted in XML format). Open Links then directly writes to the target system.

The OpenLinks XML mapping layer greatly reduces new development and maintenance. If the source system needs to send its data to a new endpoint, the database administrator only needs to create a new OpenLinks Service Configuration File to develop the data mapping and validation rules to perform the transformation to the end-point. If the source format changes, only the mapping engine has to be changed.

The OpenLinks Engine does a great job of defining a map between target database schema and an XML web service and adding additional system support for scheduling, monitoring, logging and data validation. For example, it is now safe and easy to create web services from an ERP System such as Oracle or SAP to create a direct flow of product data to an ecommerce web application.

Choose your path OpenLinks versus Build from scratch integration

If your system designs call for complicated or repeated development of XML web services to transport data between applications, you should decide in advance to pursue one of two paths.

The first option: Develop your own set of standard tools that allow you to create repeatable and supportable XML data integration solutions.

The second is to begin by implementing OpenLinks with you web application, you'll recover the cost of the license many times over in the cost of maintenance associated with a custom solution for a system with large numbers of data interfaces or endpoints.