CustomerPartnerSync Collaboration Template

Customer information is often stored in a hierarchy with the customer that is referenced in Sales Order Processing (the SoldTo customer) at the top. In the WebSphere Business Integration Server Express Plus system, the CustomerSync collaboration maintains the integrity and consistency of these SoldTo customers across all systems in the global company. CustomerSync also maintains the relationships between the SoldTo customer and its related customers (such as the Billing address or the BillTo customer).

The CustomerPartnerSync collaboration specifies a common process for maintaining and synchronizing customer entities that are related to the SoldTo customer across all systems that use such entities. The collaboration uses the generic CustomerPartner business object, which stores data about the subordinate customers related to the SoldTo customer.

CustomerPartnerSync ensures a common view of subordinate customer information throughout an organization. CustomerPartnerSync synchronizes customer information between a Customer Interaction Management (CIM) application and an Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) application. Either of these applications can serve as the source or destination for the synchronized information.

This replication of data allows separate applications to use information consistently whenever data is added, changed, or deleted in the enterprise. The collaboration assures the accuracy of duplicate information in the destination application without duplicate entry.

See the reference page for the CustomerSync collaboration for more information about how the Customer Manager collaboration-object group:

Collaboration object setup

This section includes information on port bindings and required steps for setting up collaboration objects based on CustomerPartnerSync. For information on standard features, ports, and configuration properties for collaboration templates, see the Collaboration Development Guide. For general information on creating collaboration objects, see the System Implementation Guide./p>

Note: If the destination application does not store the customer partner as an independent object, the collaboration should not subscribe to the Create event and the CONVERT_UPDATE property should be set to "false"'.

Port information

Figure 1 illustrates CustomerPartnerSync's ports, as they are displayed in System Manager.

Figure 1. CustomerPartnerSync collaboration ports

Note: To prevent the collaboration object from using a port, bind that port to the Port connector. Binding the port indicates that the port is unused without causing the collaboration object to provide additional functionality.

Port name: DestinationAppRetrieve
Business object Bound to Function Verbs used
CustomerPartner The destination application's connector Sends a reference-valued business object to retrieve the full-valued business object. The result determines the verb to use when synchronizing the CustomerPartner. Retrieve

Port name: From
Business object Bound to Function Verbs used
CustomerPartner Source application's connector or calling collaboration. Receives the triggering business object. At the end of a synchronous call, this port also returns the triggering business object to the source application when the collaboration ends successfully. Create Retrieve Update Delete

Port name: To
Business object Bound to Function Verbs used
CustomerPartner The destination application's connector Sends the triggering business object out of the collaboration Create Update Delete

Setting up the collaboration object

Using CustomerPartnerSync as stand-alone

CustomerPartnerSync is triggered directly by a source application's connector when a subordinate customer entity (CustomerPartner) is created, modified, or deleted in the source application.  

Using CustomerPartnerSync in a collaboration-object group

If you use CustomerPartnerSync in conjunction with the CustomerSync collaboration so that related Customers are synchronized along with the other collaboration's triggering business object, CustomerPartnerSync becomes part of a collaboration-object group. In this scenario:

Collaboration template processes

This section illustrates the process logic for this collaboration template:

Overall process logic

Figure 2 illustrates CustomerPartnerSync's main processing.

Figure 2. CustomerPartnerSync collaboration main process

Inherited process logic

This collaboration template uses the following standard collaboration business processes:

For information about standard collaboration business processes, see the Collaboration Development Guide.

Compensation processing

InterChange Server Express can roll back a transaction when any step in a transactional collaboration fails. For example, when CustomerPartnerSync is a member of a collaboration-object group that participates in a transactional collaboration, its actions are one subtransactional step of a larger transaction. If any step in the collaboration-object group's business process fails, the transactional collaboration details how InterChange Server Express rolls back the processing of every collaboration in the group.

When a CustomerPartnerSync collaboration object is used independently of other collaboration objects or the collaboration object's From port is bound to a source application rather than to another collaboration, its process comprises a single transactional step. In such a situation, it is not necessary to perform rollback.

To cause a collaboration object or a collaboration-object group to perform rollback requires modification of the collaboration template. To understand transaction processing in the WebSphere Business Integration Server Express Plus system, see the System Implementation Guide. For information on adding transaction processing to the collaboration template, see the Collaboration Development Guide.

To extend the collaboration object to handle transaction processing, complete the following steps:

  1. Add this capability to the collaboration template and to every other collaboration template in the collaboration-object group.
  2. Set the minimum transaction level of the collaboration object and all members of the collaboration-object group to a value higher than None. If a failure occurs in any subtransaction step, settings of Minimal Effort or higher cause this collaboration object and other collaboration objects in the group to execute compensation for Create, Update, and Delete operations performed on all business objects.
  3. Set the USE_RETRIEVE property of the collaboration object and all other members of the collaboration-object group to "true". Forcing the collaboration objects to retrieve values before changing them allows the collaboration objects to restore the original values in an Update or Delete process.

Configuration properties

Note: CustomerPartnerSync does not have unique configuration properties. All of its properties are standard. Standard properties

This collaboration template uses the following standard configuration properties for collaboration templates:

For information on these configuration properties, see the Collaboration Development Guide.

Collaboration messages

To view an explanation of the messages of this collaboration template, launch the Log Viewer and open the collaboration template's message file. To launch the Log Viewer and open the collaboration template's message file:

  1. In the Start menu, click Programs > IBM WebSphere Business Integration Express > Toolset Express > Administrative > Log Viewer.
  2. In the File menu, click Open.
  3. Use the Look In field to change the current folder to ProductDir\collaborations\messages, and then select the message file for this collaboration template.

Upgrade information

Upgrade process

To upgrade to a newer version of the collaboration template, perform the following steps:

  1. Stop the current CustomerPartnerSync collaboration.
  2. Back up the repository. For information about backing up the repository see the System Implementation Guide.
  3. If you have customized the collaboration template:
  4. Install the new CustomerPartnerSync collaboration template.
  5. Add your customizations to the new collaboration template.
  6. Create the new collaboration object, binding it to the appropriate connectors. For more information, see Collaboration setup.
  7. Run and test the new collaboration object.
  8. Make changes to the collaboration object based on any problems found during testing.

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