Creating a collaboration object

This section describes how to create a new collaboration object using the System Manager wizard. It describes the general flow of the wizard and references other sections in this chapter to address the specifics of collaboration object configuration. Do the following to create a collaboration object using the wizard:

  1. In System Manager, right-click on the Collaboration Objects folder in an integration component library and choose Create New Collaboration Object from the context menu.

    The "Create New Collaboration" wizard appears, listing the installed templates in the Template Name column and a description (if available) in the Description column. The dialog is the first screen in a wizard that steps you through the initial creation and configuration of a collaboration object. You can later modify the configuration values.

  2. Select the collaboration template upon which the object should be based from the list of templates. The name you select is displayed in the Selected Collaboration template field below the list.

    You can also type text in the Find field and the dialog will select a collaboration template whose name begins with the characters you type in the field. You can then use the up and down arrows to navigate among templates that share the pattern of characters, if there are several that match.

  3. Type a name for the collaboration object in the Collaboration object name field.
    Note:
    Do not give the collaboration object exactly the same name as the collaboration template from which it is derived. That is, if the collaboration template name is SalesOrderProcessing, the name of the collaboration object cannot be simply SalesOrderProcessing. If the names are completely identical, you will not be able to access the collaboration object using repos_copy with the -e (Entity) option because repos_copy searches for the collaboration template before searching for a collaboration object. A typical approach to naming the collaboration object is to include the name of the template along with the names of the source and destination applications that the collaboration object integrates, as in the following syntax: CollabTemplateName_SourceAppName_to_DestAppName

    The name cannot exceed 80 characters in length.

  4. Click Next to advance the wizard to the Bind ports screen.

    The "Bind ports" screen displays the ports defined in the collaboration template, the business object definition supported by each port, the type of component to which the port might be bound, and the particular components of the specified type to which each port can be bound.

    Depending on the value in the Type column, the Bind With column displays either the connectors or the collaborations that support the business object type in the Business Object Definition field. For each port displayed, choose either Collaboration, Connector or Web Service from the Type column and then choose the desired component in the Bind With column.

    To configure a port so that it can receive business object requests from an external programmatic entity (such as a servlet), you must follow the instructions in Configuring external port bindings.

    You can bind some, all, or none of the ports at this screen of the wizard. If you do not bind all the ports at this point you can always modify the port bindings after finishing the wizard. This way, if a particular component that you have to bind to a port does not support the necessary business object definition you can finish the collaboration object wizard, add support for the business object definition to the required component, and then reconfigure the collaboration object.

    For more information about binding ports, and information about how to modify port bindings, see Binding collaboration object ports.

  5. Click Next to advance the wizard to the "Collaboration General Properties" screen. This screen allows you to configure the properties that belong to all collaboration templates defined in the WebSphere Business Integration Server Express business integration system. Figure 41 shows the "Collaboration General Properties" screen:
    Figure 41. Configuring collaboration object general properties

    Set each property to the desired value.

    For more information about collaboration general properties and how to modify them for an existing collaboration object, see Configuring collaboration object general properties.

  6. Click Next to advance the wizard to the Properties screen. This screen allows you to configure the properties that are specific to the particular collaboration template.
    Figure 42. Configuring collaboration template-specific properties

    Enter a value for each property or accept the default value. For information about each property, refer to the documentation for the particular collaboration template.

    Click Finish to complete the collaboration object creation wizard. The new collaboration object is displayed in the Graphical View tab. For more information about the collaboration object graphical view and outline view, see Collaboration object views.

Copyright IBM Corp. 2004, 2005