Service connector overview

BMC Digital Workplace Catalog  integrates with external fulfillment systems through service connectors, which pass information from a service request to an external system.

This topic describes the integration with third-party systems via service connectors, and describes high-level integration use cases. 

Integration types 

BMC Digital Workplace Catalog  can be integrated with third-party systems via service connectors in one of the following ways:

• Via direct integration
• Via BMC Integration Service 

The following diagram illustrates these integration types:

The direct integration type uses connectors that are shipped with  BMC Digital Workplace Catalog . For a summary of service connectors installed with  BMC Digital Workplace Catalog , see Service connector capabilities.

The integration via BMC Integration Service uses connectors that are available in the Integration Service. When the connection to BMC Integration Service is configured, the available and enabled connectors are displayed in the list of connectors on the Connectors page.   

Integration use cases

Service connectors are necessary for integrating  BMC Digital Workplace Catalog  with third-party systems. When this integration is done, a third-party system can receive data from the  BMC Digital Workplace Catalog , and process these data as described in workflows of corresponding  BMC Digital Workplace Catalog services.

A service request in the  BMC Digital Workplace  is a ticket opened by the end user. A service in the  BMC Digital Workplace Catalog  contains a service description and the work that must be done to complete the service request. The work that must be done is described by the actions that are part of a service workflow.

The work to be done can be automatic (when no human is involved in a service request completion), or  manual (a human is involved in the completion of a service request). In both cases, the actual work is performed on the side of a third-party system, and a service request is closed only when this work is completed.

Examples of direct integration with external systems

The following diagram shows an example of a manual process that uses a Remedy connector shipped with BMC Digital Workplace Catalog :

The following diagram shows an example of automatic process that uses a third-party system, such as Amazon Web Service shipped with  BMC Digital Workplace Catalog :

Example of integration with an external system via BMC Integration Service

The following diagram shows an example of automatic process that uses a third-party system, such as JIRA connector shipped with BMC Integration Service:

Service connector capabilities

Service connectors offer the following types of integration capabilities:

• Resource mapping: Provides data from external forms and data sets that can be used for building service questionnaires. For more details about how this capability can be used, see Creating service questionnaires. 
• Catalog import: Provides catalog items that can be imported into  BMC Digital Workplace Catalog . For more details about how this capability can be used, see Importing service catalog items and Importing service categories.
• Process workflow: Provides actions and activities for use in designing fulfillment workflows in the workflow designer. For more details about this capability, see Connector elements.