Adapter overview
Adapters provide an interface between BMC Atrium Orchestrator workflow processes and external third-party applications and support systems. Adapters are located on peers and configured in Grid Manager to establish connections and facilitate communications. Adapters are used in BMC Atrium Orchestrator Development Studio when creating processes and in BMC Atrium Orchestrator for executing processes and providing input for rules to evaluate.
Adapters are of the following categories:
- Base adapters interface to systems by using standard protocols, such as JDBC, Telnet, SSH, JMS processes, and so on.
- Application adapters interface with a specific product.
Within these categories are adapters of the following types:
- Actor adapters
- Monitor adapters
Video
The following video (6:57) shows an end-to-end process for using a BMC Atrium Orchestrator adapter starting from configuring and enabling the adapter on the Grid Manager to developing workflows, enabling the adapter and process logging, and running the workflows successfully. Using the example of the CSV-adapter, the video shows how to develop a workflow to read, write, and delete a CSV file.
Actor adapters
Actor adapters interact with external systems, sending commands or requests and, in some cases, receiving responses to requests. For example, an email actor adapter can be used to send an email message.
Monitor adapters
Monitor adapters listen on external systems and, based on their configuration, generate events. An email monitor adapter would monitor an email account on a specified server and generate an event when a specific message is received. This event could be used to trigger a workflow process.
You can configure the adapters with Grid Manager for specific grids and can then enable them on one or more peers on the grid. Any adapter that is used in a process must be enabled on at least one peer on a grid. The configuration is referenced when adapters are called within processes.
You can create processes within BMC Atrium Orchestrator Development Studio. Actor adapters are used within workflow processes to perform specific functions and to interface with external applications. Schedules can be created to trigger the execution of specific processes.
You can create rules within BMC Atrium Orchestrator Development Studio to evaluate events generated by monitor adapters. A rule contains event criteria and specifies a process to be executed when the rule is satisfied (true).
You can create a module using BMC Atrium Orchestrator Development Studio. A module contains processes, schedules, and rules. In BMC Atrium Orchestrator Development Studio, use Library Manager to export the adapter module to the repository. In Grid Manager, activate the module on the grid.
On activation of a module on a grid, schedules and rules are enabled. Schedules trigger processes at defined intervals and rules evaluate events generated by monitor adapters, triggering designated processes for events that evaluate to true for a rule. A single event can trigger multiple processes if multiple rules evaluate to true for that event.