Any workflow includes a set of tasks (steps) that follow a certain order to
complete the workflow. Usually, these tasks require either automatic or human intervention
with master data.
A Talend connector must be attached
to one or more of the defined tasks in order to establish connectivity between the workflow
and master data. Then the steps for adding Talend connectors to tasks that require
automatic intervention are the same as for those that require human intervention.
Talend MDM connectors that you can
use to retrieve master records from the MDM server include:
TalendMDMProcedureSearch,
TalendMDMViewSearch and
TalendMDMXPathSearch.
Talend MDM connectors that you
can use to update master records include:
TalendMDMContextConnector,
TalendMDMConnector and sometimes JobLauncher.
The table below lists possible operations through the available Talend connectors:
Talend Connector
|
Description
|
Job Launcher
|
launches a Talend
Job through a workflow.
|
Talend
MDMContextConnector
|
creates or updates a record in Talend MDM.
|
Talend
MDMConnector
|
updates master data records in a specific business entity.
|
Talend
MDMProcedureSearch
|
launches a stored procedure that does a search on an entity and then
retrieves the search results.
|
Talend
MDMViewSearch
|
searches through an MDM View and retrieves the results.
|
Talend
MDMXPathSearch
|
runs an xpath query and retrieves the results.
|
The section below gives an example about how to attach to a task the
Talend MDMContextConnector
that will establish the connection between the workflow and the master data record that
needs to be updated.
Before you begin
You have already connected to the MDM server from
Talend Studio. At least one workflow
exists.
About this task
To attach a
Talend connector
to a task that requires automatic intervention, do the following:
Procedure
-
In the
BPM
perspective, open the workflow and then click the task to which you
want to add connectors. The Submit New Price task is selected
in this example.
-
In the Execution view in the lower part of the perspective,
click the Connectors out tab to open the corresponding
view.
-
Click Add to proceed to the next step: select a
connector.
-
Select
Talend
MDM from the Categories list and then select
the connector you want to attach to the selected task. In this case, we want to add a
connector to update master data in the Product business
entity.
Note: Four operations are possible through the available
Talend MDM
connectors: update master data records in a specific business entity, creates or
updates a record in Talend
MDM, search a stored procedure and search through an MDM view. The steps that
follow differ according to the selected option.
-
Click Next to proceed to the next step: set the connector
parameters.
-
In the Name field, enter a name for the new connector you
want to add to the selected task.
If required, set a description in the Description
field.
In the Select event area, select the option you want to use
to initiate the connector.
Note: The available options represent various steps in the task life cycle when the
defined connector can be initiated. With tasks that need human intervention, extra
steps are available at which defined connectors can be initiated, namely:
start, suspend and
resume.
In the If connector fails... field, select the appropriate
procedure in case of connection failure.
-
Click Next to proceed to the next step: set parameters to
connect to the MDM server.
-
Select/enter the endpoint URL of the MDM server.
By default, the Connector uses the credentials of the current user running the
workflow. Since this may prevent some automatic tasks from running correctly, for
example if the current user does not have write access to an entity value, you can
enter specific credentials to be used instead in the User and
Password fields.
Note: You can click the Save button to save the current
connector configuration in order to use it again.
Click Next to proceed to the next step.
-
You can select the Partial Update check box if more than one
occurrence of the same attribute is defined in the business entity and you want the
workflow to update only the new occurrences. If you select the Partial
Update check box, select the Overwrite check
box to replace the element if an element with the same key or position already
exists, or leave the Overwrite check box unselected to add a
new element instead.
-
If required, click the Save button to save the current
connector configuration for repeated usage.
-
Click Finish to close the dialog box.
The new Talend connector
configuration is added to the list of connectors in the
Connectors view.