Architectural Overview - IBM WebSphere Adapters User Manual

WebSphere adapters utilize a format-independent data model for representing data
objects. In a WebSphere Process Server or WebSphere Enterprise Service Bus
runtime environment, WebSphere adapters use an extension of the service data
objects (SDO) for representing data objects.

Architectural overview

In conjunction with the appropriate EIS-specific subclasses, the WebSphere Adapter
Foundation Classes provide a JCA-compliant resource adapter implementation that
can be managed by the application server to enable bidirectional connectivity to an
enterprise information system (EIS).
Outbound requests, those requests intended for the EIS, can be sent to the resource
adapter by any J2EE component via the Common Client Interface (CCI) defined by
the JCA specification. For inbound events, events within the EIS sent to the
adapter, message-driven beans that implement the InboundListener interface are
registered with the adapter by the application-server enabling them to receive any
appropriate inbound events from the EIS via the adapter.
Regardless of the whether data is intended for inbound or outbound delivery, the
resource adapter (i.e. Adapter Foundation Classes plus EIS-specific subclasses) acts
as a conduit for any J2EE application to communicate with the EIS.
Figure 2. Architecture overview
Runtime architecture component model
The adapter runtime architecture is a collection of components interacting through
well-defined interfaces and based on the J2EE Connector Architecture (JCA)
specification version 1.5.
At run time, the adapters implement both the Data Exchange Service Provider
Interface (DESPI) contracts to interact with the runtime container and the CCI
contracts to interact with the application component. The JCA architecture has been
extended with the data exchange component that allows efficient data exchange
between the adapter and the server runtime and supports multiple runtime
environments.
The layered approach provides a set of elements that can be assembled to provide
desired functionality and quality of service. The componentized approach allows
the separate, independent development of each element, as well as their reuse. The
following illustration presents the runtime architecture component model. The
4
WebSphere Adapters: WebSphere Adapter Toolkit User Guide