Overview

This chapter provides an overview of Oracle Trading Community Architecture integration features, including APIs and business events.

This chapter covers the following topics:

• Introduction
• API Overview
• Business Events

Introduction

This document describes the integration features that you can use to access and leverage the Oracle Trading Community Architecture (TCA) data model, which is the foundation for various applications in the Oracle E-Business Suite. Deploying companies, consultants, and Oracle internal development teams can all use these public objects.

• Granular (V2, or Version 2) Application Programming Interfaces (APIs): APIs that manipulate data for granular entities, which correspond to specific tables in the TCA data model.

• Business Object APIs: APIs that manipulate data for business objects, which are abstract groupings of granular entities that form operable, logical business units.

• Business Events: Events that signal the creation or update of data, and push data out to subscribing objects, based on triggers such as granular or business object API calls.

One major area to use these integration features is in a data hub, where data from various systems are connected and transacted in real-time via the TCA data model. Using APIs and business events, you can create or update in one system and ensure that the change is reflected in the other systems.

Related Topics

API Overview

API Overview

Important features of the TCA API:

• Flexible, easy to understand, and modular.

• Extensive debugging capability.

• Extensive error handling and reporting capability.

• Robust validation in all of the APIs.

• A new locking mechanism based on the OBJECT_VERSION_NUMBER field, which has been included in all of the HZ entities for which the public APIs have been provided.

• Standard signature and availability of common parameters.

• The following main categories of TCA entities are covered:

  • Parties - person, organization, group

  • Locations

  • Party sites, party site use

  • Organization contact, organization contact role

  • Contact points

  • Contact preferences

  • Relationship types

  • Relationships

  • Classification

  • Customer accounts

  • Account sites and site uses

  • Customer account role, role responsibility

  • Customer profile, customer profile amount

Related Topics

Business Needs Met

Granular Versus Business Object APIs

Introduction

Business Needs Met

Programmatic access to the TCA data model meets the following business needs:

• Applications in the Oracle E-Business Suite can use the TCA public APIs to insert and update entities in the TCA model, as part of server side and middle tier business logic.

• APIs provide a gateway to the TCA data model from applications that use Forms 6.0 user interfaces (UIs) as well as from HTML UIs.

• Data from providers such as D&B can be mass loaded into the TCA model by using the PL/SQL API. The D&B integration currently available with TCA also utilizes the TCA APIs.

• Data migration from legacy systems into the TCA model.

• Access to the TCA model from custom applications built by deploying companies and Oracle Consulting.

Granular Versus Business Object APIs

Granular APIs manipulate data at the granular Oracle Trading Community Architecture entity level. For example, a person record consists of profile, address, and relationship information, so this record corresponds to the TCA Party, Party Site, and Relationship entities respectively. To create this person information, you need to use three granular API procedures to create a party of type person, party site, and relationship, as shown in this diagram.

Oracle Trading Community Architecture provides seeded business objects, which can contain other business objects, granular entities, or both. When a business object API is called, it can subsequently call granular APIs.

For example, the Person business object contains various business objects and granular entities, including the Party Site business object and Relationship entity. When the Create Person Business Object API procedure is called, it subsequently calls the Create Party Site Business Object procedure and the Create Relationship granular API procedure. So instead of three separate initial API calls, as is the case with the granular APIs, you can use just one business object API to create the same person information, as illustrated in this diagram.

Related Topics

API Overview

Business Events

TCA utilizes three concurrent programs to manage business events.

• TCA Business Object Events: Generate Infrastructure Packages Program

• TCA Business Object Events: Raise Events Program

• TCA Business Object Events: Cleanse Infrastructure Program