Concepts Guide

Liquid Data Quick Start

The following sections guide you through all the tasks required to design and implement a real-time data access and aggregation solution using BEA Liquid Data for WebLogic. This chapter provides a high-level view of a typical process. To read more detail about any particular task, follow the links provided to the document where that topic is discussed in full detail.

The following sections are included:

For a walkthrough of steps 3, 4, and 5, see Getting Started With Liquid Data

Step 1. Install the Software

To use Liquid Data, you begin by installing the WebLogic Platform and the Liquid Data software according to the instructions in Installing Liquid Data

Step 2: Explore the Liquid Data Samples

After you install the software, launch the samples server, and then explore Liquid Data using the Liquid Data samples. For more information, see Overview of the Avitek Self-Service Sample Application in Liquid Data by Example.

Step 3. Define the Data Access and Aggregation Requirements and Scope

Before you can create queries, you need to clarify the requirements and scope of your data access and aggregation solution, answering such questions as:

Who is the audience for data access and aggregation?
What kinds of problem statements/queries, in plain English, are you trying to solve?
What are the data sources and their types?
What is the required information output, also known as the query result? What specific content is required and how should it be presented (layout, order, and so on)? How should the output or query result be structured in the target schema? What source-to-target mappings do you need to create in order to shape the result as needed?
What is the required information input? Which data sources can provide such information? What types of data sources are involved—relational databases, XML files, Web services, application views, or data views? What is required to obtain access to these data sources? What is the structure of the data sources (source schemas)? What conditions do you need to define in a query in order to obtain the appropriate view on the information?

Step 4. Configure Access to Data Sources

Before you can create queries, you must configure access to the data sources that provide these queries with the required content. You use the Liquid Data node in the Administration Console to configure access to data sources, via data source descriptions, as described in the following topics in the Liquid Data Administration Guide:

Certain data source types, such as relational databases and application views, require additional configuration tasks that are also described in their respective sections. You might also need to perform other configuration tasks described elsewhere in the Liquid Data Administration Guide.

Step 5. Create and Test Queries in the XQuery Language

Once you have configured access to data sources, you can create XQuery queries to retrieve the information needed for your data access and aggregation solution. You can either use the Data View Builder to generate the XQuery for you (based on a design you construct using its graphical tools), or you can hand code the XQuery. Either way, you use the Data View Builder to save queries as stored queries in the Liquid Data server repository. For more information, see Building Queries and Data Views.

Step 6: Develop Applications to Display Liquid Data Queries

Client applications can invoke Liquid Data queries in the following ways:

The WebLogic Workshop Liquid Data control provides easy access to Liquid Data queries in the WebLogic Workshop environment. The Liquid Data control provides access to both stored and ad-hoc queries, and generates XMLBeans for the stored queries (based on the schema associated with the stored queries). The XMLBean interface makes it easy to use NetUI and other workshop features to create robust applications that display and process data from Liquid Data.
The Liquid Data Query API (Application Programming Interface) allows EJB and JSP client applications to invoke queries programmatically. Developers can create custom Java applications or build JSP pages. In addition, other BEA software—WebLogic Portal, the Business Process Management component of WebLogic Integration, WebLogic Web Services, and WebLogic Workshop—can invoke queries on the Liquid Data Server, providing real-time integration with Liquid Data.
Web service clients can invoke Liquid Data queries using Web services that have been generated in the Administration Console from stored queries.

For more information, see the Application Developer's Guide.

Step 7. Deploy the Data Access and Aggregation Solution

After you have created all the components of your data access and aggregation solution, you need to deploy it in a production environment. In addition to defining deployment requirements and designing the deployment, you need to deploy the Liquid Data Server, the server repository, and other resources in a WebLogic domain in a production environment. For more information, see Deploying Liquid Data.