Defining External Connections

On the Home page, select Administer.

From New, select External Connection.

Enter a name and description.

From Object Access, select Standard, System or a custom group.

Select a connection type: Server File, FTP, Database, or Web Service.

Do one of the following:

If you selected Server File, enter a UNC path to the server and click .

Note:

The Windows user account used by the Oracle Data Relationship Management application server is automatically used for Server File connections. The default Windows user account used for the Oracle DRM Server Processes Windows service is Local System account. The account used for the service must be able to access the UNC path for proper Server File connectivity. Additionally, the UNC path must have the appropriate permissions for the service account to read and write files.
If you selected FTP, enter the following information:
- Host Server
- User ID
- User Password
- Click .
If you selected Database:
- Select the Data Access Provider: Oracle, SqlServer, or OleDb.
  - Enter a Database Connection Timeout value
  - Enter a Database Command Timeout value
- Enter the Connection String.
- Enter your user ID and password
  
  Note:
  
  To establish a writable external connection, the administrator must have SELECT, INSERT, and DELETE access. A user who has only SELECT access can establish a read-only external connection to tables and views.
- Click .
- On the Allowed Objects tab, to filter a large list, do any of the following:
  - Select or enter a schema/owner, using wildcards if needed.
  - Enter the name of an object, using wildcards if needed.
  - Select Include Views to include views where the privilege is at least SELECT. Note that views are always read only.
  - Select Include Read-Only Tables to include tables where the privilege is at least SELECT but does not include both INSERT and DELETE.
  - Click and then select objects from the Available list. Use the arrows to move objects to the Selected list.
  - Optional: To use the Quick Add section, enter the schema/owner and name of the object that you want to add and click the arrow to move it to the Selected list.
- To add an external operation, click the External Operations tab, click Add, and then do the following:
  - Enter Name for the operation. The name must be unique for the parent External Connection.
  - Enter Description text describing the purpose of the operation.
  - Select the Operation Type––Lookup or Commit. This selection is used to filter the list of operations available for selection with the External Lookup and External Commit features.
  - Select the Database Operation Type––Statement or Stored Procedure.
    - If you selected Statement, click Add, and then do the following:
      - Enter parameters to be passed in when calling the operation:
        
        Parameter Name––Name of the parameter. No white space is allowed.
        
        Parameter Description––Description of the parameter
        
        Test Value––Value used for testing the operation. The value is stored for reuse.
      - In the SQL Statement field, enter a single SQL statement to be executed. You can use substitution parameters in the SQL statement to pass runtime values. Substitution parameter formatting is <%ParamKey%>, where <% and %> denote a substitution parameter and ParamKey is the name of the parameter to be used for substitution. For example, <%TopNode%>.
      - Click to test the operation. The Rollback option rollbacks any changes made to the database by the script. Rollback is selected by default. When an operation is tested, the parameter’s test values are inserted into the statement and executed. Click the Result tab to view the results of the test.
    - If you selected Stored Procedure:
      - Enter the Stored Procedure Name to execute, may include package name as prefix.
      - Enter Name for the operation. The name must be unique for the parent External Connection.
      - Enter Description text describing the purpose of the operation.
      - View the list of parameters for the stored procedure. Select True for Results Param to return the parameter in Data Relationship Management operation result. Only one parameter may be selected as a result parameter. Result parameters are only returned for Lookup operations. For Commit operations, success or failure only is indicated.
      - Test Value––Value used for testing the operation. The value is stored for reuse.
      - Click to test the operation. The Rollback option rollbacks any changes made to the database by the stored procedure. Rollback is selected by default. When an operation is tested, the parameter’s test values are inserted into the stored procedure and executed. Click the Result tab to view the results of the test.
If you selected Web Service:
- Select the Protocol: HTTP or HTTPS.
- Enter the Hostname
- Enter the Port––If port 0 is specified, standard ports 80 and 443 are used for HTTP and HTTPS respectively
- Select the Authentication Type––If set to Basic, then User ID and Password can be saved.
- Enter User ID and Password.
- To add an external operation, click Add and then do the following:
  - Enter Name for the operation. The name must be unique for the parent External Connection.
  - Enter Description text describing the purpose of the operation.
  - Select the Operation Type––Lookup or Commit. This selection is used to filter the list of operations available for selection with the External Lookup and External Commit features.
  - On the Request tab, click Add, and then enter parameters to be passed in when calling the operation:
    - Parameter Name––Name of the parameter. No white space is allowed.
    - Parameter Description––Description of the parameter
    - Test Value––Value used for testing the operation. The value is stored for reuse.
  - From HTTP Action select GET, POST, PUT, or DELETE.
    
    Note:
    
    Only POST and PUT allow sending HTTP Body content.
  - Enter the HTTP URI for the Web service message.
  - Enter the raw content of the HTTP Header.
  - Enter the text content of the HTTP Body.
  - Response tab––Displays the full outgoing and incoming messages for the Web service operation. Parameters used in the outgoing message will have their test values inserted into the request. The HTTP body of the incoming message returned by the Web service is expected to be in XML or JSON format. For external lookup operations, the incoming message needs to be converted to a tabular format (rows and columns) for use with external lookup properties. To handle this conversion, XPath expressions can be used. The List Identifier Expression parameter identifies the elements in the incoming message which are the rows of the result set. The Result Columns identify the attributes of the row elements which are displayed as columns in the result set.
    
    To preview the results of the List Identifier Expression and Result Columns configurations, click the Preview tab. The results are displayed in a data grid.
  You can use substitution parameters in the URI, HTTP Header, and HTTP Body to pass runtime values to the external operation. Substitution parameter formatting is <%ParamKey%>, where <% and %> denote a substitution parameter and ParamKey is the name of the parameter to be used for substitution. For example, <%TopNode%>.
  
  To test the configuration, click . The HTTP Request is built and sent to the endpoint. The user-interface automatically switches to the Response tab and displays the full outgoing message and incoming response. Parameters used in the outgoing message will have their test values inserted into the request.

Click

to validate the selected items to verify that they are accessible at the appropriate level through the connection user name and password.

Click

to save the external connection.