10 Things to Know Before You Start
New to Oracle Integration? Whether you're a seasoned developer or have done a little work in low-code platforms, these pointers will help you get started with confidence and become an expert quickly.
Oracle Integration has an intuitive drag-and-drop interface that lets you design integrations quickly and easily. To ensure that you're building efficient integrations, spend some time developing your expertise before you start building.
1. Integrations Streamline Your Business
No matter your business or your goals, you can use Oracle Integration to automate your business processes. For example, you can:
- Send data between your applications.
- Connect applications in the cloud with on-premises software.
- Automate end-to-end solutions, such as procure to pay, inquiry to order, and hire to retire.
- Monitor your business processes.
- Recover from errors.
Several components help move data, including connections, mappings, and lookups. Understand how they work together so you can grow your skills and build integrations quickly and efficiently.
Learn more: About Integrations, About Connections, About Mappings, and About Lookups
2. A Project Is Your Super-Powered Release Manager
Oracle Integration offers an intuitive user interface that places all the components that you need in a single solution, called a project. There, you design, manage, and observe related integrations. A project streamlines your day-to-day work and your integration deployment.
Learn more: About Projects
3. An Integration's Pattern Determines How it Starts
When you begin designing an integration, you choose the integration pattern to use. The pattern determines the event or activity that starts the integration.
The following integration patterns are available:
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Application integrations
Create an application integration to move data after a specific business event occurs or after a change in an application occurs. For example, an application integration runs after a customer submits an order, or after an employee makes an update in an application.
When the business event occurs, the application sends a request to Oracle Integration to start the integration. A trigger connection handles the request. You create the trigger connection using an adapter.
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Event integrations
Create an event integration to move data when someone creates a specific event type in an application. This publish-subscribe pattern requires two integrations. The first integration detects that a specific event type has been created in an application and publishes the event. The second integration subscribes to the event.
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Schedule integrations
Create a schedule integration to move data, either at a specific time and date or on demand.
Learn more: Understand Integration Patterns
4. Application Integrations Can Be Asynchronous or Synchronous
You can design an application integration as either a synchronous or asynchronous integration. Synchronous integrations deliver immediate responses, whereas asynchronous integrations guarantee the delivery of requests, no matter how complex the integration is.
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Asynchronous integrations are guaranteed to run when they are accepted
Use asynchronous integrations whenever you can. An asynchronous integration provides an immediate acknowledgment and, depending on the design, it can also provide a response upon completion.
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Synchronous integrations give immediate responses
When your business process requires an immediate response, such as providing a customer with a confirmation number for an order, build a synchronous integration. A synchronous integration finishes quickly, provides a response back to the caller, and raises any errors back to the caller.
Errors that occur for synchronous integrations are unrecoverable. For example, if an error occurs, you can't submit the failed integration instance.
5. Schedule Integrations Should be Staggered and Simple
When your business response must run on a schedule, use a schedule integration. For example, use a schedule integration to run payroll at the end of the month or to synchronize your inventory every Friday at 5 PM.
Keep in mind the following guidance when creating schedule integrations:
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Stagger the start times.
For example, if you need to run ten daily integrations at the end of the business day, start one at 5 PM, the next at 5:05 PM, and so on.
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Keep schedule integrations small and simple.
Keep reading to learn tips for keeping schedule integrations small and simple.
6. You Can Combine Integrations with Different Patterns
If you need an immediate response or need an integration to run on a schedule, you can pair a synchronous or schedule integration with an asynchronous integration.
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When to pair a synchronous and asynchronous integration
When a business process is complex and requires an immediate response, build a synchronous integration that completes two tasks:
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Returns a quick response.
For example, a synchronous integration can return the confirmation number for a customer's order or complete a credit check for a customer before fulfilling an order.
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Kicks off one or more asynchronous integrations.
The asynchronous integrations contain the bulk of the work, such as updating inventory, creating packing lists, and more.
See How to Choose Between Synchronous and Asynchronous Integrations.
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When to pair a schedule and asynchronous integration
If a business process is complex, build a schedule integration that completes two tasks:
- Starts the process at the right time.
- Kicks off one or more asynchronous integrations, which contain the bulk of the work.
Tip:
No matter what type of integration you create, try to keep it as simple as possible. Simple integrations run more quickly than complex integrations. Of course, an integration can be only as simple as its corresponding business process, and some business processes are overwhelmingly complex. When designing for such complexity, remember that your integrations are competing for resources. Make sure that they all get a fair chance to complete as planned.7. Service Limits Provide Guard Rails
Everyone must work within the service limits, which are the quotas and allowances for working with integrations. A common mistake that new users make is designing a complex integration that exceeds the service limits.
Your focus right now is understandably on getting your business flow started, but spend some time thinking about the scenarios the integration will encounter in the real world. For example, before you start designing a synchronous integration that needs to process orders, consider the real-world size of the files that the integration must process. For example, if the order that the integration must process contains many lines, the order processing could take a long time, and the integration might time out.
You don't need to memorize the service limits. However, reference them often when planning and developing an integration. Know the limits up front so you can design effective and appropriate integrations from the beginning.
Learn more: Service Limits in Provisioning and Administering Oracle Integration 38. Best Practices Are Available
You don't have to be an expert at Oracle Integration to create best-in-class integrations. That's because we collected the best practices and antipatterns, also known as worst practices. Follow this guidance so you know the actions to take—and the mistakes to avoid. Review this guidance before and while you work so that you create integrations that go live without issues.
Knowing the best practices and antipatterns, along with the service limits, will make you the go-to resource for integration best practices at your organization.
Learn more: Common Integration Pattern Pitfalls and Design Best Practices
9. Fault Handlers Keep Things Moving When Mistakes Happen
Before you start designing your first integration, spend some time implementing a global fault handler. A fault handler translates cryptic error messages into actionable tasks. This small time investment keeps your business running smoothly and saves everyone time.
10. Test Now, or Rework After Go-Live
An integration that performs well in isolation might perform well under load...or it might not. You won't know how all your systems work together until you test them in a production-like environment. For instance, an on-premises application that's experiencing some latency could negatively impact your synchronous integration.
Before you move your integrations to a production environment, test them in a real-world scenario, under load. If you need to modify the integration, it's much faster and easier to rework it before you start using it in a production environment.