Glossary
analytics
Enables mobile cloud administrators and mobile application developers to gauge the success of a mobile application, respond to user preferences, and explore business opportunities by observing patterns in performance and usage.
Analytics API
A platform API that allows mobile applications to collect custom events. Combined with system analytics gathered by MCS, this information can be used to provide insight into user engagement, usage patterns, and adoption rates of your mobile application.
anonymous access
anonymous key
A MCS-generated string used by a mobile application to get access (through HTTP Basic authentication) to APIs that don’t require login.
API
Application Program Interface. An interface description that provides the methods, return values, and other parameters that make it possible to be implemented in written code. In MCS, all APIs are RESTful APIs and their interface is described with a RAML document.
API key
A Google identifier you can use to access Google public APIs. MCS uses the Google Cloud Messaging system and the API key to send notifications to mobile applications running on Android devices.
APNS
Apple Push Notifications Service. The Apple network service used to deliver notifications from MCS to mobile applications running on iOS devices.
Apple Feedback Service
An Apple service that monitors failures in the notifications sending process. The Apple Feedback Service helps MCS keep its device registry up to date and ensures a higher rate of successful notifications deliveries on the Apple network.
application ID
A unique string approved by a platform vendor to identify a given mobile application. For Google, the application ID is the package name for the mobile application assigned in the manifest file. For Apple, the application ID is the bundle identifier assigned in the mobile application’s Xcode project. For Microsoft, the application ID is the name you gave your app when you registered it in the Windows Dashboard.
application key
A unique ID issued by MCS to each mobile application registered in a mobile backend, used for tracking purposes in Diagnostics and Analytics.
artifact
An artifact in MCS can be a mobile backend, a custom API, a connector API, a collection, or a realm. An artifact exists in a specific environment and can be deployed and versioned.
collection
An MCS user-defined container that is used to store mobile application data on an MCS server. Data can be an image file, a text file, or a JSON payload. Using collections allows for efficient sharing of data between mobile users sharing the same mobile application, or by a single user sharing between several devices.
connector
A connector simplifies the task of connecting securely to a backend system, such as a database, or a system based on SOAP or REST. Connectors produce a class of APIs; you create an instance (using a wizard) and the result is a connector API.
connector API
An API produced as the result of using a connector. The API can then be invoked from custom code to simplify the task of exchanging data with a backend system, such as a database, or a system based on SOAP or REST.
correlation
A means of associating a given message with other messages logged for the same request. MCStags this message with a Correlation ID. This ID includes an ECID. By querying all of the log messages generated during that request, you can analyze what happened to the request, as well as any problems that it encountered.
correlation ID
An ID that associates a request received by the server with other logging data. The correlation ID appears in the Message Details view for a request and enables you to filter the logging data by the ECID.
custom API
Any API that a developer creates in the API Designer and implements in MCS using custom code they write themselves using those APIs.
custom event
A customer-defined analytic event generated by a mobile application to track a significant event occurrence that is of value to a business, such as login, checkout, or knowledge-based search.
Database API
A platform API that you can call from custom code to add, update, view, and delete rows in a database table.
Database Management API
A platform API that you can use to add, replace, and drop database tables as well as view the tables' metadata.
Data Offline and Sync API
A platform API that allows data to be locally available on a mobile device, by managing the efficient caching and network synchronization of data with MCS.
deploy
Once an artifact is in a published state, it can be deployed from one MCS environment to another. For example, a mobile backend that is in the published state can be deployed from a Development environment into a Production environment.
device handshake
The start-up registration process between a mobile app, the platform’s network service (such as GCM, FCM, or APNS), and MCS. The device handshake provides authentication to MCS that the mobile application is trusted by the network and helps facilitate the sending of notifications from MCS.
device registry
A mechanism instead of MCS that matches and keeps track of applications, users, and devices. The device registry does this automatically, which frees MCS developers from having to do it manually.
diagnostics
A feature that gathers and displays data relating to all traffic flowing through MCS, such as incoming mobile API requests, outgoing connector requests, and other data transactions. It also provides a way to view and control custom code log messages. Diagnostics is the primary mechanism for mobile cloud administrators to diagnose issues that may occur with the service.
Draft state
When an artifact is initially created in MCS, it is placed in a draft state. Only artifacts in a draft state can be modified. As part of the MCS lifecycle, when artifacts in a draft state are completed, they can be moved to a published state.
ECID
Execution Context ID. A globally unique identifier to correlate events or requests associated with the same transaction in the Oracle technology stack.
endpoint
One end of a communication channel, for example, a URI. An API endpoint is a noun (resource) and verb (HTTP method).
enterprise systems
On-premises or cloud-based processing systems that are integrated and extended by a mobile backend through the use of MCS connectors.
environment
The runtime containers where artifacts and metadata are developed and deployed in MCS. The default environments are Development, Staging, and Production.
ETag
The entity tag. A field value in an HTTP header that identifies a resource from a specific web service endpoint. The ETag’s value represents the version of a resource. For example, to avoid overriding an object in the mobile application’s cache, the Storage API uses the ETag value in the If-Match and If-None-Match fields for GET and HEAD operations.
funnel
Used in analytics, funnels provide a way to analyze sequences of events, to gain insight into user behavior and usage of a mobile application.
GCM
Google Cloud Messaging. A network delivery system provided by Google, which is being replaced by Google Firebase Messaging (FCM). It is used by MCS to deliver notifications to targeted users running mobile applications developed with MCS on Android devices. Both XMPP and HTTP are transport mechanisms supported by the Google Cloud Messaging system.
GUID
Globally Unique Identifier. The unique identifier that gets generated for every stored object in MCS. Any mobile user with the correct permissions can use this identifier to access the associated data object in a collection.
JSON
Javascript Object Notation. An open standard format that uses human-readable text to transmit data objects between a server and web application. Commonly used to attach a body of content to a REST—based API transaction.
lifecycle
The overall process of maintaining MCS artifacts and managing versions of those artifacts.
mobile app
An application resident on a mobile device. The mobile application can be an in-house application developed using MCS for distribution to internal company employees or an application released through a public store, such as the Google Play Store or the Apple App Store.
mobile backend
A secure container of APIs and other resources for a defined set of mobile apps. Mobile backend capabilities include platform APIs like storage, notifications, my profile management, and analytics, as well functionality described by custom APIs.
mobile backend ID
An identifier issued by MCS that allows a mobile application to access APIs associated with a mobile backend when authenticating with HTTP Basic authentication.
client SDK
A bundle of libraries, utilities, and wrapper classes that MCS provides for multiple mobile platforms to simplify use of MCS features in your apps.
mobile user
The user of a mobile application built using MCS. A mobile user is granted access to the mobile backend and platform APIs associated with the mobile application when it gets installed on a device and the user is authenticated with MCS.
mobile user management
APIs and other functionality that allows you to manage mobile users, roles, realms, and team members.
notification
A short, highly-tailored message sent to a specified set of recipients running a mobile application on a mobile device.
Notifications API
A platform API that provides the ability to send short, tailored messages to different groupings of recipients, immediately or on a schedule. Recipients can include everyone in a specific mobile backend, a user or set of users, a specific device or collection of devices, or a unique role.
platform APIs
APIs provided by MCS that simplify mobile app development. Features such as Analytics, Mobile Object Storage, Notifications, and Data Offline are platform APIs. Some platform APIs can be called by mobile applications, whereas others are called exclusively from custom code.
Published state
When an artifact is in a published state in MCS it can no longer be modified. As part of the MCS lifecycle, published artifacts can be deployed to a target environment.
RAML
RESTful API Modeling Language. A non-proprietary specification built on broadly used standards, which is used to describe the structure of practically RESTful APIs. It is capable of describing APIs that do not obey all the constraints of REST.
realm
A set of mobile users associated with a mobile backend. A realm exists within an environment and helps manage roles, properties, devices, and mobile users access to a mobile backend and associated platform APIs.
REST
Representational State Transfer. An internet software methodology used by MCS, which defines a set of APIs and a transport mechanism (HTTP) for interacting with those APIs.
REST connector
A type of connector API used to connect a mobile backend and its artifacts to a backend system based on REST.
RESTful
A description of a software implementation that uses REST APIs and conforms to the network transport, content body types, and other expectations of REST design.
RID
Relationship ID. An identifier that distinguishes the work done in one thread (and on one process) from work done by any other threads or processes, on behalf of the same request. The RID enables you to use log file entries to correlate messages from one application or across components.
role
A set of permissions granted to a team member or mobile user. The permissions may allow a mobile user access to a specific backend, or a team member access to certain functionality within MCS. Both team members and mobile users have roles, but the roles are different and not related to each other.
sender ID
A Google identifier used to identify a mobile application to the Google network. The sender ID is assigned by Google and used only when sending notifications from MCS to an Android application over the Google Cloud Messaging network, using XMPP.
SOAP
Simple Object Access Protocol. A protocol specification for exchanging structured information in the implementation of web services.
SOAP connector
A type of connector API used to connect a mobile backend and its artifacts to a backend system based on SOAP.
Storage API
A platform API that provides an easy-to-use, non-SQL, cloud-based mechanism for mobile applications to store and share text and binary data.
Synchronization API
The API for data offline and sync functionality in mobile applications. It is exposed as part of the MCS client SDKs and provides functionality to sync REST resources such as JSON payloads from custom code, and view and edit these resources while the mobile device is offline, as well as sync them back to the cloud when the device comes online.
system analytic data
Data gathered by MCS about runtime events received from mobile applications connected to mobile backends and from custom code.
team members
People who are authorized to log into MCS. These people include developers, administrators, enterprise architects, and others working with MCS.
user isolation
The ability to isolate objects within a storage collection by user. This enables a mobile application developer to create generic mobile applications without worrying about one user’s storage conflicting with another’s.
Mobile User Management API
A platform API that provides the ability to manage mobile users, roles, and realms.
versioning
A new copy of an artifact, that is unique and distinct from the original artifact. MCS has major versions of artifacts and minor versions. Minor versions are backward-compatible, major versions are not.
virtual user
XMPP
Extensible Messaging and Presence Protocol. An open source network messaging framework used by Google and other cloud network vendors that provides custom capabilities for messaging transmissions.