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21 Creating and Managing Generic Technology Connectors 21-1 21 Creating and Managing Generic Technology Connectors This chapter explains how to create and maintain Generic Technology Connectors. It contains these sections: ■ Overview ■ Creating Generic Technology Connectors ■ Managing Generic Technology Connectors ■ Using the Generic Connection Pool Framework in Custom Connectors ■ Best Practices

21.1 Overview

Providers are the starting point for developing generic technology connectors. Oracle Identity Manager provides a standard set of providers that you can use as building blocks of your generic technology connectors. For details about these providers, see Chapter 19, Predefined Providers for Generic Technology Connectors . If no suitable provider is available, you can develop a provider to fit your requirements. For details, see Chapter 20, Creating Custom Providers for Generic Technology Connectors . Finally, if generic technology connectors do not meet your integration requirements, you can make use of the programmatic options available with adapters. For details, see Part V, Requests and Approval Processes .

21.2 Creating Generic Technology Connectors

This section explains how to create generic technology connectors. The procedure to create a generic technology connector is composed of the following steps: ■ Determining Provider Requirements ■ Selecting the Providers to Include ■ Addressing the Prerequisites ■ Using the Administrative and User Console to Create the Connector ■ Configuring Reconciliation ■ Configuring Provisioning 21-2 Oracle Fusion Middleware Developers Guide for Oracle Identity Manager ■ Enabling Logging

21.2.1 Determining Provider Requirements

As mentioned in Chapter 19, Predefined Providers for Generic Technology Connectors , the following providers can be used as the building blocks of the generic technology connectors you create: ■ Reconciliation Transport Provider ■ Reconciliation Format Provider ■ Provisioning Transport Provider ■ Provisioning Format Provider ■ Transformation Provider ■ Validation Provider See Section 18.2, Functional Architecture of Generic Technology Connectors for the definitions of these providers. Then, based on your knowledge of the data formats and data transport mechanisms supported by the target system, identify the providers that must be included in the generic technology connector that you create. If the target system supports multiple data formats and data transport mechanisms, you must select a single combination of the transport and format providers discussed in the first chapter. You cannot include, for example, multiple reconciliation format providers in a single generic technology connector.

21.2.2 Selecting the Providers to Include

Identify the predefined providers that can be used to meet your provider requirements. See Chapter 19, Predefined Providers for Generic Technology Connectors for information about the predefined providers. If all your provider requirements are addressed by the predefined providers, you need not create custom providers. You must create custom providers to address only the requirements that are not addressed by the predefined providers. See Chapter 20, Creating Custom Providers for Generic Technology Connectors for information about creating custom providers.

21.2.3 Addressing the Prerequisites

You must address the following prerequisites: ■ If you are creating the generic technology connector on a production server, enable the cache for the following cache categories: – GenericConnector – GenericConnectorProviders See Tuning and Managing Application Cache in the Oracle Fusion Middleware Administrators Guide for Oracle Identity Manager for more information. ■ Testing connectivity between the target system server and the Oracle Identity Manager server You must take steps to ensure that connectivity can be established between the target system server and the Oracle Identity Manager server. For example, in a See Also: Section 21.2.1, Determining Provider Requirements Creating and Managing Generic Technology Connectors 21-3 UNIX environment, you must enter the fully qualified host name of the Oracle Identity Manager server in the etchosts file on the target system server. ■ Creating the user account to be used for creating the generic technology connector All users belonging to the SYSTEM ADMINISTRATORS group of Oracle Identity Manager can create generic technology connectors. Alternatively, members of a group to which you assign the required menu items and permissions can create generic technology connectors. The required menu items are as follows: – Create Generic Technology Connector menu item – Manage Generic Technology Connector menu item The required permissions are as follows: – Form Designer Allow Insert, Write Access, Delete Access – Structure Utility.Additional Column Allow Insert, Write Access, Delete Access – Meta-Table Hierarchy Allow Insert, Write Access, Delete Access If these permissions are not correctly assigned to the group, an error is thrown when the user clicks the Create button on the final Administrative and User Console page for creating generic technology connectors.

21.2.4 Using the Administrative and User Console to Create the Connector

To navigate to the first Administrative and User Console page for creating a generic technology connector, login to the Administrative and User Console, click Advanced, and under Configuration, click Create Generic Connector. From this point onward, page-wise instructions are provided in the following sections: ■ Step 1: Provide Basic Information Page ■ Step 2: Specify Parameter Values Page ■ Step 3: Modify Connector Configuration Page ■ Step 4: Verify Connector Form Names Page ■ Step 5: Verify Connector Information Page

21.2.4.1 Step 1: Provide Basic Information Page

To provide basic information about the generic technology connector that you want to create, use this page as follows

1. In the Name field, specify a name for the generic technology connector.

The following are guidelines related to selecting a name for the generic technology connector: ■ The name must not be the same as that of any other connector predefined connector or generic technology connector on this Oracle Identity Manager installation. ■ The name must not be the same as that of any other connector object such as resource objects, IT resources, and process forms on this Oracle Identity Manager installation.