Interface Determination 

Purpose

You use an interface determination to specify for a sender and a receiver which inbound interface is to be used for the inbound processing of a message.

In an interface determination you define the following for the outbound interface of a sender:

·        One or more inbound interfaces

·        An interface mapping for the outbound and inbound interface

You are only permitted to use interface mappings from the Integration Repository.

In an interface determination, you can enter the assignment of multiple inbound interfaces of a receiver.

Prerequisites

For more information, see Generic Definition of Interface Determinations.

Features

In the Display/Edit Interface Determination editor, enter the assignment between the outbound interface and the inbound interface(s) in a table. Each table line represents exactly one assignment between the outbound interface and an inbound interface.

To insert or delete lines, choose Insert One Line After Selection () or Delete Selected Line ().

Specifying Inbound Interfaces

You can enter an inbound interface in the Inbound Interface column. You have the following options:

·        Manual entry

If you enter an interface manually, the system does not check whether the interface is defined in the Integration Repository.

·        Input help (icon )

·        Drag and drop

If you have also opened the Integration Repository, you can drag the interface from the Integration Repository navigation area and drop it on the   icon.

If the receiver is an SAP system, you can also use the RFC namespace.

Specifying the Interface Mapping

In the Interface Mapping column, select the interface mapping between the outbound and inbound interface. To do so, call the input help ( icon in the Software Component Version column).

Within an interface determination you can only reference interface mappings that are saved in the Integration Repository. Design objects in the Integration Repository are release-dependent. To identify an interface mapping uniquely, you must specify the release from which the selected interface mapping is to be taken. For this reason, you must use the input help here. You cannot enter an interface mapping manually.

Specifying Multiple Inbound Interfaces

In an interface determination you can specify the assignment to multiple inbound interfaces (in the Display/Edit Interface Determinationeditor shown by multiple table lines).

Quality of Service (for Multiple Inbound Interfaces)

If you have assigned more than one inbound interface, the messages are forwarded to the inbound interfaces according to the quality of service Exactly Once in Order. This means that the sequence in which you enter the inbound interfaces in the interface determination editor determines the order in which the messages are received.

You can change this default by deselecting the checkbox Maintain Order at Runtime. In this case, the quality of service Exactly Once is used to forward the message to the inbound interfaces.

This setting is recommended if an adapter is involved that does not support Exactly Once In Order processing. This setting is also recommended if you want to avoid a single message that develops errors during delivery from stopping all subsequent messages from being delivered.

Specifying Conditions (for Multiple Inbound Interfaces)

If you have assigned more than one inbound interface, you can specify the conditions for forwarding the message.

To do so, in the Condition column, call the condition editor ( icon).

This column is only available when you are assigning multiple inbound interfaces.

Example

In the demo scenario Booking a Single Flight (Proxy-to-Proxy), a booking order is sent from a travel agency to an airline. In the specified standard configuration the travel agency communicates with the systems of two different airlines (Lufthansa and American Airlines).

To define the inbound interfaces in both airlines and the interface mapping used for the booking order (from the travel agency), you require two interface determinations.