The primary task of the connector framework is to create the basic connection. The ConnectionSpec interface is a collection of properties that have to be specified to connect to a back-end application.
A connection property consists of:
System-parameter or user-parameter
The system-parameter is shared among all users, while a default value for the user-parameter may be overridden by the user mapping.
Is the parameter mandatory
The data type of the parameter
The default value of the parameter
A list of valid values for the parameter
The ConnectionFactory gets an instance of the connection based on the given ConnectionSpec collection.
The Connection interface is the entry point for the connector to perform an operation like getting metadata, launching a query, or getting a native interface. Once the basic connection has been established, additional functions can be enabled.