Developing a Connector 

The developer of a connector to an EIS is likely to be familiar with the functionality and methods of connecting and interacting with that system. The EIS-specific implementation, therefore, is up to the developer. Additional requirements are:

·        The connector developer must be familiar with the JCA standard.

·        The developer must gain familiarity with, and implement, the packages and interfaces of the portal connector framework, which extends the JCA standard.

For more information and details, see the sections under Connector Framework Structure and see the Javadocs for the portal and portal runtime APIs, located on the SAP Developer Network (SDN) at www.sdn.sap.com/irj/sdn/javadocs. The connector framework packages begin with com.sapportals.connector*.

·        The connector needs to be deployed on the WebAS.

See Connector Deployment.

For working with the Enterprise Portal:

·        The connector developer must create and deploy, in the portal, a system template for the EIS, upon which portal system objects, which represent the back-end system, will be based.

See System Template.

 

For developing connector code, though optional, it is recommended to take advantage of the new connector wizard. For details, see Connector Wizard.

Prerequisites

Following are the file and envirionment prerequisites for the development of connectors compliant with JCA and the Enterprise Portal connector framework.

File/Environment	Description	Source
GenericConnector.jar	Required to test the connector.	Comes with SAP Enterprise Portal.
ExtendedConnector.jar	Adds functionality to generic connector	Comes with J2EE application server.
ConnectorHelper.jar	Contains utilities that support the developer.	Comes with SAP Enterprise Portal.
Connector.jar	Contains the JCA API.	Comes with J2EE application server.
JAAS.jar (Java Authentication and Authorization Service)	Required by the connector framework.	Comes with J2EE application server.
JTA. JAR (Java Transaction API)	Required by the connector framework.	Comes with J2EE application server.
EIS (Enterprise Information System)	Required to test the connector.	Has to be installed separately.
Java Application Server	Any J2EE JCA 1.5-compliant WAS to work with servlets without the SAP Enterprise Portal. Recommendation: SAP Web AS 6.40 Java	Has to be installed separately.
PRT (Portal Runtime)	Required to test the connector in the SAP Enterprise Portal environment	Comes with SAP Enterprise Portal.
IDE (Integrated Development Environment)	SAP NetWeaver Developer Studio See also Connector Wizard.	Has to be installed separately.
Connector Wizard	The connector wizard is a plug-in for SAP NetWeaver Developer Studio / Eclipse IDE. It creates a project that contains a template for a connector.	Comes with the PDK. Location: Java Developer tab -> Development -> Downloads
Connector Web Service	Required to test the connector in the SAP Enterprise Portal environment	Comes with SAP Enterprise Portal.

Additional Documentation

See also, in the Development Manual, Connectivity and Interoperability, J2EE Connector Architecture, Implementing A 1.0 Resource Adapter.

Another potentially useful source of helpful information is the SAP J2EE Development Manual. See SAP Web AS for Java Applications on the help portal.