The IBM® FileNet® P8
family
of products provides an extensive collection of development and integration
tools. This section briefly describes these tools and provides links
to more information about them.
Content Engine Java API
The Java API is an interface-based API that provides access
to the full capabilities of Content Engine.
The Java API can be configured to run across either the Enterprise
Java Beans (EJB) or Web Services Interoperability (WSI) protocols.
When running across the EJB listener, the Java API leverages the full
capability of the Java 2 Enterprise Edition (J2EE) framework to propagate
security and transaction context. The Java API also leverages a Java
Authentication and Authorization Service (JAAS) context, if available.
Content Engine .NET API
The .NET API (which is functionally equivalent to the Java
API) provides a Microsoft .NET Common Language Runtime (CLR)-compliant
API for accessing the full capability of Content Engine. The API accepts username
and password credentials for authentication. The .NET API works only
with the WSI Listener.
Content Platform Engine Client Download Service Java API
The Content Platform Engine Client
Download Service enables you to build version-compatibility checks
and automatic updates into Java client applications that use any of
the Content Platform Engine APIs.
Using the Client Download Service, a client can compare and report
on the compatibility between its APIs and the API versions on the Content Platform Engine. If incompatibilities
exist, the client can download the latest API components from the
server.
Compatibility Layer for the 3.5.x Content Java API
The Content Java API compatibility layer is a client-side
API that allows you to maintain applications written using the 3.5.x
Content Java API. The compatibility layer is designed to maximize
support for the Content Java 3.5.x API. However, in a few cases, platform
technologies diverged too greatly for an interface to be supported.
Process Java API
The Process Java API provides classes for accessing the
workflow definition, administration, configuration, and runtime features
of Process Engine. For example,
you can use the Process Java API to build a custom step processor,
which performs all the operations associated with a step in a workflow.
Process Engine Rest Service
The Process Engine REST
Service enables lightweight clients (typically, Javascript/Ajax-based
applications) to access Process Engine resources
over HTTP, using the HTTP query string format for both request and
response data. JavaScript Object Notation (JSON) is used as the data-interchange
format.
Web Services
The IBM FileNet P8 Platform includes
web services for both Content Engine and Process Engine. Both web services are
compliant with WS-I Basic Profile 1.0 and WS-Security. Using these
web services, you can access most of the same functionality that the Content Engine APIs provide, including
all objects and most properties and methods. In addition, you can
create and launch workflows as well as perform queue, step, and roster
operations. Process Engine also
provides process orchestration functionality based on Web Services
and workflow standards (BPEL4WS), which you can call from an external
client.
Web Application Toolkit
The IBM FileNet Web Application Toolkit provides an extensible,
Model-View-Controller framework of reusable modules for building event-driven,
Java Server Pages (JSP)-based web applications. The Toolkit supplies
the behaviors and data structures for authentication, event routing,
state information, preferences, multicultural support, and other features
of robust and scaleable applications. A number of IBM FileNet applications
(such as Workplace) are built using this framework.
Workplace Application Engine UI Service IBM FileNet P8 Workplace
provides the Application Engine UI
Service (formerly named Integration Servlet) to enable custom application
developers to leverage reusable Workplace JSP pages with a minimum
amount of coding. The Application Engine UI
Service allows thin clients to use request-based command and response
URLs to communicate with Workplace.
Workplace Application Customization
IBM FileNet Workplace is built using the Web Application
Toolkit and provides thin-client web access to content and process
management servers. Administrators can customize the out-of-the-box
UIs and behaviors of the Workplace application by modifying configuration
files to perform such tasks as changing UI labels, redefining actions,
filtering classes for Wizard views, or setting Search query criteria.
Workplace Application Integration Toolkit
The Application Integration Toolkit enables third-party
client applications to integrate with IBM FileNet Workplace by interacting
with Workplace Application Integration objects. Win32-based client
applications that run on either Microsoft Windows 2000 or Windows
XP, such as Microsoft Word and Outlook, can integrate with IBM FileNet
Workplace using the Application Integration in-process COM Server
components and interfaces contained in the toolkit.
Workplace Application Integration ExpressAddin
The ExpressAddIn is a developer tool that enables two-way
communication between a third-party application and the IBM FileNet
Application Integration infrastructure. The tool is implemented via
COM interfaces and methods, and communication with the Application
Integration framework is achieved through the use of an event sink
and event handlers. The ExpressAddIn provides developers with a much
simpler method for accessing the Application Integration framework
than the objects in the Workplace Application Integration Toolkit
and offers some features that are not available from the Toolkit,
such as document tracking. In addition, the ExpressAddIn coalesces
various Application Integration functionality into a single operation,
whereas the Toolkit requires that the commands that correspond to
that functionality be stacked in order to achieve the same behavior.
Component Integrator
The Component Integrator provides a mechanism for easily
interacting with components (such as Java classes) from a workflow.
Adapters provide the ability to interact with different types of components
from a workflow step. IBM provides a Java and Java Message Service
(JMS) adapter for calling Java components and interacting with message
queues. You can write custom Java components as well as custom adapters
for interacting with other types of components or applications. IBM
also provides a Content Engine component
(CE_Operations) that includes functions to get and set properties,
file and unfile objects from folders, and publish a document.
FileNet P8 eForms Java and JavaScript APIs IBM FileNet P8eForms includes both Java and
JavaScript APIs for developing applications that enable you to define
customized client-side processing for your electronic forms.
IBM Enterprise Records IBM Enterprise
Records includes
a framework--exposed as a Java API--for developing applications that
can securely capture, declare, classify, store, and dispose of both
electronic and physical records. The framework also includes Component
Integrator components that support declaring records from workflows,
as well as a sample Content Engine event
script that you can customize to enable event-driven records declaration.
For more information, contact your service representative.
FileNet System Manager APIs
The System Manager APIs include listener APIs that collect
performance data and make the data available, and a manager API for
creating client applications that gather the performance data.