How to use IBM App Connect with IBM Maximo

IBM Maximo is an enterprise asset management solution. Enterprises use it to track and manage assets, and optimize work processes.

Availability:
  • A connector in IBM App Connect Enterprise as a ServiceApp Connect Enterprise as a Service connector
  • A local connector in a Designer instance of IBM App Connect in containers (Continuous Delivery release)Local connector in containers (Continuous Delivery release)
  • A local connector in a Designer instance of IBM App Connect in containers (Support Cycle 2)Local connector in containers (Long Term Support Cycle-2 release)

The following information describes how to use IBM App Connect to connect Maximo to your other applications.

Supported product and API versions

To find out which product and API versions this connector supports, see Detailed System Requirements on the IBM Support page.

Connecting to Maximo

Either complete the connection fields in the App Connect Designer Connect > Applications and APIs page or when you create a flow. If necessary, work with your Maximo administrator to obtain these values.

To connect App Connect to an Maximo account, complete the following steps.

  1. To connect to Maximo from the App Connect for the first time, expand Maximo and click Connect.
  2. From the Authorization method list, select the authorization method that you want to use to establish a connection.
    • Provide credentials for App Connect to use (BASIC)
    • Provide credentials for App Connect to use (API KEY)
  3. Complete the connection fields.
    BASIC
    • Set the Maximo URL to the URL of the Maximo on-premises instance in the format <https>://<hostname>:<port> or <http>://<hostname>:<port>.
    • Set the User name to the username for the Maximo account.
    • Set the Password to the password for the specified username.
    • Private network connection (optional): Select the name of a private network connection that App Connect uses to connect to your private network. This list is populated with the names of private network connections that are created from the Private network connections page in the Designer instance. You see this field only if a switch server is configured for this Designer instance. For more information, see Connecting to a private network from App Connect Designer. (In App Connect Designer 12.0.10.0-r1 or earlier instances that include this field, the display name is shown as Agent name.)
    • Set the WebSphere Application Server user name to the username for the WebSphere Application Server account.
      Tip: If the Maximo instance is installed on WebSphere® Application Server, provide the username of the WebSphere Application Server account so that you can use WebSphere authentication. For more information, see Installing on WebSphere Application Server in the Maximo Asset Management documentation.
    • Set the WebSphere Application Server password to the password for the WebSphere Application Server account.
    API KEY
    • Set the Maximo URL to the URL of the Maximo on-premises instance in the format <https>://<hostname>:<port> or <http>://<hostname>:<port>.
    • Private network connection (optional): Select the name of a private network connection that App Connect uses to connect to your private network. This list is populated with the names of private network connections that are created from the Private network connections page in the Designer instance. You see this field only if a switch server is configured for this Designer instance. For more information, see Connecting to a private network from App Connect Designer. (In App Connect Designer 12.0.10.0-r1 or earlier instances that include this field, the display name is shown as Agent name.)
    • Set the API key to the API key that is used to authenticate the REST API calls. For more information, see API keys on the Maximo documentation.
    • Set the WebSphere Application Server user name to the username for the WebSphere Application Server account.
      Tip: If the Maximo instance is installed on WebSphere Application Server, provide the username of the WebSphere Application Server account so that you can use WebSphere authentication. For more information, see Installing on WebSphere Application Server in the Maximo Asset Management documentation.
    • Set the WebSphere Application Server password to the password for the WebSphere Application Server account.
    The following example shows completed fields to connect to Maximo from App Connect.
    Example of completed fields for connecting from App Connect
    Note: If Maximo is installed on WebSphere Application Server, you must also provide credentials for the WebSphere Application Server account.
  4. Click Connect.

This action creates an account in App Connect. For more information, see .

Tip:
  • To interact with multiple Maximo instances in your flows, add an account for each instance that you want to access.
  • If you don't have a Maximo account, you can create one to try Maximo for free.

Before you use the account that is created in App Connect in a flow, rename the account to something meaningful that helps you to identify it. To rename the account on the Applications and APIs page, select the account, open its options menu (⋮), then click Rename Account.

What to consider first

Before you use App Connect with Maximo, take note of the following considerations.

  • App Connect supports Maximo version 7.6 deployments that run on premises. For more information, see Maximo Asset Management 7.6.0 in the Maximo documentation.

  • App Connect can listen for events from your Maximo instance and then use those events to trigger event-driven flows. To use a Maximo event as a trigger, you must configure the integration framework in your Maximo instance before you start the flow in App Connect. For information, see Triggering an event-driven flow with a Maximo event and Configuring the IBM Maximo Integration Framework to route outbound event messages to App Connect.
  • App Connect supports actions that create, retrieve, update, or delete records for objects in your Maximo instance. A set of standard objects are displayed by default in the Applications tab or flow editor, and you can click Show More to discover and work with more Maximo objects. Show more option for IBM Maximo
  • (General consideration) You can see lists of the trigger events and actions that are available on the Applications and APIs page of the App Connect Designer.

    For some applications, the events and actions depend on the environment and whether the connector supports configurable events and dynamic discovery of actions. If the application supports configurable events, you see a Show more configurable events link under the events list. If the application supports dynamic discovery of actions, you see a Show more link under the actions list.

  • (General consideration) If you are using multiple accounts for an application, the set of fields that is displayed when you select an action for that application can vary for different accounts. In the flow editor, some applications always provide a curated set of static fields for an action. Other applications use dynamic discovery to retrieve the set of fields that are configured on the instance that you are connected to. For example, if you have two accounts for two instances of an application, the first account might use settings that are ready for immediate use. However, the second account might be configured with extra custom fields.
See also:

Triggering an event-driven flow with a Maximo event

App Connect supports new, updated, and deleted event types for a defined set of Maximo objects.Available Maximo objects for events, showing the Assets events list expanded

To use any of these event types as the trigger for an event-driven flow, you must work with your Maximo system administrator to configure the Maximo Integration Framework. As part of this configuration, you need to provide the webhook callback URL that is supplied for the event in the App Connect flow editor.

Webhook callback URLs are unique to an App Connect instance and Maximo account, object, and event type (as illustrated in the following figure). Therefore, you must configure a separate Maximo integration for each event type that you add to a flow. For example, you're connected to Maximo with Account 1, and you want to trigger flows whenever a record is created, updated, or deleted for an asset object. In this situation, configure three separate integrations for the New asset, Updated asset, and Deleted asset event types. Also configure similar integrations for the event types for other Maximo objects under Account 1. After you configure the integration for a specific event type (for example, New asset), you can use it in multiple flows in your App Connect instance.The following example shows a webhook callback URL in App Connect.Webhook callback URL example

The high-level steps for using a Maximo event to trigger a flow are as follows.
  1. From your App Connect instance, create an event-driven flow.
  2. Add a Maximo event as a trigger for the flow (for a selected Maximo account and object).
  3. For the selected event type, configure the Maximo Integration Framework to route outbound event messages to App Connect. This configuration delivers a POST HTTP request to the webhook callback URL when the status of the object changes in your Maximo instance (for example, when a record is created).

    For more information, see Configuring the IBM Maximo Integration Framework to route outbound event messages to App Connect.

  4. Add actions and any appropriate toolbox nodes to the flow and then start it.

Error handling in the Maximo Integration Framework

Messages in the outbound sequential queue are processed on a first-in-first-out basis. Messages remain in the queue until they are successfully delivered to App Connect or are deleted from the queue. If a message is flagged with a processing error, subsequent messages in the queue are not processed until the error is resolved or deleted.

If you're not seeing the expected results for your App Connect flow and no errors are logged for the flow in App Connect, the flow might not be triggered because Maximo messages are not being delivered to the endpoint URL. Use the Message Reprocessing application to check whether any message is flagged with an error and then resolve or delete the error message. For more information, see Error management in the Maximo Asset Management documentation.

Events and actions

Maximo events

These events are for changes in this application that trigger a flow to start completing the actions in the flow.

Object Event Description
Assets (mxapiasset) Deleted asset Triggers when an asset is deleted in Maximo
New asset Triggers when a new asset is created in Maximo
Updated asset Triggers when an asset is modified in Maximo
Companies (mxapivendor) Deleted company Triggers when a company is deleted in Maximo
New company Triggers when a new company is created in Maximo
Updated company Triggers when a company is modified in Maximo
Contracts (mxapicontract) New contract Triggers when a new contract is created in Maximo
Updated contract Triggers when a contract is modified in Maximo
Crafts (mxapicraft) Deleted craft Triggers when a craft is deleted in Maximo
New craft Triggers when a new craft is created in Maximo
Updated craft Triggers when a craft is modified in Maximo
Labors (mxapilabor) Deleted labor Triggers when a labor is deleted in Maximo
New labor Triggers when a new labor is created in Maximo
Updated labor Triggers when a labor is modified in Maximo
Person groups (mxapipersongroup) Deleted person group Triggers when a person group is deleted in Maximo
New person group Triggers when a new person group is created in Maximo
Updated person group Triggers when a person group is modified in Maximo
Person users (mxapiperuser) Deleted person user Triggers when a person user is deleted in Maximo
New person user Triggers when a new person user is created in Maximo
Updated person user Triggers when a person user is modified in Maximo
Purchase orders (mxapipo) New purchase order Triggers when a new purchase order is created in Maximo
Updated purchase order Triggers when a purchase order is modified in Maximo
Service addresses (mxapiseraddress) Deleted service address Triggers when a service address is deleted in Maximo
New service address Triggers when a new service address is created in Maximo
Updated service address Triggers when a service address is modified in Maximo
Service requests (mxapisr) Deleted service request Triggers when a service request is deleted in Maximo
New service request Triggers when a new service request is created in Maximo
Updated service request Triggers when a service request is modified in Maximo
Work orders (mxapiwo) Deleted work order Triggers when a work order is deleted in Maximo
New work order Triggers when a new work order is created in Maximo
Updated work order Triggers when a work order is modified in Maximo

Maximo actions

Your flow completes these actions on this application.

Object Action Description
Assets (mxapiasset) Create asset Creates an asset
Delete asset Deletes an asset
Download assets as CSV Downloads assets as CSV
Replace asset Replaces an asset
Replace or create asset Replaces or creates an asset
Retrieve assets Retrieves assets
Update asset Updates an asset
Update or create asset Updates or creates an asset
Assets (mxasset) Create asset Creates an asset
Delete asset Deletes an asset
Download assets as CSV Downloads assets as CSV
Replace asset Replaces an asset
Replace or create asset Replaces or creates an asset
Retrieve assets Retrieves assets
Update asset Updates an asset
Update or create asset Updates or creates an asset
Companies (mxapivendor) Create company Creates a company
Delete company Deletes a company
Download companies as CSV Downloads companies as CSV
Replace company Replaces a company
Replace or create company Replaces or creates a company
Retrieve companies Retrieves companies
Update company Updates a company
Update or create company Updates or creates a company
Contracts (mxapicontract) Create contract Creates a contract
Delete contract Deletes a contract
Download contracts as CSV Downloads contracts as CSV
Replace contract Replaces a contract
Replace or create contract Replaces or creates a contract
Retrieve contracts Retrieves contracts
Update contract Updates a contract
Update or create contract Updates or creates a contract
Crafts (mxapicraft) Create craft Creates a craft
Delete craft Deletes a craft
Download crafts as CSV Downloads crafts as CSV
Replace craft Replaces a craft
Replace or create craft Replaces or creates a craft
Retrieve crafts Retrieves crafts
Update craft Updates a craft
Update or create craft Updates or creates a craft
Labors (mxapilabor) Create labor (mxapilabor) Creates a labor
Delete labor Deletes a labor
Download labors as CSV Downloads labors as CSV
Replace labor Replaces a labor
Replace or create labor Replaces or creates a labor
Retrieve labors Retrieves labors
Update labor Updates a labor
Update or create labor Updates or creates a labor
Locations (mxapilocations) Create location Creates a location
Delete location Deletes a location
Download locations as CSV Downloads locations as CSV
Replace location Replaces a location
Replace or create location Replaces or creates a location
Retrieve locations Retrieves locations
Update location Updates a location
Update or create location Updates or creates a location
Person groups (mxapipersongroup) Create person group Creates a person group
Delete person group Deletes a person group
Download person groups as CSV Downloads person groups as CSV
Replace person group Replaces a person group
Replace or create person group Replaces or creates a person group
Retrieve person groups Retrieves person groups
Update person group Updates a person group
Update or create person group Updates or creates a person group
Person users (mxapiperuser) Create person user Creates a person user
Delete person user Deletes a person user
Download person users as CSV Downloads person users as CSV
Replace user Replaces a user
Replace or create person user Replaces or creates a person user
Retrieve person users Retrieves person users
Update person user Updates a person user
Update or create user Updates or creates a user
Purchase orders (mxapipo) Create purchase order Creates a purchase order
Delete purchase order Deletes a purchase order
Download purchase orders as CSV Downloads purchase orders as CSV
Replace purchase order Replaces a purchase order
Replace or create purchase order Replaces or creates a purchase order
Retrieve purchase orders Retrieves purchase orders
Update purchase order Updates a purchase order
Update or create purchase order Updates or creates a purchase order
Service addresses (mxapiseraddress) Create service address Creates a service address
Delete service address Deletes a service address
Download service addresses as CSV Downloads service addresses as CSV
Replace service address Replaces a service address
Replace or create service address Replaces or creates a service address
Retrieve service addresses Retrieves service addresses
Update service address Updates a service address
Update or create service address Updates or creates a service address
Service requests (mxapisr) Create service request Creates a service request
Delete service request Deletes a service request
Download service requests as CSV Downloads service requests as CSV
Replace service request Replaces a service request
Replace or create service request Replaces or creates a service request
Retrieve service requests Retrieves service requests
Update service request Updates a service request
Update or create service request Updates or creates a service request
Work orders (mxapiwo) Create work order Creates a work order
Delete work order Deletes a work order
Download work orders as CSV Downloads work orders as CSV
Replace or create work order Replaces or creates a work order
Replace work order Replaces a work order
Retrieve work orders Retrieves work orders
Update work order Updates a work order
Update or create work order Updates or creates a work order

More items are available after you connect App Connect to Maximo.

Examples

Dashboard tile for a template that uses IBM Maximo

Use templates to create flows for Maximo

Learn how to use App Connect templates to create flows that complete actions on Maximo. For example, go to the Discover page and search for IBM Maximo.

Learn more

Dashboard tile for a template that uses IBM Maximo

Model Context Protocol (MCP) support

The Maximo connector supports MCP, and all Maximo actions for the listed objects can be added to an MCP server as tools. For more information on how to configure an MCP server, see Creating and managing MCP servers.