App Connect for Manufacturing built-in nodes

App Connect for Manufacturing supplies built-in nodes that you can use to define your message flows.

The nodes are listed in the categories under which they are grouped in the node palette, see Message flow node palette.

The mode in which IBM App Connect Enterprise is running can affect the types of node that you can use, see Operation modes.

Manufacturing nodes

The Manufacturing drawer in the Palette view contains App Connect for Manufacturing nodes.

The nodes are represented in the Toolkit by the following images.

Manufacturing nodes common properties and tasks

The following table describes the common properties for the App Connect for Manufacturing nodes.

Description tab properties

Table 1. Common property field
Property	Description	Mandatory	Configurable
Node name	Name of the node.	Yes	Yes
Short description	Brief description of the node.	No	Yes
Long description	Purpose of the node.	No	Yes

Basic tab tasks

The following are the tasks that you can perform in the Basic property tab for a manufacturing node.

Add or Edit

Click to add or edit client items.

Create

If you import message flow from a different computer and database, you can click Create to create the missing datasource items. You need to provide password for each missing datasource item. You then need to create client items by using the same properties as in the imported message flow.

Update Namespace

An OPC UA server maintains the list of namespaces at Root/Objects/Server/NamespaceArray with the value of the NodeId as i=2255. If the OPC server is upgraded, the Namespacearray can change and hence result in message flows that are no longer working.

When you create a client item, SOURCE_ITEM_ADDR attribute of the source item to which the client item is mapped, gets stored in the database. When the client item is added in the message flow, the SOURCE_ITEM_ADDR attribute gets stored in the message flow. The SOURCE_ITEM_ADDR attribute contains the NodeId of the node in the following format.

ns%3D2;s%3DDemo.Static.Scalar.Int32 i.e. ns=2;s=Demo.Static.Scalar.Int32

Each client item should have SOURCE_ITEM_NS attribute. This attribute has the namespace value, fetched from the Namespacearray by using the namespace index of the source item Node Id. If a client item is missing this attribute, before you deploy the message flow, click Update Namespace to add the missing SOURCE_ITEM_NS attribute. Update the Client Items present in the Client Items tree so that SOURCE_ITEM_ADDR attribute is added in database by deleting the mapping target, and remapping it again to the Source Item.

The following are the App Connect for Manufacturing built-in nodes: