Mechanisms for providing BAR files to an integration server or integration runtime
Integration servers and integration runtimes require two types of resources: BAR files that contain development resources, and configuration files (or objects) for setting up the integration servers or integration runtimes. When you create an integration server or integration runtime, you are required to specify one or more BAR files that contain the development resources of the App Connect Designer or IBM® App Connect Enterprise Toolkit integrations that you want to deploy.
A number of mechanisms are available for providing these BAR files to integration servers and integration runtimes. Choose the mechanism that meets your requirements.
Mechanism | Description | BAR files per integration server or integration runtime |
---|---|---|
Content server |
When you use the App Connect Dashboard to upload or import BAR files for deployment to integration servers or integration runtimes, the BAR files are stored in a content server that is associated with the App Connect Dashboard instance. The content server is created as a container in the App Connect Dashboard deployment and can either store uploaded (or imported) BAR files in a volume in the container’s file system, or store them within a bucket in a simple storage service that provides object storage through a web interface. The location of a BAR file in the content server is generated as a BAR URL when a BAR file is uploaded or imported to the Dashboard. This location is specified by using the Bar URL field or spec.barURL parameter. While creating an integration server or integration runtime, you can choose only one BAR file to deploy from the content server and must reference its BAR URL in the content server. The integration server or runtime then uses this BAR URL to download the BAR file on startup, and processes the applications appropriately. If you are creating an integration server or integration runtime from the Dashboard, and use the Integrations view to specify a single BAR file to deploy, the location of this file in the content server will be automatically set in the Bar URL field or spec.barURL parameter in the Properties (or Server) view. For more information, see Creating an integration server to run your BAR file resources (for Designer integrations), Creating an integration server to run IBM App Connect Enterprise Toolkit integrations, and Creating an integration runtime to run your BAR file resources. If you are creating an integration server or integration runtime from the Red Hat®
OpenShift® web console or CLI, or the Kubernetes CLI, and want to deploy a BAR file from the content server, you must obtain the BAR file location
from the The location of a BAR file in the content server is typically generated in the following format:
Where:
For example:
|
1 |
External repository (Applicable only if spec.version resolves to 12.0.1.0-r1 or later) |
While creating an integration server or integration runtime, you can choose to deploy multiple BAR files, which are stored in an external HTTPS repository system, to the integration server or integration runtime. You might find this option useful if you have set up continuous integration and continuous delivery (CI/CD) pipelines to automate and manage your DevOps processes, and are building and storing BAR files in a repository system such as JFrog Artifactory. This option enables you to directly reference one or more BAR files in your integration server or
integration runtime CR without the need to manually upload or import the BAR files to the content
server in the App Connect Dashboard or build a custom image. You will need to
provide basic (or alternative) authentication credentials for connecting to the external endpoint
where the BAR files are stored, and can do so by creating a configuration object of type
If you are creating an integration server or integration runtime from the Dashboard, you can use
the Configuration view to create (and select) a configuration object of type
BarAuth that defines the required credentials. You can then use the
Properties (or Server) view to specify the endpoint
locations of one or more BAR files in the Bar URL field or as the
spec.barURL value. If you want to be able to use the App Connect Dashboard to view your integration server or integration runtime, also
set the following parameter:
If you are creating an integration server or integration runtime from the Red Hat
OpenShift web console or CLI, or the Kubernetes CLI, you must create a configuration object of type
BarAuth that defines the
required credentials, as described in Configuration reference and BarAuth type. When you create the integration
server or integration runtime CR, you must specify the name of the configuration object in
spec.configurations and then specify the endpoint locations of one or more BAR
files in spec.barURL. If you want to be able to use the App Connect Dashboard to view your integration server or integration runtime, also
set the following parameter:
You can specify multiple BAR files as follows:
Tip: If you are using GitHub as an external repository, you must specify the
rawURL in the Bar URL field or in spec.barURL. For example: https://raw.github.ibm.com/somedir/main/bars/getHostAPI.bar
https://github.com/johndoe/somedir/raw/main/getHostAPI.bar
https://raw.githubusercontent.com/myusername/myrepo/main/My%20API.bar Some considerations apply if deploying multiple BAR files:
|
Multiple |
Custom image |
You can build a custom server runtime image that contains all the configuration for the integration server or integration runtime, including all the BAR files or applications that are required, and then use this image to deploy an integration server or integration runtime. When you create the integration server or integration runtime CR, you must reference this image
by using the following parameter:
For example:
This image must be built from the version that is specified as the spec.version value in the CR. Channels are not supported when custom images are used. |
Multiple |