Sterling File Gateway partner conversion overview

To use the features and advantages of Global Mailbox, you can convert the existing Sterling File Gateway partners (producers and consumers) to use Global Mailbox.

You can convert a single partner at a time or multiple partners at one time. A Sterling File Gateway route provisioner, administrator, architect, or operator can convert a partner to use Global Mailbox.

Restriction: The conversion is irreversible. If for any reason you no longer want to use Global Mailbox, you must re-create the partner and routes in Sterling File Gateway.

When you convert partners to use Global Mailbox, mailboxes equivalent to the existing traditional mailboxes are created in the Global Mailbox realm for the partner. User permissions and virtual roots are also created in the Global Mailbox realm. The user accounts associated with an Sterling File Gateway partner remain in Sterling B2B Integrator when the partner is converted to use Global Mailbox. Permissions for the user on a certain Global Mailbox are granted within Global Mailbox system, but the user account remains within Sterling B2B Integrator.

Traditional mailboxes continue to exist, but are no longer used. You can move the messages in traditional mailboxes to the Global Mailbox, at the time you convert the partner. After a partner is converted to use Global Mailbox, new messages for that partner are written to the Global Mailbox.

Important: Producing Partners with Global Mailbox can only send files to Consumers in Global Mailbox, not traditional mailboxes. Producers with traditional mailboxes can send to Global Mailbox consumers or traditional consumers.
The system has the following behavior for messages that are staged for pickup by a consumer partner who is converted to use Global Mailbox:
  • If a message is staged for pickup by an initiating consumer, the message is created in the Global Mailbox.
  • If a message is staged for a listening consumer partner, a Global Mailbox is not created for the listening consumer partner, as Sterling File Gateway routes reference files directly from a queue. However, if the listening consumer partner has a mailbox and virtual root assigned in Sterling B2B Integrator, then a Global Mailbox is created for the partner.

If users want to access messages that were processed before conversion, they must access the messages with a user or virtual root that is not configured to use Global Mailbox. Sterling B2B Integrator adapters route to the appropriate realm based on the user virtual root.

At the time of conversion, routing events and subscriptions corresponding to the routing channels are created in Global Mailbox realm for the producer partner if the producer has associated routing channels in Sterling File Gateway. The event subscriptions and routing events are created in the Global Mailbox realm and linked to Sterling File Gateway business processes. You can verify the event rules and subscriptions in the Global Mailbox management tool.

Upon receipt, if a file matches routing channel information, Sterling File Gateway honors the routing events and routes the files to the Global Mailbox. If the file does not match a routing channel, Sterling File Gateway rejects the file.

Important: Routing channels for Producing Partners in the Global Mailbox must not have Consumers in traditional mailboxes.

When a partner who is converted to use Global Mailbox is deleted, event subscriptions that are associated with the partner routing channels, the virtual root mailbox, and all sub-mailboxes are deleted from the Global Mailbox realm. Also, the routing channels that are associated with partner are deleted from Sterling File Gateway database, and Sterling B2B Integrator user, organization, and trading partner hierarchy objects are deleted from the Sterling B2B Integrator database.

You can use the search functions in Sterling File Gateway to search for files in the Global Mailbox. Activity in myFileGateway cannot be searched when Global Mailbox is enabled.