Deploying integration servers and integration runtimes

The App Connect Dashboard capability provides an IBM® App Connect runtime environment for integrations, and is intended to host production workloads.

From your App Connect Dashboard instance, you can deploy the following types of integrations:

Integrations that were developed as an integration solution in the IBM App Connect Enterprise Toolkit (the toolkit). An integration solution is the container for the resources (for example, message flows, message flow nodes, and message models) that you develop to process your business messages and data.
Integrations that were authored as flows in an instance of App Connect Designer or App Connect on IBM Cloud.
Hybrid integrations that were developed by using the toolkit, and App Connect Designer or App Connect on IBM Cloud.

You can deploy any of these integrations as follows:

From the toolkit, package the message flows and other development resources for an integration solution into a broker archive (BAR) file. Or from your App Connect Designer or App Connect on IBM Cloud instance, export a flow definition as a BAR file.
Upload the BAR file to your App Connect Dashboard instance.
Deploy the BAR file to an integration server or integration runtime to expose the underlying integration that runs in your production system.

You can also use your App Connect Dashboard instance to store and manage BAR files.

Considerations for deploying integration servers and integration runtimes

To deploy BAR files that contain flow definitions from App Connect Designer or App Connect on IBM Cloud, take note of the following considerations:
- If you want to export a flow from App Connect on IBM Cloud as a BAR file, that flow must meet the requirements for export. Certain actions or nodes in App Connect on IBM Cloud are not supported for BAR file export, so you might need to reconfigure alternative actions in the flow before you are allowed to export.
- While deploying the BAR file in the App Connect Dashboard, you must set up accounts to connect to the target applications that are referenced in the flow definition and to run the configured operations.
While deploying the BAR file for any type of integration, you can select or create one or more configuration objects that you want apply to the integration server or integration runtime. Various configuration types are supported, which you can use to define environment-specific settings, secrets, or data. The accounts that are required for connecting to the target applications in Designer integrations must be configured as configuration objects.