Writer modules

Writer modules manage communications between gateways and third-party applications, and format the alert correctly for entry into the application.

The writer module generates log files that can help debug the gateway.

Communication between the writer module and the third-party application uses helper applications, which interact directly with the application through its APIs or other interfaces. These processes are transparent to the user (though they are visible using the ps command or similar utility).

The writer module uses a reference number cache to track the alerts and their associated reference number in the target application. For each alert, the cache stores the following:

The serial number of the alert
A reference number from the target application, such as a helpdesk ticket number

When a ticket is raised in response to an alert, the writer module enters the reference number in the cache and returns it to the ObjectServer where the alert is updated to include the reference number.

The following figure shows a simplified example of the writer module architecture.

This figure shows an example reader/writer module architecture. — Figure 1. Reader/writer module architecture