Develop code using Java API

When you are programming through the Java API, you generally follow a programming pattern. The pattern involves obtaining a context, obtaining a manager from the context, obtaining a Java API entity object, and modifying the object and saving it.

Obtaining a context

To access IBM® Product Master entities and methods, the Java code must first obtain a PIMContext. You can obtain a PIMContext in two ways:

• You can obtain a fresh context by providing the username, password, and company information to the API: PIMContextFactory.getContext(user name, password, company name). This method is used when you are writing stand-alone Java API applications or unsecured web services.
• If the Java API code is running in an already authenticated context (for example, an extension point implementation class that runs within the Product Master application or a secure web service, where authentication information was provided when the web service was started), you can obtain the existing context through the API: PIMContextFactory.getCurrentContext(). Using this approach removes the over head of creating extra contexts.

Obtaining a manager from the context

After the context is available, you can retrieve from the context a Java API manager object that corresponds to the entity. For example, a manager for the catalog can be obtained by using the Java API.

CatalogManager ctgManager = context.getCatalogManager();

Obtaining a Java API entity object

After manager for an entity is obtained from the context, you can access the entity itself. For example, a catalog object can be obtained from the catalog manager by using the Java API.

Catalog catalog = ctgManager.getCatalog("my catalog");

Modifying the object and saving it

The entity object that you obtained from the manager class can be modified by using the APIs that are available within the object itself. After the modifications are done, you save them to the database with the save() method. For example, a catalog object that is obtained from the catalog manager can be modified and saved by using the Java API.

catalog.addSecondaryHierarchy(hierarchy);
catalog.save();