Connection - part of the Open Connector Framework (OCF)

The Connection provides the set of properties needed to create an instance of a connector used to access the contents of a specific Asset.

Inside a Connection

A Connection contains properties about the specific use of the connector, such as user Id and password, or parameters that control the scope or resources that should be made available to the connector. It links to an optional Endpoint and/or ConnectorType object.

• ConnectorType - this is a object that describes the type of the connector that needs to be created in order to access the Asset.
• Endpoint - this is the object that describes the server endpoint where the asset is accessed from.

Connector types and endpoints can be reused in multiple connections.

Connections are typically managed in a metadata repository but they can also be manually populated.

Connection implementations

The OCF offers two implementations of the Connection.

  org.odpi.openmetadata.frameworks.connectors.properties.beans.Connection

Connection is a bean implementation of the connection used in REST API requests and events. It allows properties for be set up and retrieved.

  org.odpi.openmetadata.frameworks.connectors.properties.ConnectionProperties

ConnectionProperties is a read-only wrapper for the Connection properties that is used in client interfaces that do not allow the properties to be updated.

Using Connections from open metadata repositories

Each connection stored in a metadata repository has a unique identifier. An application can request a connector instance through selected Egeria OMAS interfaces, such as the Asset Consumer OMAS, with just the unique identifier or name of a connection.
The OMAS retrieves the connection object from the open metadata repositories and passes it to the Connector Broker factory object. The Connector Broker (and underlying Connector Provider) uses the information from the Connection object to create an instance of the connector.

The advantage of retrieving the connection information from a metadata repository is that the connection properties do not need to be hard-coded in the consuming applications.

Connections can be created in the open metadata repositories through the Asset Owner OMAS.

License: CC BY 4.0, Copyright Contributors to the ODPi Egeria project.