The Info*Engine Java Platform, Enterprise Edition (Java EE) connector is Info*Engine’s implementation of Java EE Connector Architecture (JCA) version 1.0. JCA was designed to supply standard implementation for interaction between Java EE application servers and enterprise information systems (EIS), in this case Info*Engine.

The connector is a low level software driver that allows access to Info*Engine from a Java EE application server environment (such as JBOSS or Sun ONE), or a standalone Java client (command-line or swing application). The Info*Engine Java EE connector uses SOAP as its communication protocol. The connector is similar to a JDBC driver, in that the connector understands the low-level aspects of connecting to and interacting with Info*Engine similar to how a JDBC driver connects to and interacts with a relational database.

For more information on configuring your application server environment for use with the Info*Engine Java EE connector, see the appropriate white paper for your environment (Sun ONE or JBoss). These white papers can be found on the Windchill Info*Engine page of the Reference Documents section of the PTC website at the following URL:

The Info*Engine Java EE connector communicates with Info*Engine using SOAP. SOAP is a standard request/response protocol for interacting with a web service using XML. Info*Engine includes the SOAP RPC servlet which allows Info*Engine tasks to be exposed to a client using HTTP or JMS.

Info*Engine can describe a SOAP service to a client at runtime using Web Service Definition Language (WSDL). Delivered along with the Java EE connector are tools that use WSDL metadata information to generate client-side Java classes that can be used to simplify interactions with Info*Engine. The supplied tools can generate Data Access Objects (DAOs) and Enterprise Java Beans (EJBs) that expose standard Java methods that drive interactions with Info*Engine.