Entity operations and actions

This topic explains the following fundamental concepts which form the basis for a request originating from any connector:

• Entity
• Operation
• Action

All the Integration Connectors provide a layer of abstraction for the objects of the connected application. You can access an application's objects only through this abstraction. The abstraction is exposed to you as entities, operations, and actions.

• Entity: An entity can be thought of as an object, or a collection of properties, in the connected application or service. The definition of an entity differs from a connector to a connector. For example, in a database connector, tables are the entities, in a file server connector, folders are the entities, and in a messaging system connector, queues are the entities.

  However, it is possible that a connector doesn't support or have any entities, in which case the Entities list will be empty. For example, the Pub/Sub connector doesn't have any entity, but only has the publishMessage action.

• Operation: An operation is the activity that you can perform on an entity. You can perform any of the following operations on an entity:
  • List
  • Get
  • Create
  • Update
  • Delete

  Selecting an entity from the available list, generates a list of operations available for the entity. For a detailed description of the operations, see the Connectors task's entity operations. However, it is possible that a connector doesn't support any entity operations, in which case the Operations list will be empty.

• Action: An action is a first class function that is made available to the integration through the connector interface. Actions let you make changes to an entity or entities, and vary from connector to connector. However, it is possible that a connector doesn't support any action, in which case the Actions list will be empty.