Chapter 6 Using Application Integrator with EAServer

EAServer and Application Integrator architecture

To create EAServer components that execute COBOL applications or stored procedures, use the Application Integrator (AI) Component Builder. The AI Component Builder is a Sybase Central plug-in, which runs on Windows. You can use the Component Builder to easily create components and deploy them on EAServer running on a Windows or UNIX machine.

This chapter does not include instructions for creating EAServer components; see either the Application Integrator for CICS Reference or the Application Integrator for Stored Procedures Reference.

Figure 6-1 shows how AI components on a Windows or UNIX server access CICS (COBOL) programs on the mainframe and stored procedures in databases.

Figure 6-1: EAServer and Application Integrator

Each AI component makes calls to either the COBOL program or a stored procedure through the AI Adapter, which is a set of Java classes. For AI for CICS components, the call is routed through either a direct TCP/IP network connection or a TCP/IP-SNA (Microsoft's SNA Server) network connection managed by Sybase DirectConnect™. For AI for Stored Procedures components, the call is routed through a JDBC protocol network connection.

On the MVS mainframe, Open ServerConnect™, the AI for CICS server, and the COBOL program reside in a CICS region. The call is received by Open ServerConnect, which forwards it to the AI for CICS server; the AI for CICS server forwards the message to the COBOL program, which executes the business logic associated with the component method.

On the database, the call is received by the database server, which executes the stored procedure that corresponds to the component method. You can access Sybase Adaptive Server Anywhere and Adaptive Server Enterprise database stored procedures. You can also access stored procedures on any database that provides JDBC connectivity. EAServer uses jConnect as the JDBC driver. You must install another vendor's JDBC driver if you are connecting to a non-Sybase database.