Introduction

This document covers the following topics:


About Natural Business Services

NaturalONE - or more specifically, the Service Development component of NaturalONE - is the client for the Natural Business Services (NBS) product which runs on the server. This server product also includes Natural Construct.

When the Service Development component of NaturalONE has been installed, you can generate and maintain business services on the client, and you can upload the generated business service resources to your Natural Business Services environment on the server.

Before you read this documentation, it is recommended that you make yourself familiar with the Natural Business Services documentation, which is available separately. The most up-to-date Natural Business Services documentation is always available at http://documentation.softwareag.com/natural/nbs.htm (Empower login required).

Managing Business Services with NaturalONE

Each business service combines a group of methods related to a common business entity, such as a customer or order. Processing for the methods is supplied by either existing or wizard-generated Natural subprograms.

The Service Development component of NaturalONE provides a wizard for generating business services. But you can also download your existing business services from a Natural Business Services environment on a mainframe or Linux server.

This wizard generates all default resources that are required by the business service. These include:

  • Domain
    Domains are used to group related business services. Each business service is assigned to a domain. For each domain, you can define specific security permissions.

  • Steplib Chain
    A steplib chain defines the libraries in which the Natural objects for a business service are stored. The libraries are accessed in the order in which they are listed in the steplib chain. By default, all business services in a domain are accessed using the same steplib chain.

  • Methods
    The wizard allows you to generate a specific subprogram type (for example, a subprogram that provides browse functionality for a Natural object) or no subprogram at all. The type of method that is generated depends on the subprogram type that you select in the wizard.

After you have generated or download a business service, you can generate Java clients and web services from your business service.

Note:
For information on how to test your business services, see the documentation for the Application Testing component of NaturalONE.

Prerequisites

Server

To use the Service Development component of NaturalONE, a Natural Business Services (NBS) environment is required on the server. For information on installing and configuring a Natural Business Services environment on a server, see the Natural Business Services documentation.

Although business services can be generated into a project connected to the local Natural runtime environment, they cannot be executed in the local Construct runtime environment. You have to upload the business services to the server so that they can be tested with Application Testing component of NaturalONE.

NaturalONE only supports Natural RPC servers. A Natural RPC server is a service which runs under a broker and which routes the requests from the NBS client to the NBS server. Responses (data) generated on the NBS server are then sent to the client via the Natural RPC server. The Natural RPC server definitions are set in the EntireX preferences.

Natural Business Services Version 5.3.1 Service Pack 20 or higher is required to execute business services via the Natural RPC server. However, if you want to make use of the latest server functionality (for example, the Object-Maint-Enhanced-Subp model), Natural Business Services Version 8.2 is required on the server.

Business services created on a Natural RPC server can be used in other NBS environments.

Note:
If you want to test business services and subprograms, see NaturalONE's Application Testing documentation for information on the prerequisites.

Client

If the Service Development component of NaturalONE has not yet been installed, use the Software AG Installer to install it.

The Service Development component is always installed together with the Application Testing component and the Natural Construct component of NaturalONE.