With implicit transactions, Integration Server automatically manages both local and XAResource transactions without requiring you to explicitly do anything. Integration Server starts and completes the implicit transaction.

An implicit transaction context, which the transaction manager uses to define a unit of work, starts when an adapter service is encountered in a flow execution. The connection required by the adapter service is registered with the newly created context and used by the adapter service. If another adapter service is encountered, the transaction context is searched to see if the connection is already registered. If the connection is already registered, the adapter service uses this connection. If the connection is not registered, a new connection instance is retrieved and registered with the transaction.

Note that if the top level flow invokes another flow, adapter services in the child flow use the same transaction context. When the top level flow completes, the transaction is completed and is either committed or rolled back, depending on the status (success or failure) of the top level flow.

A single implicit transaction context can contain any number of XA_TRANSACTION connections but no more than one LOCAL_TRANSACTION connection. If you choose to provide dynamic user credentials at run time, all the adapter services using the LOCAL_TRANSACTION connection within a single transaction must use the same user credentials. For example, if you have two adapter services, s1 and s2, configured using the LOCAL_TRANSACTION connection c1 in a single transaction context, both s1 ands2 must either use the same dynamic credentials at run time or the default configured credentials provided at design time. For more information about providing dynamic user credentials for a service's associated connection, see “Changing the User Credentials of a Service's Associated Connection at Run Time”.

For more information about designing and using flows, see webMethods Service Development Help.