Teiid Designer
Designer "modeling" Perspective
The Teiid Designer perspective provides a model explorer for creating, editing and managing models (XMI/EMF-based) and Virtual Databases (VDBs). When deployed to Teiid server, these VDBs can be accessed like any other JDBC data source and queried.
A model is a representation of a set of information constructs. A familiar model type is the relational model, which defines tables composed of columns and containing records of data. Another familiar model type is the XML model, which defines hierarchical data sets.
In Teiid Designer, models are used to define the entities, and relationships between those entities, required to fully define the integration of information sets so that they may be accessed in a uniform manner, using a single API and access protocol. The file extension used for these models is '.xmi' ( Example: NorthwindOracle.xmi ).
Below is an example of the partial contents of a model file.
The fundamental models in Teiid Designer define the structural and data characteristics of the information contained in data sources. These are referred to as source models. Teiid uses the information in source models to federate the information from multiple sources, so that from a user's viewpoint these all appear to be in a single source.
In addition to source models, Teiid Designer provides the ability to define a variety of view models. These can be used to define a layer of abstraction above the physical (or source) layer, so that information can be presented to end users and consuming applications in business terms rather than as it is physically stored. Views are mapped to sources using transformations between models. These business views can be in a variety of forms:
- Relational
- XML
- Web services
- Uml 2.0
In Teiid Designer 7.1 you can Preview Data through the models you've created and execute queries against VDBs created in your workspace. These features are enabled by deployment of VDB artifacts to an instance of Teiid running in an application server. In Designer, the Teiid view is a window which displays the contents of your deployed Teiid artifacts, namely Data Sources and Virtual Databases (VDBs).
The Virtual Database (VDB)
A VDB, or Virtual Database is a container for your models and pertinent source connection data used by Teiid query engine to access your federated data.
Teiid Designer allows you to create and edit VDBs. The VDB is a zip archive file that contains sources and view models, source connection properties, index files used at runtime for data identification, and a manifest to pull it all together.
Each source model must contain connectivity information in order for the Teiid engine understand which connection factory/data source instance to connect with. In particular, a "Translator" name and an existing "JNDI" name must be defined.
After a VDB is defined, it must be deployed to the Teiid instance to be accessed. You can select a VDB in your Model Explorer and right-click select "Modeling > Deploy VDB" action or drag the VDB onto an existing server connected in your Teiid view.
Teiid as JDBC Data Source
Teiid Designer 7.1 provides access to the VDBs deployed to Teiid via a JDBC Connection Profile in the Eclipse Database Development perspective. The properties for this connection include standard JDBC inputs including URL, host, port, user-name and password.
Through this connection, you can perform standard SQL queries on VDBs. The nature of the Teiid Virtual Database allows complex, multi-source modeling and data transformation, so you can design views targeted for your front-end applications and simplify or reduce the work necessary to pull all that data together.
Web Services support
Teiid Designer 7.1 supports generation of deployable web service War Files. For VDB's that contain web service models, there is a contextual menu option to generate a JBossWS-CXF war. This generated war can be deployed to a JBossAS server with CXF enabled. The wizard will ask for a war context name, target namespace, JNDI name for the deployed Teiid VDB, and location to generate the war file. Once deployed, the wsdl can be obtained via http://host:port/warContextName?wsdl