The SAP HR system is a relational database. Individual HR objects, such as the Person object, do not contain all of the information that is typically needed to describe the function of the Person within an organization. Organizational and Position information is contained in different objects that are related to the Person object for a specified period of time. The name of a Position a Person holds, the name of the Organization he or she belongs to, and the Organizational hierarchy to which a person belongs can only be determined by traversing the various relationships between objects.
The SAP driver has a special capability that allows a query to be made for the object relationships between an SAP object being processed in the Publisher channel and other SAP objects. This information is contained in Infotype 1001 (Object relationships) in the HRMD_A IDoc. (The documentation for the meaning of the various fields of this Infotype can be found on the SAP system by using transaction WE60.) Because this relationship information cannot be easily mapped to Identity Vault attributes, and because namespace attributes are stripped out of XML documents during various phases of processing, the capability to query for the pseudo-class RELATIONSHIPS was built into the driver.
The Relationship Query uses different forms:
This query uses the class identifier of the last object sent by the driver to the engine. In the context of the driver’s default configuration, this query provides accurate results for obtaining relationship data from Position objects as they are processed.
<nds dtdversion="1.0" ndsversion="8.5">
<input>
<query class-name="RELATIONSHIPS" event-id="0"
scope="entry">
<association>50000354</association>
</query>
</input>
</nds>
This query utilizes the <search-class> element to specify the class of the object from which relationship data is desired. The driver combines the value of the element with the association to identify the proper relationship vector to return. This allows the policies to obtain relationship data from any object in the current IDoc being processed. The default driver configuration contains queries of this type to provide working examples.
<nds dtdversion="1.0" ndsversion="8.5">
<input>
<query class-name="RELATIONSHIPS" event-id="0"
scope="entry">
<association>50000354</association>
<search-class class-name="S"/>
</query>
</input>
</nds>
The driver allows the return of all relationship information in a structured <value> format. This allows the style sheets to utilize any relationship data that is desired for implementing business rules. It is the responsibility of the configuration expert to determine which data is utilized, including time stamp information. The driver returns all requested fields in the 1001 (Relationships) infotype that contain a value. If a field is not populated or present, it is not returned. A sample of a reply to the RELATIONSHIPS Query 2 is presented below:
<nds dtdversion="1.0" ndsversion="8.5">
<source>
<product build="INVALID_BUILD_ID" instance="SAP-HR" version="1.0.2">Identity Manager Driver for SAP/HR</product>
<contact>Novell, Inc.</contact>
</source>
<output> <instance class-name="RELATIONSHIPS" timestamp="20030529" xmlns:sapshim="http://www.novell.com/dirxml/drivers/SAPShim">
<association>50000354</association>
<sapshim:policyAttr attr-name="RELATIONSHIPS">
<value type="structured">
<component name="ITXNR">00000000</component>
<component name="BEGDA">20020225</component>
<component name="INFTY">1001</component>
<component name="SEQNR">000</component>
<component name="ISTAT">1</component>
<component name="OTYPE">S</component>
<component name="RELAT">003</component>
<component name="ENDDA">99991231</component>
<component name="SCLAS">O</component>
<component name="PLVAR">01</component>
<component name="MANDT">001</component>
<component name="UNAME">NOVADM</component>
<component name="RSIGN">A</component>
<component name="SOBID">50000127</component>
<component name="OBJID">50000354</component>
<component name="VARYF">O 50000127</component>
<component name="AEDTM">20020225</components>
</value>
<value type="structured">
<component name="ITXNR">00000000</component>
<component name="BEGDA">20020225</component>
<component name="INFTY">1001</component>
<component name="SEQNR">000</component>
<component name="ISTAT">1</component>
<component name="OTYPE">S</component>
<component name="RELAT">005</component>
<component name="ENDDA">99991231</component>
<component name="SCLAS">S</component>
<component name="PLVAR">01</component>
<component name="MANDT">001</component>
<component name="UNAME">NOVADM</component>
<component name="RSIGN">A</component>
<component name="SOBID">50000485</component>
<component name="OBJID">50000354</component>
<component name="VARYF">S 50000485</component>
<component name="AEDTM">20020301</component>
</value>
<value type="structured">
<component name="ITXNR">00000000</component>
<component name="BEGDA">20020225</component>
<component name="INFTY">1001</component>
<component name="SEQNR">000</component>
<component name="ISTAT">1</component>
<component name="OTYPE">S</component>
<component name="RELAT">007</component>
<component name="ENDDA">99991231</component>
<component name="SCLAS">C</component>
<component name="PLVAR">01</component>
<component name="MANDT">001</component>
<component name="UNAME">NOVADM</component>
<component name="RSIGN">B</component>
<component name="SOBID">50000144</component>
<component name="OBJID">50000354</component>
<component name="VARYF">C 50000144</component>
<component name="AEDTM">20020225</component>
</value>
</sapshim:policyAttr>
</instance>
</output>
</nds>
The <read-attr> implementation of the driver RELATIONSHIPS query has been modified as follows:
The lack of a <read-attr> element implies a request to return all components of each matching relationship value.
An empty <read-attr/> element specifies that no values will be returned. This is a useless operation that is not recommended.
<read-attr> elements with attr-name attribute values indicate which specific component values are desired for each matching relationship value.
The <search-attr> functionality of the XDS DTD has been added to the driver RELATIONSHIP query. This enables queries for relationships matching more exacting criteria to reduce the quantity and type of reply data. Multiple <search-attr> values are interpreted as a logical AND of the individual search components. The default Publisher Command Transformation policy has been modified to use the new capabilities of the driver.
The following example is from the set-roles-manager-attr template, used to retrieve the SOBID value from any relationship with an RSIGN value of A and an SCLAS value of S:
<nds dtdversion="1.0" ndsversion="8.5">
<input>
<query class-name="RELATIONSHIPS" event-id="0" scope="entry">
<association>
<xsl:value-of select="$newRole-ID"/>
</association>
<search-class class-name="S"/>
<search-attr attr-name="RSIGN">
<value>A</value>
</search-attr>
<search-attr attr-name="SCLAS">
<value>S</value>
</search-attr>
<read-attr attr-name="SOBID"/>
<query>
</input>
</nds>