Cloud Pak for Integration

Before you dive into using the integration yourself, this post will provide you with a quick overview of what to expect, giving you a taste of the features and benefits of IBM’s solution to multi-form API management. This guide will not cover the configuration steps however, you can find the instructions in the documentation. 

To get started, we need to set up our Event Endpoint Management system with some event sources that we will use to share AsyncAPIs with our instance of API Connect later on. Event Endpoint Management v11.3.0 and API Connect v10.0.8.0 was used in this integration example at the time of writing.

Step 1: Define event sources in Event Endpoint Management 

Event source is the term used to describe a topic when it has been added to Event Endpoint Management. You need to first define event sources in Event Endpoint Management by identifying which Kafka topics from your Kafka cluster are needing to be managed. In this walkthrough, we will be using an IBM Event Streams Kafka cluster to add topics from. In Event Endpoint Management, event sources will act as the entry points for applications to consume or produce messages. You can view event sources in the ‘Manage topics’ page.  

The Event Endpoint Management 'Manage topics' page, where an admin creates event sources to describe a topic once it has been added. 

Step 2: Manage event sources 

Event sources can be categorized as either consume-enabled or produce-enabled when registered with Event Endpoint Management, depending on how you plan the applications will interact with them. You can manage these event sources to ensure that they interact with the correct types of Kafka clusters. New event sources are added by clicking the `Add topic` button and following the flow to determine the type of interaction and provide basic topic details from the Kafka cluster such as name, partition and replica information. You can be update and add additional information such as tags, which can help describe the content of the event source through keywords and schema details. 

Additional information, such as: descriptions, tags, schema, sample messages, about the kafka topic can be documented in the event source. 

Step 3: Publish options to Event Endpoint Management catalog 

Once you have defined your event sources, you need to publish an option for the event source to the Event Endpoint Management catalog. This action makes the event endpoints viewable to developers in the organization, facilitating the reuse of events.  

Options can be created for an event source, which enables the admin to control how the topic's stream of events are made available in the catalog.

Step 4: Implement governance controls 

Event sources offer the ability to implement controls on options, such as approval, which allows you to gain greater management over how event source data is presented. This governance ensures that only authorized users can interact with the specific event data. The approval control can be applied to both consume and produce-enabled event sources. However, in the integration with API Connect, note that the approval control must not be added to the option as this level of management will be managed in API Connect. Other controls such as redaction, schema filtering and schema enforcement can be applied to options that will be discoverable in API Connect. For more details about the how the different controls can be used, refer to the documentation.

Step 5: Use API Manager to add AsyncAPIs 

With the power of the integration, you can create new AsyncAPIs in the API Manager without needing to navigate back to the Event Endpoint Management UI. You can view all discoverable event endpoints and publish them to products directly. This enables a smoother workflow and accelerates the API development process, enabling the APIs to be discoverable by a developer quicker. 

Event Endpoint Management provides the capability to discover, describe and manage event endpoints as an AsyncAPI, which can then be imported into API Connect. The API Manager is able to discover the published options from Event Endpoint Management without the need to go back and forth between platforms. 

Once an AsyncAPI has been imported to the API Manager from Event Endpoint Management, an API administrator can manage their events alongside their RESTful APIs in one unified platform. 

Step 6: Publishing API to a product in API Manager

Once you have the AsyncAPI registered with API Manager, you can configure policies for security, rate limiting and logging to ensure governance. Next, you need to associate the API with a product, which serves as a container for one or more APIs bundled together. This simplifies access to the relevant APIs for developers within your organization. After you have configured your product from a selection of plans, added documentation and any required approval workflows, it is published to the developer portal. This makes the API accessible to registered developers, who can generate the necessary credentials for their applications that require AsyncAPIs that are integrated from Event Endpoint Management.  

The developer portal catalogs all published APIs and events for your organization's developers to discover and interact with. 

Step 7: Generate access credentials 

In the developer portal, a developer from your organization can browse through an array of available products, which can be identified by descriptions and organized base on specific functionality and services. For example, in our case we have two products: Produce-events-to-EEM and Consume-events-from-EEM, which are grouped based on the type of interaction that a developer would have with the event endpoint. When the developer discovers a product that includes an API which they want to use, they can review details about the APIs in the product. 

Once the developer has reviewed the details and is ready to begin interacting with the API, the developer can proceed to generate access credentials within the portal. This process typically involves selecting the appropriate access plan, after which the developer is provided with an API key or token that enables secure interactions with the API and its event data.  

A developer can 'Get Access' to the APIs and events they want in the developer portal. 

Step 8: Integrate APIs and Events 

With access credentials in hand, developers can now integrate their APIs and events into applications, leveraging the streamlined access to event-driven data managed by Event Endpoint Management. The developer will need to implement these credentials and other properties into their applications, which can all be referenced in the overview of the API. If you are looking at starting a new application, you can find sample code snippets that help the developer get started. With the access credentials generated and the integration successfully established, the developer is now fully equipped to consume and produce events using the integrated APIs, unlocking the potential to create dynamic and responsive applications powered by real time data from Event Endpoint Management.

Sample code is provided in both API Connect and Event Endpoint Management, in order to help you get started with integrating your APIs and events into your applications.