What are services
The following sections describe some possible service integrations. You can invoke REST services or Java™ applications directly from your process or add an external service to discover and invoke published REST services, web services, or Java applications from a service flow. For information on adding services to processes, see Services.
REST services
- By selecting an operation in a service task, mapping the inputs and outputs, and calling the service task in a service flow. When you discover a REST service, the operations that you select are included in the external service and they are available for invocation by a service task. See Invoking a REST service.
- Some REST operations can only be invoked by using JavaScript. These operations are not available for invocation by a service task. When you discover a service, you see a list of the operations that require JavaScript invocation. See Invoking a REST service by using JavaScript.
Web services
You can discover a web service that is hosted on an external system, and use a service task in a service flow to invoke the web service. To invoke a web service, you discover the WSDL file from a URL and select the operations that you want to include. The external service is generated when you complete the service discovery.
Each external service maps to a single port type. The external service includes the operations for the port type and the inputs, outputs and faults that are defined in the WSDL for each operation. The external service is bound to a web service server that contains the information for connecting to the host. The operations of the external service are available for invocation by a service task. See Invoking a web service server.
Java services
A Java service invokes a Java application. To create a Java service, discover a JAR file from the library and select a class. An external service is created, with an operation for each method in the class, and inputs and outputs. The service has a binding type of Java.
To call a Java service, you can discover a Java class and generate an external service. You can then use the external service in a service flow to call the Java service. See Invoking a Java service.