Processes

A Process defines multiple steps to achieve a data validation or human validation process, a transformation process, an enrichment process, a data integration process, and so on. Each step of a Process can use a plugin, which is a mechanism to add specific capabilities to the process to perform a single task. The list of available plugins is extensible by J2EE developers. The steps defined in each Process and the plugins used will differ according to the task you want to accomplish.

One of the plugins available in any Talend MDM platform is the callJob plugin, which invokes a Talend Job. For further information on Process types and associated plugins, see Process types and Important plugins.

Parameters to set when you define a Process include:

• Process name,

• Process description,

• sequence of steps: the list of all plugins included in the Process to be executed, one after the other,

• step specifications: a Process plugin consumes data in input parameters and produces a result in the output parameters. You must define variables to hold the result of a step. Then you send the variable to the input of the next step, and so forth. Eventually, you define a "pipeline" where each step result is chained to the next step through a variable.

  A plugin may have multiple input variables and parameters, as well as multiple output variables and parameters.

When you design a Process, you combine specific Process plugins in a sequence of steps, which are executed one after the other to perform specific tasks.

For each step, do the following:

1. Choose the appropriate plugin.

2. Enter or select an input variable and an input parameter.

3. Select the output parameter and select or enter the output variable.

For a step-by-step procedure on creating a Process, see Creating a Process from scratch.