Today I am going to tell you about what Sitecore Connect is and some of the basic terminologies you must know before working with Sitecore Connect.
Sitecore Connect is a low-code or no-code, set of powerful integration tools and connectors platform that allows businesses to easily integrate their Sitecore Digital Experience Platform (DXP) with other third-party systems.
Workato's iPaaS (Integration Platform as a Service) system powers the Sitecore Connect. It offers various features such as a code editor, and testing tools along with a drag-and-drop interface builder in addition to a large selection of pre-built connectors, APIs, and other development tools to make the integration process easier and faster. Since it offers pre-built connectors, APIs, and tools, it allows the developers and marketers to collaborate with each other resulting in faster time to market, and lower development costs.
In my previous blog, I provided a detailed explanation of the topic introduction to Sitecore Connect. You can read about it here.
Basic Terminologies
Connectors – Connectors are a set of integration tools provided by Sitecore to seamlessly integrate Sitecore with various third-party systems and technologies. With the help of these connectors, organizations, and businesses can integrate Sitecore to other platforms, services, and applications for improved automation, sharing of data, and improved functionality. They handle the technical details of authentication, data exchange, and API calls.
Recipe – Recipe refers to a set of instructions in a particular order that facilitates the integration between Sitecore and other systems or platforms. These recipes usually illustrate the steps to integrate Sitecore with third-party applications like content management systems (CMS), marketing automation tools, or customer relationship management (CRM) systems. A typical recipe consists of triggers, actions, and conditions that define how data flows between the connected applications.
Trigger – Trigger is an event or condition that initiates the execution of a Recipe in Sitecore Connect. Triggers are designed to detect events or actions that occur outside of the Sitecore platform. These events could be user interactions on the website, data updates in CRM, or any other relevant activities like calling an external API.
Action – Action is a step performed by Sitecore Connect in response to a Trigger. The individual steps within a recipe that performs a specific task are Actions. Actions can include creating, updating, deleting, or retrieving data from an application.
Data Mapping – Data Mapping is the process of defining how data fields from one application correspond to fields in another application within a Recipe. This ensures that data is correctly transferred and mapped between connected systems.
Datapills – Datapills are the output data from a trigger or an action step. They are variables that can be used to map business logic into recipe steps. They streamline the data mapping and reduce errors in integrations.
Variable – A variable is a user-defined datapills that contains a data value. They are the placeholders for dynamic data that can be used within Recipes. They allow users to store and manipulate data dynamically during the execution of a Recipe. These user-declared variables are different from a standard datapill as these declared variables are mutable - the value of the variable can be changed within a recipe.
These are the main terminologies you must know before starting with Sitecore Connect.
References
Introduction to Sitecore Connect - https://doc.sitecore.com/connect/en/users/sitecore-connect/introduction-to-sitecore-connect.html
Sitecore Connect Documentation - https://developers.sitecore.com/integrations/connect
That’s all for Today,
Happy Coding