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Sodium Sync: Configuration and Scheduling

 

Sodium Sync enables synchronization between directory servers and other data sources such as files and databases.

On this page you can read about synchronization configuration and scheduling.

On other pages you can about Data Transformation Mapping and Merging, how Sodium Sync can combine syncs and data checks into a Directory Replication Workflow, other Sodium Sync features and Sodium Sync Conformance.

Sodium Sync Configuration

In this section you'll find an overview of Sodium Sync configuration options. New syncs are configured via a wizard which offers immediate access to a number of synchronization options:

• 3 common directory to directory syncs.
• 4 common LDIF transformations.
• Go straight to Advanced view
• Group syncs into a directory replication workflow as described on this page.

Some of these sync options will lead to a Simplified view of the Sync Wizard, consisting of Source & Target and Scheduling tabs. Others will go directly to an Advanced view which has additional tabs (shown in the following screenshots and in the additional screenshots accessed by clicking on the one below).

The front profile screen gives a workflow diagram of the core functions, the diagram will adapt as different options are chosen in the tabs which define options, including those described below.

Mode

A sync can be configured to operate in a number of different modes (screenshot here):

• Source Only: This sync operates without a target, the primary use of this mode if for checking data.
• Complete Scan: The standard mode of operation used for directory to directory syncs. Source and target (which can be independently configured as directory, LDIF, CSV or SQL) are compared and changes applied to the target.
• Cached Scan: This varient uses a cached copy of the target directory, which the sync will update. This has the advantage of removing the need to read data from the target, which reduces network overhead. This mode is essential for sync over email and related modes where it is not possible to read data from the target directory.
• Recreate: Where a standard sync will calculate changes and apply only necessary changes to the target, this mode will delete the target and fully load each time.
• LDIF: This mode takes a change LDIF (an LDIF representing a set of changes to be applied to a directory) as input.
• Queues: This mode takes as input a sequence of LDIF files and is designed to support sync by email and related modes.

Source and Target

Source and target tabs control where data is coming from and where it is going to. Where to source or target is a directory server, the server is referenced by a bind profile that is configured to connect to that directory at the point of the DIT (directory information tree) used. For the source, options exist to handle aliases either as a mechanical copy or be de-reference (so that the target gets the data from the entry that is pointed to by the alias). Screenshots of the source and target tabs are available.

Checks

A number of checks can be configured including a referential integrity check, constraint on update size and a check that a given attribute is unique. Attribute syntax checks can also be configured by defining custom XML.

Output

The Output tab (which can be seen in this screenshot) gives a number of options for the final step of the sync:

• Discard changes
• Apply changes to the target (this is the standard approach).
• Apply changes to another directory.
• Generate a change LDIF file.
• Generate a change LDIF file for a queue, this is in support of synchronizations by email.
• For a source-only scan, the set of output options is LDIF, CSV and writing to a different area of the source directory.

Trace

The final tab, Trace, gives a number of trace, logging and debug options.

Additional tabs are described in other sections and on other pages. The scheduling tab is described below. The Entries, Attribute, Mapping and Glue tabs are described on the page on Data Transformation Mapping and Merging and the Hooks tab on the Directory Replication Workflow page.

Sync Scheduling

Sodium Sync enables independent scheduling of multiple syncs. Regular syncs can be scheduled daily, hourly or on specified days of the week or month. Syncs can also be specified with an interval so that a sync will start a configurable time after the previous sync has finished.

When unscheduled tasks are run from the Sodium GUI, status and errors are shown interactively. Sodium Sync Manager (below) can be run at any time to check on the status of synchronizations.

When there are problems this screen can be used as an entry point for diagnosing problems and accessing error logs. Any errors are also logged as Isode events. These events can be monitored using any of the approaches available as part of the Isode event system.