2010-12-23 Developers Conference Call

Owned by Ben Wolfe
Last updated: Dec 23, 2010 by Burke MamlinVersion comment
3 min read

Date

23/12/2010

In Attendance

  • You

Agenda

  • Quickly review previous meeting minutes (5 min)

  • 1.8 Update (20 min)

  • Webservices 1.0 discussion meeting (60 min)

  • After-action review & next week's agenda (5 min)

Minutes

Real-time notes: http://notes.openmrs.org/devcall20101223

Web services 1.0 talking points

  1. End goal?

    1. How many services, how many objects, etc

  2. Soap vs REST

    1. both?

    2. Is there a framework that will help us combine them?

  3. Baked into API, or separate module?

  4. Any good examples of object+transaction based APIs out there?

    1. Atlassian JIRA API

    2. Atlassian Confluence Remote API

  5. Authentication methods?

    1. Session-capable (OAuth 2.0 , OpenID)

    2. (REST module uses stateless basic auth through request now)

  6. Publish a WSDL /WADL (Why Contract First?) - (Interesting Debate on Contract First Vs Code First )

Outcomes

Transcripts

  • Backchannel IRC transcript

  • Audio recording of the call: Listen online or download - available after the meeting

Notes

Last Week's TODOs:

  • Need a ticket to test new 1.8 widgets in FormEntry (Burke is creating)

  • Figure out how to mavenize modules

1.8 Update

  • Beta release will be Jan 6 2011

  • Darius has a few tickets left that should be done by then

  • Speed difference for location search is a red flag, but it is due to a built-in 400ms delay on all searches

    • For the sake of performance testing, set the delay to zero

    • Argument against that: trying to mimic a realistic environment, not optimal

  • TODO: reassign TRUNK-1707 (jQuery UI themerolling)

  • TODO: increase resources for OpenMRS servers (test and apps), get OSU involved

  • TODO: Wyclif will email Zabil and cc: Darius re: 1.8 installer

Web Services

  • End goal?

    • 0.1

    • Requirements

    • Within a module (not built into core)

    • Must allow API methods to be easily exposed to web services

    • Must allow modules to easily expose methods through web services (or at least head down this path)

    • Should limit/avoid business rules in web service layer – i.e., thin layer exposing API methods

    • Must support secure connections

    • Methods are documented on the wiki

    • Strategy

    • Not covering full API

    • Not 100% final – will need to allow for us to fail and iterate

    • Not part of core

    • Not necessarily using the same objects as the API – i.e., introduce DTOs

    • How many services, how many objects, etc?

    • Authentication

    • R (get & search) methods (concept, person, user, locations, cohorts, ...)

    • CRUD methods (patient, encounter, obs)

    • Export "patient" (with their encounters, obs, etc.)

    • 0.2

    • HL7

    • CRUD for metadata

    • Run rule(s)

    • Get reports for a time period

  • Strategy and road map?

    • Web service-a-thon? If so, when?

    • What's the plan to move Web Services forward? Who is going to do what?

  • Soap vs REST vs. both?

    • Is there a framework that will help us combine them?

    • Burke: SOAP++ for heavy work, ReST++ for quick & dirty

    • Darius: wants ReST and SOAP requests to have the same underlying method returning the same data

    • Sunny: SOAP = WSDL, ReST = WADL (Spring supports ... ReST?)

    • Summary: would like both (i.e., pseudo-REST by exposing methods as simple HTTP calls)

  • JSON vs XML vs. both?

    • SDMX-HD = XML

    • Summary: would like both

  • Baked into API, or separate module?

  • Any good examples of object+transaction based APIs out there?

    • Atlassian JIRA API

    • Atlassian Confluence API (http://confluence.atlassian.com/x/3QI)

    • Facebook API

    • Twitter API

    • Google Health

    • GDATA for Google Health exposes a subset of CCR

    • Microsoft Healthvault

  • How is authentication handled?

    • Authentication methods?

    • REST module uses stateless basic auth through request now

    • Session-capable – i.e., token-based

    • Authenticate to get token

    • Token sent to all subsequent calls

    • Authenticate as user

  • Publish a WSDL (Why Contract First?? )