The SmartPlant integration approach is based on a publish/retrieve paradigm. Applications publish their own data and retrieve data published by other applications. The publish and retrieve processes are done using an adapter, which is a piece of software that implements specific interfaces used to support SmartPlant integration.
The adapter must bridge the gap between the application's representation of its data and the SmartPlant representation of equivalent data. This bridge process involves defining a mapping between the application's representation (its schema) and the SmartPlant representation (its schema). SmartPlant mapping is the bridge that is used to integrate SmartPlant applications.
The following graphic shows a simple example of how the authoring tool map schema defines the mapping between the tool data model (schema) and the SmartPlant schema:
The mapping process involves two basic steps:
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Defining the tool map schema objects that reflect the application's schema
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Mapping those tool schema objects into (publish) and out of (retrieve) the SmartPlant schema
You can find work processes that describe the mapping process, as well as individual mapping examples for authoring tools in the Authoring Tool Mapping section.