Version 9 of the Publishing Framework supports the generation and publication of events. In this context, an event is an action or occurrence that can be detected by a computer program. The Publishing Framework creates events using well-formed XML specifications that contain the name of the event, a set of associated properties, and a message body.

The Publishing Framework provides two methods for publishing an event:

Explicit event publication. This feature enables a SAS program to generate any type of event and publish it using HTTP, message queuing, or a publication channel.
Implicit event publication. This feature enables a channel's subscribers to be designated as "event" subscribers. The Publishing Framework then automatically notifies event subscribers whenever new information is published to the channel.

Using Explicit Event Publication

Explicit event publication enables a SAS program to generate an event of any kind and publish it explicitly. First, the event is defined using the CALL routines EVENT_BEGIN and EVENT_BODY. The CALL routine EVENT_PUBLISH is used to generate the event and publish it using HTTP, message queuing, or a publication channel. The event is generated using a well-formed XML specification for generic events. The CALL routine EVENT_END is then used to free all resources associated with the event.

For details about using the event CALL routines, refer to the Event Publish CALL Routines documentation. For details about the format used to generate explicit events, refer to the XML Specification for Generic Events.

Note: The SAS Publisher user interface does not currently support explicit event generation, and the Publishing Framework does not currently support event retrieval. However, custom programs can be developed to provide this functionality.

To collect and process events that the Publishing Framework generates, you can develop customized programs using the Event Broker service. The Event Broker is one of the Foundation Services provided with Integration Technologies. For more information, see com.sas.services.events.broker in the Foundation Services class documentation.

Using Implicit Event Publication

With Version 9 of the Publishing Framework, the PACKAGE_PUBLISH CALL routine and the SAS Publisher interface automatically generate a SASPackage event whenever a package is published to a channel. The SASPackage event is captured as a well-formed XML document that describes the package. For details, see the XML Specification for SASPackage Events.

Subscribers to the channel who are designated as "event" subscribers then receive the event via their chosen transport methods. This feature enables subscribers to be aware that new information has been published to the channel.

To designate a subscriber as an event subscriber, use the Publishing Framework plug-in of SAS Management Console. For details, see the Publishing Framework section of the SAS Integration Technologies: Administrator's Guide.

Note: If you are using LDAP (instead of a SAS Metadata Server) as your metadata repository, you will need to develop custom programs to designate subscribers as event subscribers. The Subscription Manager interface does not currently support this function.

XML Specifications for Events

The Publishing Framework uses well-formed XML specifications to generate events. For detailed information, see the following topics:

the XML Specification for Generic Events, which is used for explicit event publishing
the XML Specification for SASPackage Events, which is used for implicit event publishing
Examples of Generated Events using both of these specifications