Channel

Concept of a channel defines a way or purpose of information passing in midPoint. Every time midPoint distributes information from users to account (or vice versa) it does it within a channel. Channels are usually something like synchronization, discovery, import, user request, etc. They denote why is the change being executed and how was the change detected in the first place.

Channels can be used to fine-tune midPoint functionality. E.g. channels can be used to limit execution of certain mappings to specific situations. The typical case is to limit application of inbound mappings only to import. This is done by limiting the mapping to an import channel and therefore it will be executed only when the accounts are imported and will not be executed for common synchronization.

Channels are identified in midPoint by URL. There are some pre-defined URLs used internally by midPoint for common tasks such as synchronization or import. But the deployer may choose his own URLs for other situations which are frequently used in integration scenarios. The pre-defined channel URLs are defined in the following table.