In 10.1.500 we pushed out for review ‘REST’ services. I can go geek on that area forever but want to give you one use case that I hear a ton and is enabled easily in the new release and going forward.
The new REST endpoints use an open standard called oData. It’s basically TSQL for URLs. Again if you want to geek out go to oData.org for the overview there.
The reason we chose oData is that some popular clients out there consume it. The one my daughter lives is in Excel so I know how popular and powerful it is for data analysts. Normally in Excel you can copy and paste data in. A better approach would be to point at the Epicor Server and say give me my data directly in Excel. That’s what the new REST feature in E10 gives you. Turn it on in Admin Console, point Excel at it through Data / External Data / From oData and get your data. It is read only so don’t think you can round trip this yet.
There are a lot of benefits in the new REST endpoints. Non dotNet clients, no client impls to try to keep in sync on integrations, standard tools like Excel, PowerBI, Tableau, etc can consume the data directly. Take a good look at the help system-
System Management → Working with System Management → REST Implementation
Sorry to go all sales engineer on you but it’s in preview because we really are interested in feedback. If you have 500 let me know your thoughts.
I also live in Excel, and actually prefer to grab data directly in Excel using ODBC. It’s got some limitations, but faster than whipping up a BAQ. At least for me.
I’m most excited for the REST API due to its mobile app development and website integration possibilities even if it’s read-only to start. That’s half way there right
Any idea when 10.1.500 will be available for direct customer download/eval? Is REST included in the MT-SaaS environmets that were recently upgraded to 10.1.500?
The reality is today Epicor or anyone can’t be a dictator and tell you that you have to do something in the one approved way. Welcome to the new world of internet technology. Microsoft has even learned that. This is for those areas that are difficult once you stray outside the lines of the one approved Epicor view of the world for it’s internal forms.Need simplicity and precanned? Sure use our stuff. But if you need to tie into other areas, we need to help you. Expect more in that flavr in the coming months and years. I just wrapped up vNextNext planning and it’s still the number one theme three releases in a row (forward looking tech wise. #1 in day to day execution is quality and stability)
And don’t forget for analysts too, not just devs. Take a peek at the docs or the post I just did on the overview. It’s for people using data tools that don’t want to be limited to just what we ship in the box. Bring Your Own Client?
SaaS and security in general
In using oData we are exposing the services, not the database. Again look at the other post. All the security of the server comes into play with columns censoring, BPMs, calculations, etc. SaaS already has these live due to that.
OAuth2 Looking forward statement Cannot guarantee delivery Not speaking for the company
Did I cover myself yet?
It’s an obvious feature but the first priority was talking to the rest of the Epicor systems that use the token authentication that started in the legacy Activant products. We did not want to be bringing yet another feature to market that doesn’t even talk to our sister products. Next step would obviously be connecting to other sources of truth.Both in the REST endpoints and in the core of the product itself.
