How to configure a custom e-commerce connector

The Commerce Connector Pack provides out-of-the-box connectors to the commercetools and Magento. If you use another third-party e-commerce solution, you can configure your own connector.

Prerequisites

We assume you are familiar with Magnolia, Maven and Java.

Before configuring the connector, make sure you have:

• A running instance of Magnolia with the Commerce Connector Pack.
• Access to your e-commerce solution documentation (including the API documentation).
• Administrator access to your external e-commerce solution for testing.

Configuration

Complete the steps below to configure your connector.

Create your Maven module

1. Create your Maven module.

2. You Maven module must depend on:

   <dependency>
     <groupId>info.magnolia.ecommerce</groupId>
     <artifactId>magnolia-ecommerce</artifactId>
     <version>1.0</version>
   </dependency>

3. Your module class should implement ModuleLifecycle and close all client providers upon stopping the module. For reference see info.magnolia.ecommerce.magento.EcommerceMagentoModule 

Implement the data suppliers and required cart and checkout functionality

1. Implement DataSuppliers for products and categories:
   • info.magnolia.ecommerce.common.Products – check for the required list of suppliers for products.
   • info.magnolia.ecommerce.common.Categories  – check for the required list of suppliers for categories.
     See info.magnolia.ecommerce.magento.common.MagentoCategory for an example of how to map the JSON received.
2. Optionally, implement the required functions for the cart: info.magnolia.ecommerce.cart.CartProvider
3. Optionally, implement the required functions for the checkout process: info.magnolia.ecommerce.checkout.CheckoutProvider
4. Cart and checkout providers use multi-binding so they must be annotated by @Multibinding and added to the module descriptor as components for injection. For an example, see ecommerce-magento-connector.xml 

Implement the provider

Implement the EcommerceClientProvider according to the connection type you want to use to connect to your external e-commerce solution:

• RestClientProvider – REST-based client provider. For an example, see info.magnolia.ecommerce.magento.MagentoRestClientProvider and the info.magnolia.ecommerce.magento.client.MagentoHttpClient client implementation based on the org.apache.http package.
• 3rdPartyClientProvider – External e-commerce SDK-based client provider. This provider differs for each external e-commerce solution. For an example, see info.magnolia.ecommerce.commercetools.SphereClientProvider.

Define your connector

Using info.magnolia.ecommerce.common.DefaultEcommerceDefinition, create your connector definition configuration file under: <your-module-name>/ecommerces/<definition-name>.yaml.

For an example, see ecommerce-magento-connector/ecommerces/magento.yaml.

Conclusion

To finish:

1. Install your connector in the Magnolia instance that contains the ecommerce, ecommerce-templating and ecommerce-ui modules.
2. Set the connection parameters to your external e-commerce solution.

You can then use the default E-commerce app, ecomfn templating functions and REST endpoints.