JRETSC

The JRETSC acronym stands for Java RETS Connectivity. It was modeled after the well known JDBC (Java Database Connectivity) packages that allow developers to connect to and interact with any database using SQL. Since RETS uses DMQL and not SQL and is not a true database, the methods and classes created for JRETSC are not identical to JDBC nor do they implement a true JDBC driver. The design goal of JRETSC was to abstract the RETS specification into a very easy to use API (Application Programming Interface) that worked in a similar fashion to JDBC because developers are already familiar with JDBC and this would reduce the learning curve for the JRETSC API.

The basic use of JRETSC involves the following basic steps:

1. Instantiate the JRETSC Driver
2. Connect to the RETS Server
3. Optionally get the RETS Metadata
4. Execute Queries on the RETS Server and receive the results of the queries
5. Execute Updates on the RETS Server and receive the results of the updates
6. Disconnect from the RETS Server

Using this API removes the burden from developers of taking the time to learn the intricacies of the RETS transport layer. Developers simply use documented methods to do the desired operations and all the RETS transactions are handled behind the scenes for them by the API. This has been proven to dramatically speed up the time in which Java developers are able to build fully functional RETS applications.

An additional benefit of the JRETSC API, is that it will evolve with the RETS standard. As the RETS standard changes, methods may need to be added to the API, but the existing methods will not change in any way. The underlying RETS Transaction layer will take care of any differences between RETS versions transparently. Furthermore, when RETS 2.0 comes out, there are plans to provide a JRETSC Driver for RETS 2.0 as well. What this means to developers is that their code will work unchanged whether it needs to access a RETS 1.X server or a RETS 2.X server.

• Download JRETSC
• Documentation