FTAM/9000 Programmer's Guide

38 Chapter 1
HP FTAM/9000 Overview
Overview of FTAM Concepts
NOTE Refer to the “FTAM Data Structures” chapter for information on the
P_address and Dir_dn structures. Refer to the Installing and
Administering HP FTAM/9000 manual and the OSI Troubleshooting
Guide for information on the presentation address and directory
distinguished name configuration.
Once you establish the FTAM regime, you can access and manipulate
FTAM files in that filestore. You can perform two types of file actions on
the VFS: actions on complete files and file access actions. For example,
you can create and delete a complete file or access a portion of a file's
contents.
Synchronous and Asynchronous Operations
FTAM functions use two modes of operation: synchronous and
asynchronous:
Synchronous
Operations
Synchronous function calls return only after
the request is completely processed. Therefore,
all output information is available when the
call returns. Make synchronous function calls
when the results must be processed in a
specific sequence.
Asynchronous
Operations
Asynchronous function calls return as soon as
ftam_init validates the request. Processing
continues on the request. To determine
whether the request returns successfully from
the responder, you must call em_wait().
Output information is available only after the
em_wait() function indicates that processing of
the request has completed. Use asynchronous
function calls when making multiple requests
and when the order in which results are
processed does not matter. You can perform
other operations while an asynchronous
request is being processed.