Can Scheduled Integrations in OIC Send Back Values?
Understanding how Oracle Integration Cloud Scheduled Integrations handle values
🌐 Introduction
Oracle Integration Cloud (OIC) offers multiple ways to design integrations—app-driven, event-driven, and scheduled. One of the most common questions developers and consultants ask is:
The short answer is: Yes, but with a different approach.
⚡ How Scheduled Integrations Work
A scheduled integration is designed to run automatically at a defined time using an iCal expression (for example, every day at 12:01 AM). Unlike app-driven integrations, scheduled flows do not wait for a request and return a response. Instead, they are self-triggered.
✅ Can It Send Back a Value?
Absolutely. But instead of returning the value to a caller, a scheduled integration can push the value to a target system, database, or file storage. Here are the common ways:
- Insert or update the value in a database table
- Send the value via a REST or SOAP API to another system
- Write the value into a CSV/XML file on FTP or Object Storage
- Deliver the value as an email notification
A finance team needs a daily “Total Voucher Value” pushed to an ERP system at midnight. A scheduled integration can:
- Fetch the transactions from ERP/Database
- Calculate the total value
- Send the result via REST API or drop it into FTP
🔑 Key Differences vs. App-Driven Integrations
- App-Driven: Waits for a request → sends response back immediately
- Scheduled: Runs on a schedule → pushes value to a system, not to a caller
🚀 Benefits of Using Scheduled Integrations
- Automates repetitive tasks
- Ensures consistency in reporting or reconciliation
- Works without user intervention
- Ideal for nightly jobs, batch processing, and compliance reports
💡 Best Practices
- Use descriptive names for integrations (e.g., Send_Daily_Values)
- Log all sent values for auditing
- Handle failures with error hospital and alerts
- Test the iCal expression carefully before production deployment
🎯 Conclusion
A scheduled integration in Oracle Integration Cloud cannot return values directly like app-driven integrations. However, it is a powerful tool for sending back values to external systems, databases, or storage in an automated way. This makes it a perfect fit for batch processes, reconciliation tasks, and scheduled reporting.
