DFC stands for Documentum Foundation Classes and is an Object-Oriented (OO) Framework consisting of APIs for accessing and extending Content Server functionality. Simply speaking, it is a set of Java interfaces and classes written as a wrapper over DMCL. Apart from the regular DMCL capabilities, DFC also provides features such as data validation, virtual document management, etc.
Additionally, DFC also provides a Documentum Java-COM Bridge (DJCB) so that the Java interfaces can be used from within a Microsoft COM environment as well as by programs in Visual Basic, for example. DFC also includes a Business Objects Framework (BOF) that enables developers to model application business rules in the form of reusable modular components/elements.
Figure 3.1 shows how the request-response paradigm works between clients and Content Server via the DMCL and DFC layer.
We will learn more about DFC through numerous examples in Chapter 23.
Tip
Documentum 5.3 Update
Documentum release 5.3 includes some enhancements made to the DFC. Some of the new features introduced in DFC as part of release 5.3 are:
- Support for Unified Client Facilities (UCF) to assist content-related services such as check-out, check-in, import, and export as the content transfer mechanism for WDK-based applications
- Deeper integration with .NET