Required, optional and the empty element

An unmapped REQUIRED field fails loudly. An unmapped OPTIONAL one is accepted and defaults silently. The second is where wrong data comes from, and it is the most important sentence in this module. The required case is cheap. The target rejects the call, names the element, and you map it. Annoying, visible, done in a minute. THE OPTIONAL CASE PRODUCES A SUCCESSFUL RUN AND A WRONG RECORD. The element is absent from the payload, the target applies its own default — from a profile option, a setup, the first value in a list — and the record is created carrying a value nobody chose. No error, no warning, and nothing in monitoring to look at. The ones that hurt have business meaning: a business unit, a payment term, a tax classification, a currency conversion type. Each is a real decision made by default, at scale, on every record the integration…

In this module: Module 5 · Mappings and transformations

1. 1What a mapping really isFree preview
2. 2The mapper, practically
3. 3Required, optional and the empty element
4. 4Repeating elements and loops
5. 5Conditional mapping
6. 6Functions: strings, numbers and dates
7. 7Dates and time zones, carefully
8. 8Numbers, precision and currency
9. 9Lookups inside a mapping
10. 10Testing a mapping with real data
11. 11Namespaces, and the errors they cause
12. 12Keeping a mapping maintainable
13. 13What breaks: five mapping failures
14. 14Lab briefing · Map two schemas that disagree