Published Release Notes

Send and receive queued messages securely with IBM MQ servers

You can now configure applications developed on the Pega 7 Platform for secure message queuing with IBM MQ servers by using the MQ server rule form. You secure the connection by specifying the cipher suites with encryption standards that meet your requirements and the SSL/TLS X.509 certificates that you use for authentication.

For more information, see Configure secure message queuing with IBM MQ servers.

Functionality of the pyInvokeRESTConnector rule and the pxDeferenceEndpoint rule moved to core engine

The functionality of the pyInvokeRESTConnector rule and the pxDeferenceEndpoint rule has been moved into the core engine code of the Pega 7 Platform. This change provides more consistent behavior, reduces maintenance, and reduces the risk of regression issues. As a result, you can no longer customize these rules, and upgrading the Pega 7 Platform requires special considerations if you previously customized these rules.

For more information, see Upgrading with customized pyInvokeRESTConnector and pxDeferenceEndpoint rules.

Logging service now uses Apache Log4j 2

The Pega^® Platform now uses the Apache Log4j 2 logging service. Apache Log4j 2 improves performance and provides support for all log file appender types. As a result of this upgrade, the prlogging.xml file has been renamed to prlog4j2.xml and the format of the file has changed considerably.

For details about the new file format see Pega Platform logging with the Log4j 2 logging service.

For new installations or for upgrades to systems that were using the default logging configuration, no changes are needed. For information about updating custom log files after upgrading, see Customizations to the prlogging.xml file must be manually ported after upgrade. For information about updating your socket server if you use remote logging, see Socket server has changed for remote logging. For information about updated the web.xml file after upgrading, see Log file description in web.xml incorrect after upgrade to Apache Log4j2.

Customizations to the prlogging.xml file must be manually ported after upgrade

As a result of the upgrade from the Apache Log4j 1 logging service to the Apache Log4j 2 logging service, the name of the logging configuration file has changed from prlogging.xml to prlog4j2.xml and the format of the file has changed considerably. If you customized your prlogging.xml file, port the customizations to the new prlog4j2.xml file. If you do not port the changes, the Pega^® Platform uses the default prlog4j2.xml file and disregards your customized prlogging.xml file.

For more information about customizing your log files, see the Apache Log4j 2 documentation.

Socket server has changed for remote logging

As a result of the upgrade from the Apache Log4j 1 logging service to the Apache Log4j 2 logging service, the socket server that is used for remote logging has changed from the Log4j remote logging package with the LogFactor5 log analysis tool to TcpSocketServer. If you use remote logging, update your socket server to TcpSocketServer. For more information, see Installing and using remote logging.

Custom domain names in Pega Cloud

For your applications hosted on Pega® Cloud, you can use a custom domain name that conforms to your enterprise standards. By using a custom domain name, users of your Pega Cloud-hosted applications see domain names that are familiar to them.

For more information, see Requesting a custom domain name for applications hosted on Pega Cloud.

This functionality is available as of QII 2017.

Automatically process cases with SharePoint

You can now use Microsoft SharePoint Online to store and source case and Pulse attachments and to store and source attachments during automated case processing. Users only have to provide authentication and authorization details the first time they access SharePoint Online or when the trust has expired. The authentication profile must be OAuth 2.0 with a grant type of authorization code. The SharePoint Online component can be downloaded from Pega Exchange. For more information, see Downloading and configuring pluggable content management components.

Ability to set default values when importing data

You can now set default values for data that you import for a data type from a .csv file. By setting defaults, you can ensure that even when the .csv file data is incomplete, all of the data is imported. In addition, you can set default values for custom fields that do not have a matching source column in the .csv file. This feature is available for the Add and update and Add only import options. For mapped fields, the default value is used for new records if the source field is blank, and for existing records if both the source and target fields are blank. For custom fields, the default value is used for new records if a default value is provided, and for existing records only if the target field is blank.

For more information, see Importing data for a data type.

Support for Amazon Web Services Direct Connect

Pega® Cloud supports the Amazon Web Services (AWS) Direct Connect service between your Pega Cloud virtual private cloud (VPC) and your physical infrastructure within a geographical region without need for a virtual private network (VPN). Use this service to connect to:

• A data center provider that is located with AWS within the same geographical region.
• A multiprotocol label switching (MPLS) network or other type of wide area network (WAN).

For more information, see Configuring Amazon Web Services (AWS) Direct Connect in your Pega Cloud virtual private cloud.

This functionality is available as of QII 2016.

VPN backup for Amazon Web Services Direct Connect

On Pega® Cloud, you can configure redundancy for the Amazon Web Services Direct Connect service in your network. Pega Cloud supports the following options for redundancy:

• An additional AWS Direct Connect service (redundant direct connection)
• Failover to customer VPN

For more information, see Pega Cloud VPN service and Configuring Amazon Web Services (AWS) Direct Connect in your Pega Cloud virtual private cloud.

This functionality is available as of QII 2016.