Key concepts

Xoom employs specific terminology. Here we introduce the most important product-specific terms and concepts.

Retrieval, saving, loading, and deployment
Retrieval is the process of extracting a representation of configuration from the managed system and sending it to a Xoom client tool. From there, retrieved configuration can be saved as a file in XoomXML format.
XoomXML
Xoom represents configuration in a dialect of XML called XoomXML.
Types and items
Items are the smallest addressable units of configuration, which is to say they can be assigned an environment-independent Xoom identity. Types are a categorisation used by Xoom to distinguish between different kinds of items. A type has a name and defines a set of keys. It is sometimes convenient to assign items to more than one type.
Xoom identity
Xoom assigns items a unique, environment-independent Xoom identity. These let Xoom determine whether items are logically equivalent, irrespective of any environment-dependent differences they possess (for example: Keys, or Stamp).
Xoom identifier
An Xoom identifier is a string that represents the Xoom identity of an item, used especially in XoomXML. Xoom identifiers follow a consistent format.
Xoom identities in XoomXML
In XoomXML, Xoom identities are indicated by the xoom:id="" attribute.
Dependency
A dependency is where an item references, and so depends upon, another item in configuration. Any item may possess a number of dependents and, in turn, exhibit dependency upon other items.
Static data and dynamic data
A managed system produces and uses two types of data: static data and dynamic data. Xoom is intended for the management of static data but not dynamic data.
Named queries
With the exception of Settings Migration Tool, which is fully interactive, all Xoom client tools retrieve predefined subsets of configuration using named queries.
Can I write configuration changes directly into XoomXML?
Technically, yes you can, though we don't recommend this as best practice.

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