As a Senior Integration Consultant I have worked with Cloverleaf, Rhapsody and many other integration engines. Recently I had the opportunity to work with Mirth Connect. Mirth Connect is an open-source interface engine. Being an advanced user of interface engines I found that the first difference that I observed was the Mirth Connect nomenclature. I had to learn new ways of saying the same things for example; in Cloverleaf there are threads and in Mirth Connect these are called channels.
Mirth is a great little interface engine, it supports all the basic standards of the healthcare industry. HL7 version 2.X, HL7 version 3.0, X 12, XML, DICOM, EDI, NCPDP, delimited text. It also supports multiple protocols and those are, MLLP, TCP/IP, HTTP, Text Files, capital SOAP, database, secure FTP, e-mail, JMS, Web services, PDF/RTF documents. Mirth also allows the user to create custom Java, JavaScript and custom JAR files for data manipulation and processing. Mirth connect has a rich interface channel development and monitoring environment. This allows you to generate filter rules and transformation steps using an intuitive drag-and-drop template-based editor. This tool and the library behind it make it easy to write JavaScript. Mirth Connect also comes with real-time monitoring through their interface dashboard. As in all engines you have the ability to do message reprocessing through their message browser. Mirth connect does not have an internal embedded database but does come with the connectors to hook up to most of the most popular databases. Mirth Connect recommends that you use it PostgreSQL as the database for production environments. I found it easy to configure Mirth Connect to use a MYSQL database. Mirth connect is cross Platform this allows it to run on many different platforms for example, Windows, Linux, MAC OS X, and AIX.
One of the Mirth characteristics that make the engine attractive also poses a potential problem, Mirth Connect is open source. We've all seen open source projects go to the wayside as in eGate’s (SeeBeyond) and the IT industry is littered with open source operating systems that have vanished. I've watched Mirth Connect for a few years now and am surprised at how fast it's grown and the features and functions rival the most popular engines available. Mirth Connect is the #1 distribution of an open source interface engine. I was reading that they have over 100,000 downloads for Mirth Connect.
Mirth does some amazing things with XML. The Community behind Mirth Connect is worldwide and they are always willing to provide assistance and improve the product. Bugs that are found by the Community are quickly fixed and integrated into the new version.
There are no fees for Mirth Connect and the intuitive creation tools even the recommended database and database tools being all open source, this contributes to the popularity of the product and the thousands of product sites up and running.
What I would like to do in the upcoming blogs is to walk you through how to create a project from start to finish using Mirth Connect and the recommended tools. This will enable you to experience what Mirth Connect can do.
Jim Gilbert is a Senior Integration Consultant for Santa Rosa Consulting. He has years of experience in the IT integration world. Jim’s integration engine expertise involves Cloverleaf, Rhapsody, Corepoint (NeoTool), and Mirth Connect.
Santa Rosa Consulting is a leading provider of integration solutions. All of our consultants have the highest certifications or have years of experience with multiple engines. If you have concerns about your integration environment, need additional resources or require industry leading professional consultation please contact us at contactus@santarosaconsulting. To learn more about Santa Rosa visit our website at www.santarosaconsulting.com.