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Re: <TECH> Paired Elements
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>I asked the support people at Harbinger (now Innovis) why TLE allowed a
>document to go out with syntactical errors. Their reply was, "we
>figured the sender would do the checking, so we didn't need to build it
>into the product."
:-)
Many, many years ago when we produced the first versions of our EDI
translators, we concentrated at first on making sure that the syntax
checking on incoming transactions was extremely rigorous because you
never knew what 'they' were going to throw at you. The outgoing
construction side got less attention because you could always make sure
that your own house was in order. I call this the macho approach.
Nowadays the situation is reversed, and we favour the bureaucratic
approach. Outgoing transactions are strictly checked, and rejected if
there is any blemish, because it is your ass on the line if there is any
problem with them. For incoming transactions the checking is normally
de-tuned so that, even though any faults are identified and reported,
the faulty messages are allowed through if possible. This is because the
EDI messages only exist as a means of carrying business data, and the
businesses which are paying for them only care about the data, not the
arcane nuances of the syntax which expresses it. An incomplete order in
an application can generally be handled far more quickly and effectively
by a human operator than one which is quarantined in an EDI system, no
matter how vigorously it may be 997'ing about the situation.
"Be strict about what you send; be forgiving about what you receive" is
a good adage for EDI software.
Regards
Chris
--
Chris Johnson mobile:+44 (0)7785 302122
EDIMatrix Ltd work: 0845 126 0680 or +44 20 8559 2454
fax: +44 (0)20 8559 2497
EDI website http://www.edimatrix.co.uk
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