ELECTRONIC DATA INTERCHANGE (EDI) A review of possibilities

The definition…

“ electronic exchange of structured business documents between computers of different organization ” Introduction to Information Systems James O’Brien & Georges Marakas McGraw-Hill 2007

The process…

Adapted from: A Primer—An Introduction to Electronic Data Interchange, http://www.edibasics.co.uk/ Outbound Translation Document Preparation Inbound Translation Outbound Communication Document Processing Inbound Communication Network Network Outbound Translation Document Preparation Inbound Translation Outbound Communication Document Processing Inbound Communication Network Network

The composition…

Document standard Define the structure of the exchanged business document Communication standard Define a network (which is what the message “goes through”) and a communication protocol (which defines how the message should go through the network )

Famous document standards…

UN EDIFACT ANSI ASC X12

Structured language Established by the UN Predefined message format Format based on data element and segment Transmitted in binary format UN EDIFACT

Structured language Established by the ANSI Predefined message format Format based on data element and segment Transmitted in binary format ANSI ASC X12

Extensible language Established by the W3C Format based on tags that have to be defined Transmitted in plain text format

VS VS High broadband utilization due to plain text format Limited Adoption for EDI High XML Low broadband utilization due to binary format Geographically limited adoption (US industries) Low ANSI ASC X12 Low broadband utilization due to binary format Large adoption world wide Low EDIFACT TECHNICAL REQUIREMENTS ADOPTION FLEXIBILITY STANDARD UN EDIFACT ANSI ASC X12

Communication standards: Famous networks…

Value Added Network Private IP Internet

Low Low INTERNET High High PRIVATE IP High High VAN RESSOURCE REQUIREMENT SECURITY NETWORK Internet VS Value Added Network VS Private IP

Communication standards: Famous protocols…

FTP SFTP OFTP VPN SOAP HTTPS AS2 AS3

… please comment ;-) Anything to add…

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