EDI Terms
EDI Terms
AS2 (Applicability Statement 2) is a specification about how to transport data securely and reliably over the Internet. It is described in detail in RFC 4130.
Data can consist of Electronic Data Interchange (EDI) messages but may be of any other message type. AS2 specifies how to connect, deliver, validate and acknowledge data. AS2 creates an envelope for a message which is then sent securely over the Internet. Security is achieved by using digital certificates and encryption.
An implementation of AS2 involves two machines, a client and a server, communicating with each other over the Internet. On the operating system level, the AS2 client may be a server, too, offering its communication services to application software. The client sends data to the server, e.g. a trading partner. On receipt of the message the receiving application sends an acknowledgement or MDN (Message Disposition Notification) back to the sender.
AS3
AS3, or Applicability Statement 3, is a draft specification by which applications communicate EDI data, or other information such as XML documents, securely over the Internet using the FTP/S protocol. AS3 (like AS2) is an open standards protocol promoting interoperability. AS3 is not an extension or the next level of AS2, but a separate standard. Where AS2 is built on HTTP/S, AS3 leverages FTP/S.
AS3 may be particularly well suited for FTP-centric businesses that have a significant investment in FTP scripting, applications, or security. AS3 offers both ‘push’ and ‘pull’ FTP capabilities, which may widen its adoption rate compared to AS2, which is a push-only protocol.
Value Added Networks (VAN)
VAN's provide a number of services, e.g. retransmission of documents, providing third party audit information, acting as a gateway for different transmission methods, handling telecommunications support, etc. Because of these and other services VAN's provide, businesses may choose to still use a VAN even when both trading partners are using Internet protocols.
Internet transmission
Until recently the Internet transmission was handled by nonstandard methods between trading partners usually involving File Transfer Protocol or email attachments. Wal-Mart for instance requires its trading partners to use the AS2 protocol. There are also standards for imbedding EDI documents into XML.
FTP or File Transfer Protocol
Used to connect two computers over the Internet so that the user of one computer can transfer files and perform file commands on the other computer.
Extensible Markup Language (XML)
A World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) recommended general-purpose markup language that supports a wide variety of applications. XML languages or 'dialects' are easy to design and to process. XML is also designed to be reasonably human-legible. XML’s primary purpose is to facilitate the sharing of data across different information systems, particularly systems connected via the Internet.
