Subject: Re: AS#2, Section 2.2, MDN Suggestion

From: Dave Darnell <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 04 Mar 1999 16:32:16 -0700

Sounds good Greg!  There are a lot of interested parties in the utility
dereg marketplace that want to see this standard and product
implementations right away.

Are there other vendors out there that could start interoperability testing
with Cyclone?  Or is it too soon for that?

I am copying Dale Austin on this email because I just came from his meeting
here in NYC where this very topic was discussed.  We even had Dale Moberg
on a conference call.

-Dave Darnell

At 04:01 PM 3/4/99 -0700, Gregory W. Vesper wrote:
>Greetings all,
>
>Cyclone Software has already implemented EDIINT over HTTP and HTTPS and
>pursuant to a discussion this morning with Dale Moberg, I would like to
>provide the following suggestion regarding optional support for asynchronous
>MDNs.
>
>HTTP(S) is particularly well suited to the process driven exchange of large
>documents.  However, synchronous MDNs introduce robustness and reliability
>challenges when the client connection fails or times out before receiving an
>MDN from the receiving HTTP(S) server.  I therefore recommend modifying the
>AS2 specification to optionally support asynchronous MDNs as follows.
>
>The receiving system generates an MDN and asynchronously sends it back to
>the originating system via a seperate HTTP(S) client connection to the
>originator's HTTP(S) server.  The destination for the MDN is identical to
>the destination for other inbound documents.  The MDN is treated by the
>HTTPS(S) client in the same manner as an outbound document.
>
>This architecture is extremely flexible, scalable, and adaptable.  We have
>extensively tested and deployed this scheme with very positive results.  And
>in fact, we found it significanly more elegant to implement over having the
>HTTP(S) client wait for the HTTP(S) server to return an MDN.
>
>Thus I recommend the following modifications to the specification:
>1) Accomodate two separate MDN options - synchronous and asynchronous
>2) Optionally accomodate asynchronous MDNs as a failsafe for dropped or
>timed out synchronous MDNs.
>
>Sincerely,
>-Greg.
>
>Gregory W. Vesper, Cyclone Software
>t. 602-793-3934 f. 602-607-4996
>www.cyclonesoftware.com

================
Dave Darnell              
SysTrends, Inc. &  Arizona EC/EDI Roundtable     
Tel: 602.899.4787
 mailto://[email-masked]     http://www.systrends.com
===================================================

---

From: "Gregory W. Vesper" <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 4 Mar 1999 16:50:15 -0700

Hello Dave!

We are anxious to test with others.  But as far as I know, Cyclone is the
only vendor supporting EDIINT over four transports:
SMTP, HTTP, HTTPS, FTP
Hopefully this will change as vendors take advantage of the respective
strengths of each transport.

Peer to peer HTTP(S) is a very compelling solution.  By bundling both the
HTTP(S) client and server in the solution, we eliminate dependencies on
external communication servers.  All we need is a TCP/IP dialtone and we're
off to the races.  This also yields superior FIFO processing and the fastest
possible turnaround time for transactions because the data is not being
staged on intermediate servers.  Very slick stuff.  Get a hold of Cyclone
Interchange 2.1 and you'll immediately see what I mean.  You can demo
bi-directional trading on a single machine using HTTP(S).

Please let me know if I can be of further assistance in this regard.
Cheers,
-Greg.

-----Original Message-----
From: Dave Darnell <[email-masked]>
To: Gregory W. Vesper <[email-masked]>; [email-masked]
<[email-masked]>
Cc: Terry Harding <[email-masked]>; Rik Drummond
<[email-masked]>; [email-masked] <[email-masked]>
Date: Thursday, March 04, 1999 4:33 PM
Subject: Re: AS#2, Section 2.2, MDN Suggestion