You have many complex questions that are not amenable to short answers,
but I'll offer what I can (personal opinion only).
> 1. About using <CR/LF> in X12.
A segment terminator in X12 is a single character, not a pair of
characters. That said, X12 has taken the position that so-called
"blocking" by adding CR/LF at the end of segments, dividing the stream
into 80 byte records, etc, is beyond the scope of the standard. In
practice most translators will accommodate whatever is thrown at them.
> 2. Which versions exist of X12?
>
Many, and yes, the transaction set definitions can differ quite a bit
across different versions/releases.
> 3. HL7 looks a lot like X12.
>
Yes, it does. If you want to know the differences for sure you'll need
to do a detailed comparison between X12.5 and X12.6 on the one hand, and
the foundation HL7 standards on the other. I've not looked but you may
be able to find a summary of syntax differences on the web.
> 4. In X12 there is a *Basic Character Set, and a Extended Character Set;
> and there's also Control Characters.
>
Unlike the EDIFACT syntax, there is no indicator in the X12 interchange
to advise the consumer the character set (or even the encoding) that is
used. Encoding (EBCDIC vs. ASCII, for example) is beyond the scope of
the standards.
> 5. I do not understand 'bounded groups'.
>
Yes, they are used. Bounded loops are groups of segments that may
repeat. The first instance of a bounded loop is preceded by an LS
segment, and the last instance is followed by an LE segment. In
practical terms for implementing a translator, I think you probably
don't need to do anything special to handle them. They are defined in
the standard to prevent a condition in transaction set instances called
"segment collision", in which a parser might not otherwise know where it
is without the inclusion of the LS and LE segments.
> 6. Concerning data type 'binary': is this really used? How? (because it
> seems to me this would lead to syntax problems with separators/terminators.
>
Yes, it is really used, though rarely. It would cause syntax problems if
it weren't for the fact that in transaction set instances most "binary"
data is "filtered", i.e., represented in a transmission friendly
encoding such as binhex or base64.
Mike
-----------------------------------------
Michael C. Rawlins, Rawlins EC Consulting
www.rawlinsecconsulting.com
[EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:
> Greetings.
>
> I am in the process of building X12 into Bots (open source EDI software).
> I know enough about edifact, but not much about X12.
> So I would like to as some questions about X12 and the actual use in
> 'real world'.
>
> 1. About using <CR/LF> in X12.
> It seems this can be used as a segment terminator.
> In edifact I sometimes see a 'blocked' (or 'wrapped') output format,
> where after (typically) 80 characters a <CR/LF> is inserted.
> In edifact, some (actually a lot of) senders append <CR/LF> after a
> segment terminator.
> How is this for X12?
>
> 2. Which versions exist of X12?
> Do they differ a lot?
> I guess a different X12 version has another segments, elements etc?
>
> 3. HL7 looks a lot like X12.
> What are the differences (or is there documentation about the
> differences)
>
> 4. In X12 there is a *Basic Character Set, and a Extended Character Set;
> and there's also Control Characters.
> Can I see in the X12 file which character set is used?
> How is this used in 'real world': what are companies using; are
> these character sets tested when receiving messages.
> In edifact, a lot of companies disregard the character sets and use
> all of the ascii character set.
> *
> 5. I do not understand 'bounded groups'.
> Does anybody have a good explanation of these?
> Is this actually used?
>
> 6. Concerning data type 'binary': is this really used? How? (because it
> seems to me this would lead to syntax problems with separators/terminators.
>
>
>
>
...
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