Hi Ben, In my opinion AS2 is the best method for transmitting data securely, efficiently and affectively. Push Push is always better than pull-pull. Push-Push creates an event-driven environment instead of pull-pull which is batch oriented. I wrote an article on this for the EDI Academy you can find the post here, and email to your Admin and tell him or her that if he is not using the AS2 Option he is stuck in the late 80s!! http://ediacademy.com/EDISchedulingAndFileTransferBestPractices.html I have case studies that show benefits of this from my PETCO days where we converted 90% of our traffic to direct-connects using AS2 as the best method possible. To help with your business case I recommend the following talking points: 1) Why would you want to sweep an FTP server 10 times a day if a file shows up once a week (this is just a scenario) where with AS2 you can send/receive it immediately.
Your business will benefit by getting businesss transactions faster. Your network admin does not realize by having a more efficient B2B process with AS2 (Because of Push-Push) your Invoice for example could get paid faster and your A/R department could beneift, or your ASN will arrive on-time and you will avoid charge backs. I always took my paranoid IT Security Admins up to the functional area (like A/P or Procurement, logistics, compliance etc) and fought the battle there. 2) SFTP has a serious of lack of tracking, how the heck do you know if your file made it or not when itβs 3:00 am and the job is running? You have to write custom scripts that read the log and put in redicolous contigencies in place to ensure the transmission was completed. Explain (for example, use your own scenario) to your compliance/accounts receivable/logistics departments that sometims getting a 997 is too late and with AS2 MDNs you get to know right away if something fails. 3) SPEED β Experience shows that AS2 / HTTPS in general is much faster than a slow SFTP port 22 connection ο Ughh so late 1980s and 1990s Take this to the business β functional area level, explain that the encryption hashing capabilities that AS2 offers are just as great if not better. Whenever I see posts like these I realize that most problems we have today in EDI have to do with IT personnel not understanding EDI well. We have to educate IT and the businesss functional areas better about EDI, that even something like chosing SFTG vs FTP/PGP vs AS2 can have an impact on how fast or slow our invoices get paid or if we get chargebacks for ASNs or our Health Care Payment claims fail ajudication! Good luck fighting this battle, this one is worth it! Michael Kotoyan On Tue, Jul 31, 2012 at 2:44 PM, Ben Kenoyer <[email protected]> wrote: > ** > > > I am working on an internal proposal and am looking for some feedback from > my peers who are on either side of this topic. > > I am working on an EDI software migration, and I selected the software we > went with (Liaison ECS/Delta) for several reasons. One of the reasons I > chose it (and one of the points I made in getting it approved) is that I > can potentially save money by performing more direct-connections with a few > of my higher-volume trading partners and avoid the VAN costs of data > transmissions. > > My old software was limited to simple FTP connections. My new software is > capable of just about any communication protocol that can be used by EDI. > > I have been speaking with one of my Network Administrators about getting > our systems set up for AS2 (of which he and most of my Operations team have > never heard). Since this protocol is a "push" behavior, they are very > against it--even if going through a designated web server in our DMZ--from > a security perspective. > > I can still accomplish some of my promised cost savings if I perform some > direct-connections to higher-volume trading partners via S/FTP instead of > AS2, but that could require at least one of us to host the FTP server and > possibly allow the other to "push" documents to us. This seems much more > doable if both partners can simply "pull" documents at their own leisure > and keep the new processes within the scope of my current security policies. > > I have been trying to find a good business reason why AS2 is better than > S/FTP. Basically, is it worth me trying to get my company to adjust their > policies and possibly hardware, and invest their time to establish an > environment that is compatible with AS2 in order to save me money, or are > there any reasons I can't use my existing FTP abilities to accomplish this? > I understand that EDIINT recommends AS2 for EDI traffic, but I haven't seen > a discussion against S/FTP as it pertains to EDI. > > My current FTP connection to my VAN uses encryption in both directions, so > the transmissions are secure and ensured. I have been told that while an > MDN confirms receipt of a transmitted file, an X12 997 (Functional > Acknowledgement) is still necessary to communicate that the transmitted > file was functionally correct and not just simply received. So, using the > "immediate acknowledgement of transmission success via MDN on AS2" argument > is MOOT. > > Thoughts? Feedback? > > > [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] ------------------------------------ ... Please use the following Message Identifiers as your subject prefix: <SALES>, <JOBS>, <LIST>, <TECH>, <MISC>, <EVENT>, <OFF-TOPIC> Job postings are welcome, but for job postings or requests for work: <JOBS> IS REQUIRED in the subject line as a prefix.Yahoo! Groups Links <*> To visit your group on the web, go to: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/EDI-L/ <*> Your email settings: Individual Email | Traditional <*> To change settings online go to: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/EDI-L/join (Yahoo! ID required) <*> To change settings via email: [email protected] [email protected] <*> To unsubscribe from this group, send an email to: [email protected] <*> Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to: http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/
