Original publication date: March, 2004
We've broken down ECS' new feature set into several categories.
| MIME multi-part messaging | ECS handles multi-part MIME messages. It can break the multi-part messages apart or keep them together and can hand them off to Delta either way. | |
| Business framework support (SOAP, ebXML, BizTalk, etc.) | When integrated with Delta, ECS can seamlessly handle any current or future business framework and track all related attachments. | |
| HTTP/S Server and HTTP listeners | ECS 4.0 installs with an HTTP server and supports
the ability to define HTTP listeners . For each
listener, multiple HTTP paths can be defined and each of these paths are
input channels in ECS. ECS' use of an HTTP server and listeners allows it
to fully support Web services which expose the core services of
ECS for the purpose of application-to-application processing. | |
| Input/output ports | Input/output ports are generic input channels and output queues that are not associated with any protocol. Input and output ports exist to hold and forward data and to tie channels and queues together, eliminating the need to write the data to a file system as an intermediary step. | |
| New security protocol support | ECS 4.0 supports IETF EDI-INT AS2 as well as "AS3," an industry proposed security protocol. |
| Simpler user security model |
The ECS server will use a fixed SQL Server login
in lieu of Windows integrated security. ECS user accounts will be created
and stored in Trading Partner Manager (TPM).
In addition, client utilities will
access the
ECS server via ECS' HTTP service, not via ECS' file-system
share. | |
| Improved certificate management | Certificates in ECS 4.0 will be managed directly by the service and no longer require DCOM. |
| More flexible viewing in Data Administrator | ECS 4.0 displays several new views in the Data Administrator. In addition to viewing data by batches (currently available in 3.0), 4.0 also supports viewing data by interchange, documents, and deliveries. Data Administrator’s various views also display more data per view (e.g. senders and receivers are now listed). | |
| Data Administrator tracks XML data | If your XML data matches an installed identity model, it will display in Data Administrator for tracking purposes. (Identity models are a new feature for Delta 4.0, discussed in the XML Enhancements category). | |
| Event chaining | The completion, permanent failure, or transient
failure of an event rule or output queue delivery can now trigger a second
event. For example, you could configure an event rule that tells ECS to deliver data via an FTP output queue, but
only
after a particular SMTP output queue fails. | |
| Increased data security for batches | Input channels, in addition to login verification, can now specify authentication criteria that the data sender must conform to before the incoming batch is accepted. This criteria includes digital signature, AS2/AS3 identifiers found in the header, or EDI/XML identifiers found in the data. All of these criteria can be established per trading partner in TPM from the Identification tab. | |
| ECS Status Monitor | The ECS Status Monitor is a utility that presents a window into the internal operations of ECS, showing all TCP/IP sessions and all threads in real time. | |
| Archiver | From the Management Console, you can schedule an archive command based on on a rolling window. Optionally, you can set the archive command to also purge or partially purge the data that is being archived from the Data Administrator. Once archived, the data is available for viewing in the ECS Archive Viewer utility. | |
| Addition of user folders | You can configure custom user folders in the Management Console. |