AS2 activities overview

This section contains Workflow activities that are used to create an AS2 implementation in iCore. AS2 (Applicability Statement 2) is a specification which describes how to exchange structured business data securely using the HTTP transfer protocol. For more information on AS2, see RFC 4130: MIME-Based Secure Peer-to-Peer Business Data Interchange Using HTTP, Applicability Statement 2 (AS2).

note

The AS2 activities are not added to the toolbox in the Workflow Designer by default, but must be added manually.

iCore AS2 Workflow activities supports compression defined in AS2 version 1.1. They also support implementation of the EDIINT features multiple-attachments and AS2-Reliability defined in AS2 version 1.2.

Compression

With version 1.1 of the AS2 specification, compression of data is available. Compression for AS2 messages can be enabled in the Create AS2 Message Configuration activity.

Consider the following when you implement support for compression:

• When creating an AS2 Message from an IAS2MessageConfiguration with Create AS2 message activity – if compression is enabled, set the Version argument to 1.1.

EDIINT features

Starting with version 1.2 of the AS2 specification, the addition of the new version is divided into features. The features added in version 1.2 are referred to as EDIINT features. A user agent (AS2 implementation) does not have to support all features introduced in the new version to use only some of the features. User agents include all supported features in outgoing AS2 messages as an indication of the agent’s capabilities. For more information on EDIINT features, see RFC 6017: Electronic Data Interchange - Internet Integration (EDIINT) Features Header Field.

Consider this when implementing support for EDIINT features:

• When loading an AS2 message with Load AS2 message activity, specify implemented EDIINT features in the Supported EDIINT features argument. If the loaded message contains an unsupported EDIINT feature, it will be stored as a warning in the Errors property of the resulting IAS2Message.
• When creating an AS2 message with Create AS2 message activity, specify implemented EDIINT features in the EDIINT features header argument and set the Version argument to 1.2.

Activities

Icon	Name	Description
	Create AS2 Message Configuration	Creates a configuration that can be used to create an AS2 message.
	Create AS2 Message	Creates an AS2 Message to be sent with the Send AS2 Message activity.
	Send AS2 Message	Sends an AS2 Message created by the Create AS2 Message activity.
	Load AS2 Message	Loads an AS2 message from a stream that contains an encoded message.
	Load AS2 MDN	Loads an AS2 MDN from a stream that contains an encoded MDN.
	Create AS2 MDN	Creates a new instance of an AS2 MDN.
	Send AS2 MDN	Sends an AS2 MDN to a specified URL.
	Add Payload To AS2 Message Activity	Adds a payload to an AS2 message using a stream that contains an encoded message.
	Deserialize XML to AS2 object	Deserializes an XML to an AS2 object.
	Serialize AS2 object to XML	Serializes an AS2 object to XML.

See Also

Managing the iCore AS2 Server application