Merry Christmas and Happy New Year 2010!

Dear All,

This year I would like to simply wish you and your loved ones a very Merry Christmas and a prosperous Happy New Year 2010.

Sincerely Yours,

The Babelabout Team

 

I will be back the 4th of January 2010.

Babelabout, BabelAS2 and AS2Box.net

Following some recent e-mails we have received on our mailbox babelabout@gmail.com, it seems that we need to clarify the relation between Babelabout, BabelAS2 and AS2Box.net. Here is the draft of the new "About Us" page:

Babelabout is not yet a company/business. For the moment, it is just a project, started by an experienced integration specialist, who wants to provide fair and affordable platforms/solutions upon which to make e-business possible - for any person, from any company, in any industry, of any size, any where in the world.

Babelabout is currently developping three different services:

1. Babelabout (itself!) aims to be a complete on-line Integration Platform, delivering B2B integration, including "traditional" EDI. Even if it is still a project, we already have one happy customer/tester since April 2009; JAN LANGEDIJK Flower bulbs - http://www.langedijk.nl/ - is creating EDI invoices for two big customers (retailers) with Babelabout.
2. BabelAS2 is an open source VBScript implementation of the EDIINT AS2 (RFC 4130) standard transport protocol. The source code is currently hosted at Project Hosting on Google Code - please find more information at http://code.google.com/p/babelas2/.
3. AS2Box.net - http://www.as2box.net - is our NO SOFTWARE solution to manage AS2 connections. You can manage your AS2 transfers from your standard Windows Explorer without installing any software!

You can get much more information about these three different initiatives on our Babelabout's Blog - http://babelabout.blogspot.com/ - and, if you have any further questions/comments/remarks, do not hesitate to send us an e-mail at babelabout@gmail.com!

Demo's AS2Box Sends Messages to mendelson AS2 Test Server

You can instantly try AS2Box.net by sending any text file (.txt) to the mendelson AS2 test server following the instructions below:

1. Click on the start button, and select Programs > Accessories > Windows Exporer.
2. In the Folders list, select My Network Places.
3. In the right pane, double-click on Add Network Place.
4. In the Add Network Place Wizard window, click Next.
5. Select Choose another network location, and then click Next.
6. In the Internet or network address field, type http://demo.as2box.info/, and then click Next.
7. In the Connect to as2box.info dialog box, type demo in the User name field, and demo again in the Password field, and then click OK.
8. In the Type a name for this network place field, enter the name you want to use to identify this folder, e.g. Demo's AS2Box, and then click Next.
9. Click Finish.
10. If prompted, re-enter Demo's AS2Box account User name and Password to access the web folder, and then click OK.
11. Select the demo.as2box.info/outgoing sub-folder.
12. Copy the text file (.txt) you want to send to the demo.as2box.info/outgoing sub-folder.
13. Check that your file is well arrived on the mendelson AS2 test server by pointing your browser to http://as2.mendelson-e-c.com:8080/webas2 with user: guest and password: guest.

Could it be simpler?

Connect to your AS2Box.net Web Folder from your Windows Explorer

1. Click on the start button, and select Programs > Accessories > Windows Exporer.
2. In the Folders list, select My Network Places.
3. In the right pane, double-click on Add Network Place.
4. In the Add Network Place Wizard window, click Next.
5. Select Choose another network location, and then click Next.
6. In the Internet or network address field, type https://your_user_name.as2box.info/, where your_user_name is the user name for your AS2Box.net account, and then click Next.
7. Enter your AS2Box.net account User name and Password, and then click OK.
8. In the Type a name for this network place field, enter the name you want to use to identify this folder, e.g. My AS2Box.net, and then click Next.
9. Click Finish.
10. If prompted, enter your AS2Box.net account User name and Password to access the web folder, and then click OK.

Your AS2Box.net folder structure

Once connected to your AS2Box.net Web Folder, you will have access to the following folder structure:

/root [Read]
  /incoming [Read & Delete]
    /archive [Read]
  /outgoing [Write]
    /archive [Read]

The messages you receive from your trading partner will be written in both /incoming and /incoming/archive. You will be able to move the files from /incoming, but all the files will remain within /incoming/archive.

If you want to send a file to your trading partner, you just need to copy it to /outgoing, it will then be picked up, save within /outgoing/archive and send to your trading partner. The MDN will then appear in /outgoing/archive next to the copy of the sent file.

Could it be simpler?

AS2Box.net is almost ready

It was quite late yesterday night when I finished the 1st implementation of AS2Box.net. But, it's working. I still need to polish it a bit, and I would be able to create the 1st "real" account - the request I have received yesterday ;-)

I am also planning to setup a "demo" account, so you can immediately, try it, e.g. sending messages to the mendelson AS2 test server.

I got my 1st request on AS2Box.net

I am happy ;-) Ready to work hard tonight in order to finalize the AS2Box.net platform!

BabelAS2 version 0.03 has been released!

Yes! You can download BabelAS2 version 0.03 at

Google: http://babelas2.googlecode.com/files/BabelAS2.v0.03.zip

SourceForge: http://sourceforge.net/projects/babelas2/files/BabelAS2.v0.03.zip/download

This is the first "complete" version, you can send and receive any messages to/from any partners. I am a little bit disappointed by the length of the installation instructions for the IIS part, but if you are familiar with IIS, you should not find any "exotic" instructions ;-)

Do not forget to send feedback to babelabout@gmail.com, many thanks in advance!

I am almost ready...

Voilà, I have finished my first Wiki page Install, which gives a exhaustive step-by-step procedure for installing and configuring BabelAS2. This procedure is now also within the _Readme.txt file. It looks like everything is ready for the shipment of BabelAS2 version 0.03.

BabelAS2 version 0.03 will be the first "complete" version, it will include everything you need to send and receive any messages to/from any partners. No limitations, no license costs ;-)

The Wiki of Google Code is Great!

Finally, it might be quicker that expected... I really enjoy using the Wiki of Google Code as authoring tool for my _Readme.txt file. I really hope I will have finished tonight ;-)

I am still working on the "Readme.txt"

It's quite frustrating to realise that it's the _Readme.txt file that is the most time consuming to write! The Receive.asp is ready and running well on the BabelAS2 Test Server, but I have still not shipped it within BabelAS2 version 0.03 since I have not finished to detail all the steps needed to configure IIS. At the end, I am sure that I will have to describe 100+ steps :-(