Working With ebXML An Indepth Overview

To understand the working of ebXML, firstly we will explore the ebXML message service, then CPP of an organization and finally CPA between two business partners. An ebXML message is also called message package and it is comprised of two components: SOAP body having payload container and communication protocol envelope.

Payload container has the necessary information which is exchanged between two businesses. The other component, communication protocol envelope consists of information about the content type of message and a unique content ID which is used in the identification of the message package. Following is an example of a message package in which information about an organizations sales data is stored:

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Content-ID:<msgpkg-xyz.com>
Content-type: text/xml;

There are different business processes between two trading organizations and UML classes are used to define the flow of information between them. For every ebXML business process element there is a corresponding UML class.

Whenever a business wants to participate in an e-business transaction, it registers its CPP with an ebXML site. This is the way by which it declares its availability for doing e-commerce to the other organizations. CPP stands for Collaboration Protocol Profile. It defines organizations business and technical details like the collaborations it can participate in, business processes used by the organization and all the technical details which has an important role in conducting e-commerce.

All CPP documents have CollaborationProtocolProfile root element which defines all the basic things about it like its version, digital signature namespace etc. It has four child elements also which are described below.

First is PartyInfo element which is an identification element i.e. it describes each and every division of business and their characteristics. Packaging element describes the way of constructing and packaging the message (header and payload) which is to be exchanged. In addition to these elements there are two optional elements also. These are signature and comment elements. So from the CPP, organization can publish their capabilities of doing e-commerce.

Now the next step is when two businesses agree on performing e-commerce with each other. After the agreement, CPA is created by the both businesses. CPA stands for Collaboration Protocol Agreement and it is also a document like CPP which lists all those e-commerce capabilities of both businesses which they are going to use in their future transactions.

Generally one organization creates a CPA from the CPP of other partner and send it to the partner for approval. Other party performs some edits in it, if needed and then we have a mutually agreed CPA.

Similar to CPP, CPA document also has CollaborationProtocolAgreement as root element. It has child elements also which are:

PartyInfo element has information about both businesses. Next is packaging element which information about message packaging. It has signature and comment elements too which are optional. In addition to these elements, CPA has an Start and End element which indicates the time period for which CPA is valid.

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