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When importing data into X Dispatch, it is important to know the structure of an X Import configuration file. There are two types of files, which can be distinguished by their file extension.

• XINI files are on demand configurations.
• XASN files are routed configurations.

The following is for both XINI and XASN file types unless otherwise noted. 

Comments

Comments are indicated by the '#' character and continue to the end of the line and can be at the beginning of a line, or at the end. 

# This is a comment
OriginName=0,CXT Software # This is also a comment

General Configuration Items

Configuration items are set using a Key=Value format. 

Optional

This value is set to the number of concurrent data files to be processed and will tell the system how many parallel processes to attempt to create. If this value is set to -1 it will tell the system to create as many as it can.

ConcurrentDataFiles=-1

Optional

Can be set in the X Stream definition to run multiple XASN/XINI files at the same time.

Required

Specifies the extension of the import files (e.g., xml, txt, *).

To disregard the file extension, you may use '*', however, the DataMask item should be set whenever possible to prevent the processing of unintended files. Many times, third-party companies sending the import files will upload the file with a ".tmp" extension and rename the file to the correct extension only once the upload has been completed. If the DataMask is set to '*' these temporary files may be processed before they have been completely transferred.

DataMask=xml

Required

Directory to monitor for incoming files.  If the directory is not on the local machine, the fully qualified URI (\\server1\customer1\inbox) must be used. 

DataPath=c:\ximport\inbox

Optional

Specifies whether files moved to the “ProcPath” directory should inherit the permissions of that directory when moved.  A value of “1” indicates files should inherit permissions, while a value of “0” indicates the file should retain its current permissions (default behavior). 

Inherit=1

Required

This specifies the type of file to be processed and must be one of:

• “XML”: The input file is an XML formatted document
• “0”: The input file is a fixed-width file
• “TAB”: The input file is tab delimited
• “,”: The input file is in standard CSV format (See also: "Qualifier" item)
• Any other character: The input file will be split on this character.

• "Excel":  This functionality will require the installation of the 32 bit Microsoft Access Database Engine 2010 Redistributable. 

Delimiter=XML

Required

The directory in which to store any error log files for the import.

ErrPath=c:\ximport\errors

Optional

Indicates how many lines to skip from the top on an imported flat file. This allows you to bypass header rows in data files. 

NumLinesSkipped=1

Optional

Full path to the preprocessor executable. 

PreProcessor=c:\ximport\plugins\eTracPreProcessor.exe

Optional in X Dispatch 19.2 or newer

0/1 to enable/disable passing of the database instance to the pre-processor.

Defaults to 0 to not pass the parameter so that it will not cause a regression for any existing preprocessors.

Required

The directory in which to store copies of original import file and the log of XML requests used to place an order.

ProcPath=c:\ximport\processed

Optional

Qualifier defaults to the double-quote character and should almost never be modified. The corner case where Qualifier may need to be specified is if the import file format is a hybrid CSV file where escaped data is surrounded with a character other than the double-quote. This case is exceedingly rare. 

Qualifier="

Required

Full URL to the XMLListener.asp file. 

URL=http://127.0.0.1/XMLListener.asp

Required only if using XML for Routed   

The XML node used to indicate the base node.  

BaseNode=/OrdersXASN

Required only if using XML 

The XML node used to indicate orders.  

If listed, relative to BaseNode.  Otherwise, it is an absolute path from the root of the document. See DATA ITEMS (XML) below. 

OrderNode=/Orders/Order

Required only if using XML 

The XML node used to indicate parcels. See Data Item Types (XML) below. 

ParcelNode is relative to OrderNode if used in XINI or if BaseNode is specified in routed.  Otherwise, it is an absolute path from the root of the document.

Optional

If the XML file submitted is wrapped in leading characters, this will prevent X Import from processing the document.  This is because having leading characters is not valid XMDelimiterL. In order to modify the file into becoming valid XML, you can specify a mask of characters to strip out from the very beginning of the file if they are found.  

This could be more than one character and is not a dynamic field, so do not wrap the value in quotes or begin it with 0,. 

StripBeginningQualifier=”

Required only if using XML 

If the XML file submitted is wrapped in trailing characters, this will prevent X Import from processing the document.  This is because having trailing characters is not valid XML. In order to modify the file into becoming valid XML, you can specify a mask of characters to strip out from the very end of the file if they are found.  

This could be more than one character and is not a dynamic field, so do not wrap the value in quotes or begin it with 0,. 

StripEndingQualifier=”

^[^"]

Required

The number of days to keep files that are in the ProcPath (.proc, .original) and ErrPath (.err) directories (EdiProcessedPath (.proc, .original) and EdiErrorsPath (.bad) for EDI).  

If this setting is omitted from the configuration file the number of days to keep the files defaults to 90.  If the value in the configuration file cannot be parsed as an Integer the number of days to keep the files defaults to 90. 

LogRetentionDays=7

ReImport

Optional

Used to reimport the processing of a file in the processed directory that does not have a .proc file. 

ReImport=1  # Default is 0 ( no reimport ).

Optional

The e-mail address to which X Import will send a report about the import process for the current input file. Multiple email addresses should be comma separated. This works for both On Demand and Routed.

ReportEmail=text@cxtsoftware.com

ReportEmail is not stored with the Order, but is used to create an email to be sent. It could be found tblMailLog, tblMailOutbox, or tblMailOutboxHistoric, depending on the time that has passed since the import and the status of email.

Required

The number of times to attempt to re-import failed imports. Omitting this item or setting it to 0 will have no change on import functionality.  Any numeric value higher than 0 will tell X Import to try the configured number of times to re-import the failed data.

This feature will only re-import failed orders/stops. Any successfully imported orders/stops will not be re-imported. 

MaxReimport=3

LocalizedDateTimes=1

Optional

Contains the file name of the XSLT file to use for translation (e.g. C:\IMPORT\TEST.XSLT). The XSLT file can be used to modify the incoming data before it is processed by the Import plugin.

Optional

Contains the directory location where to write the XSLT translation output data. This is primarily used for debugging purposes. It allows the user to see the data that was created by the XSLT transformation.

Optional 

Contains the directory location where to write the output that the Import plugin sent to the back end. This is primarily used for debugging purposes. It allows the user to see what data is being sent to the back end server.

Optional 

Contains a 1 or 0 to enable or disable sending requests to the back end.

This value is used in conjunction with XmlDataPath.

Optional

Set to the config type from tblQueue_Batch that will denote import data to processes.

How it is configured:

1. CXT Software deploys the CXT: Save Web Service String Data plugin. This plugin creates a web based endpoint that writes whatever is sent to it to the tblQueue_Batch table. This plugin is configured to specify the config type, which will be used in the XASN file. 
2. In the XINI/XASN, set the QueueBatchConfigType key to the same config type as configured in the previous step.

How it works:

1. A web service calls the endpoint set up above and sends data as part of the body of the request. This data can be XML, JSON, TAB delimited or FIXED length - EXCEL format is NOT supported. The plugin will store the request in tblQueue_Batch using the specified config type.
2. The import plugin is run and will scan tblQueue_Batch for any records with the given config type. If found, the data from those records will be written to a file in the folder specified by the DataPath parameter. Once all of the records have been written out, the import plugin will process the files as normal.

_{Possible version compatibility issue. See Changelog below.}

Optional

Used to delay the processing of a file by a set number of seconds. 

DelayImport=180  # This is for 3 minutes  60*3 = 180

Optional

Required in some XML inbound documents or if NameSpaceUri is used. 

NameSpacePrefix =ns2  # This data would be found at the root element in the xml doc

Optional

Required in some XML inbound documents or if NameSpacePrefix is used. 

NameSpaceUri =http://internal.amazon.com/TrailerInfo  # This data would be found at the root element in the xml doc

Optional 

Used to replace content in the document with the matching value with an empty string. 

ReplaceContent =:TrailerInfo xmlns:“http://www.schema.com”  # This will remove any match for this string to be set to the empty string “”

Optional 

The e-mail address to which X Import will send a report about the import process for the current input file. Multiple email addresses should be comma separated. This works for both On Demand and Routed.

Data: ReportEmail is not stored with the Order, but is used to create an email to be sent. It could be found tblMailLog, tblMailOutbox, or tblMailOutboxHistoric, depending on the time that has passed since the import and the status of email.

File Failures

The import plugin will move any failing data files to the ERRORS folder.

_{Possible version compatibility issue. See Changelog below.}

Optional

FailureEmailFromAddress is a parameter for a return email address for failure emails. This parameter and FailureEmailFromName must be set the same as the setting in the email account. For example, if the email account has the email as email@cxtsoftware.com and the name as John Doe, the FailureEmailFromAddress must be "email@cxtsoftware.com" and the FailureEmailFrom Name must be "John Doe".

The best practice is to use the same email address as the one set in the active Mail Manager profile. 

Optional

FailureEmailFromName is a parameter for a return email name for the failure emails. This parameter and FailureEmailFromAddress must be set the same as the setting in the email account. For example, if the email account has the email as email@cxtsoftware.com and the name as John Doe, the FailureEmailFromAddress must be "email@cxtsoftware.com" and the FailureEmailFrom Name must be "John Doe".

The best practice is to use the same email address as the one set in the active Mail Manager profile. 

Optional

FailureEmailToAddress is a parameter for a valid email address where the failure email should be sent. 

Example

DataPath=C:\ximport\inbox # example comment
DataMask=XML
Inherit=0
ProcPath=C:\ximport\Processed
ErrPath=C:\ximport\Errors
# another comment
URL=http://127.0.0.1/SampleWeb/XMLListener.asp
Delimiter=XML

Data Item Types 

There are three types of data items: static, dynamic, and macro. 

Static Data Items

Static data items allow you to populate fields with known values. For example, if all of the deliveries sent in on an ASN will be assigned the same order type, origin address, etc. Static data items can be set by prepending the argument with “0,” followed by the static value. 

UserID=0,ximport-mckesson

Dynamic Data Items

Dynamic data items allow you to set an item’s value based upon the type of input file. 

• Data Items (Delimited)
• Data Items (Fixed-Width)

Macro Data Items

Macro data items allow you to populate fields with certain pre-defined macros. Currently, the only supported macros are the following:

Returns the current timestamp at the time of processing, e.g. “04/20/2008 11:11” AKA "Server Time"  This would be the time of the server on which X Import is running.

Time may be added and subtracted in minute increments by appending the appropriate math after the “NOW” route keyword.

• “NOW+30” in the example above would be “04/20/2008 11:41”
• “NOW-30” in the example above would be “04/20/2008 10:41"

Returns the current date at the time of processing with the time set to 12:00 AM, e.g. “04/20/2008 00:00” AKA "X Dispatch Time" This is the time in X Dispatch via dbo.GETCXTDate().

Time may be added and subtracted in day (whole or fractional) increments by appending the appropriate math after the “TODAY” keyword

• “TODAY+2” would evaluate to “04/22/2008 00:00”
• “TODAY-2” would evaluate to “04/18/2008 00:00”
• “TODAY+0.5” would evaluate to “04/20/2008 12:00"

Returns the current date at the time of processing within cxtAsp.

This would be useful if the time zone of the system running X Import does not line up with the time zone of X Dispatch.  For example, if a customer on Cloud is set for Eastern time but the server running their instance is set to Pacific or Central time.  

ReadyTimeFromApplies to the following XINI fields:  

• ReadyTimeTo
• PickupTime
• RequestDeliverTime

Applies to the Following XASN Fields:  

• PostDate
• StopTime
• StopTimeMin
• StopTimeMax

If CXTNOW is used in a field outside of what is outlined above, the field will contain the results of NOW instead. 

Example

PickupDate= NOW+360
DeliverDate=TODAY+2

Macro data items can also be manipulated to add time offsets. For example, if you receive an ASN for same day delivery and the file comes in at inconsistent times (11 PM one day and 1 AM the next), using the above macros may not be sufficient. For these cases, it is possible to add a time offset and then apply a date transformation.

If you want to accept a same day ASN before 3 PM, but roll everything after 3 PM to the next day, you could do the following:

PickupDate=NOW&09:01|DAYFLOOR

The syntax for this type of macro manipulation is in the following form: Item=Macro&[OffsetHours:]OffsetMinutes|Transformation

Where:

• Item is a valid Data Item for the configuration file.
• Macro must be one of: NOW (see NOTE below) or TODAY.
• OffsetHours specifies the number of hours to add to the evaluated macro (required)
• OffsetMinutes specifies the number of minutes to add to the evaluated macro (required)
• Transformation is one of:
  • DAYFLOOR: Set the resulting time to 00:00
  • DAYUPPER: Set the resulting time to 00:00 and adds one day

  • WEEKDAYFLOOR: Behaves similarly to DAYFLOOR. If the time, after adding the OffsetHours and OffsetMinutes, is on a Saturday or Sunday, it will be pushed to the following Monday and then set the resulting time to 00:00 

NOW is a macro that pulls the SERVER time, not the time local to the customer. The server time for Cloud customers is always UTC and the imported files will show the time local to the customer. In the example above, if the customer’s local time is EST you would need to add 4 hours to the syntax example: 

PickupDate=NOW&13:01|DAYFLOOR

X Dispatch 21.0

• QueueBatchConfigType
• File Failures - The import plugin will move any failing data files to the ERRORS folder. Previously any data files that failed to preprocess (via preprocessor or XSLT) would have been left in the inbound folder. This caused the import plugin to retry that data file over and over throwing errors while not processing that data file.
  • FailureEmailFromAddress
  • FailureEmailFromName
  • FailureEmailToAddress

X Dispatch 19.2

• Attempts 
• MaxFailed
• RetryDelsy(ms)

X Dispatch 18.1

• LocalizedDateTimes 

X Dispatch 14.2.4

• MaxReimport 

X Dispatch 12.1.4

• SkipLinesIfBeginsWith available in XINI

X Dispatch 12.1.3

• StripBeginningQualifier 
• StripBeginningQualifier

X Dispatch 12.0.0

• SkipLinesIfBeginsWith is available in XASN

X Dispatch 11.2.6

• Added use of modifiers for CXTNOW like with NOW

Version 1.4.5

• Resolved an issue that prevented CXTNOW from being passed to the system for these fields.

Version 1.4.3

• Delimiter - The CSV file can an unlimited number of columns. Prior versions was limited to 201 columns.

Version 1.3.0

• Delimiter value can be set to “Excel” to tell the import process to import Excel formatted files.  This process supports Excel 2003 and Excel 2007 or newer files (*.XLS, *.XLSX, *.XLSB and *.XLSM).

Version 1.2.0

# This is a comment
OriginName=0,CXT Software # This is also a comment

DataPath=C:\ximport\inbox # example comment
DataMask=XML
Inherit=0
ProcPath=C:\ximport\Processed
ErrPath=C:\ximport\Errors
# another comment
URL=http://127.0.0.1/SampleWeb/XMLListener.asp
Delimiter=XML

ConcurrentDataFiles=-1

DataMask=xml

DataPath=c:\ximport\inbox

Inherit=1

Delimiter=XML

ErrPath=c:\ximport\errors

NumLinesSkipped=1

PreProcessor=c:\ximport\plugins\eTracPreProcessor.exe

ProcPath=c:\ximport\processed

Qualifier="

URL=http://127.0.0.1/XMLListener.asp

BaseNode=/OrdersXASN

OrderNode=/Orders/Order

StripBeginningQualifier=”

StripEndingQualifier=”

^[^"]

LogRetentionDays=7

ReImport=1  # Default is 0 ( no reimport ).

ReportEmail=text@cxtsoftware.com

MaxReimport=3

LocalizedDateTimes=1

DelayImport=180  # This is for 3 minutes  60*3 = 180

NameSpacePrefix =ns2  # This data would be found at the root element in the xml doc

NameSpaceUri =http://internal.amazon.com/TrailerInfo  # This data would be found at the root element in the xml doc

ReplaceContent =:TrailerInfo xmlns:“http://www.schema.com”  # This will remove any match for this string to be set to the empty string “”

FailureEmailToAddress=email@cxtsoftware.com
FailureEmailFromAddress=monitoring@cxtsoftware.com
FailureEmailFromName=Import Failed
FailureEmailOnNoData=1

UserID=0,ximport-mckesson

PickupDate= NOW+360
DeliverDate=TODAY+2

PickupDate=NOW&09:01|DAYFLOOR

PickupDate=NOW&13:01|DAYFLOOR