[eluser]techgnome[/eluser]
Invest in a big bottle of asprin, antacid, and find a good padded surface to bang your head against when you need to.
I worked with EDI before doing XML transformations... and it wasn't a whole lot of fun. You'll find that there are things that must be there, things aren't supposed to be there (but are), things that should be there (but aren't) and things that may or may not be there, depending on the moon, tides and the position of your left elbow.
That said, EDI is a broad term... my experience with it came from the Utilities (Natural Gas & Electricity)(consumption/usage by customers) industry as well as some financial (for recording/reporting payments to/from the utilities).
There are three things you can count on. 1) There will be a header... at the very least, one header for each transaction contained. If you're lucky, there will be file header too... but don't count on it. 2) There will be a record footer.... and almost always, a file footer that will provide some sort of data control... total rec count, total $$ amount, etc. 3) Every line will have a record identifier... this is used to tell you if it's a header, footer, detail, etc.
That's all I've got... good luck!
-tg
