Building B2b

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Building B2B / EDI Integrations

B2B Manager is Celigo's EDI hub for exchanging structured business documents with trading partners. It handles X12 (ANSI) and EDIFACT (UN) standards over FTP, AS2, and VAN connections.

An EDI integration has these Celigo-specific components:

• Trading partner connector -- a pre-built template (590+) defining the connection type, EDI profile defaults, and export/import field requirements for a specific trading partner
• EDI profile -- interchange envelope settings (ISA/GS for X12, UNB for EDIFACT) that identify sender/receiver and control document versioning
• File definition -- parsing and generation rules that describe the segment/element structure of a specific EDI document type (e.g. Costco 850, Walmart 856)
• Connection -- FTP, AS2, or VAN credentials for the trading partner's EDI endpoint
• Exports and imports -- file-based data sources/destinations that use file definitions to parse inbound EDI or generate outbound EDI
• Flows -- pipelines wiring exports and imports together with transformations

EDI Standards

X12 (ANSI ASC X12) -- North American standard. Documents are transaction sets identified by 3-digit codes (850 = PO, 810 = Invoice, 856 = ASN, 997 = FA, 855 = PO Ack, 846 = Inventory, 860 = PO Change). 50+ additional types supported including healthcare (834/835/837), transportation (204/210/214), and supply chain (753/843/861). Envelope: ISA → GS → ST → segments → SE → GE → IEA. Versions: 4010, 5010, 4030, etc.

EDIFACT (UN/EDIFACT) -- International standard. Documents are messages identified by 6-letter codes (ORDERS, INVOIC, DESADV, ORDRSP, RECADV, INVRPT, PRICAT, CONTRL). Additional messages: INSDES, OSTRPT, PARTIN, DELJIT, PRODAT, DELFOR, SLSRPT. Envelope: UNB → UNH → segments → UNT → UNZ. Versions: D93A, D96A, D01B, etc.

Quick Reference

Resource Decision Matrix

Minimum Required Fields

Schema Index

• edi-profile-request.yml -- X12 ISA/GS and EDIFACT UNB fields
• file-definition-request.yml -- format, delimiters, rules structure
• edi-transaction.yml -- transaction query response shape
• tp-connector-request.yml -- connector and supportedBy sections
• tp-supported-by-section.yml -- connection, profile, export/import pre-configuration

Related Skills

• configuring-connections > Quick Reference -- FTP, AS2, and VAN connection types for trading partner endpoints
• configuring-exports > Quick Reference -- file-based exports that parse inbound EDI using file definitions
• configuring-imports > Quick Reference -- file-based imports that generate outbound EDI using file definitions
• building-flows > How to Build a Flow -- wiring EDI exports and imports into flow pipelines
• writing-scripts > Quick Reference -- preSavePage/postMap hooks for EDI record transformation and validation

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How to Build an EDI Integration

1. Find the trading partner connector

Trading partner connectors are pre-built templates (590+) that define connection type, EDI profile defaults, and export/import config for a specific partner.

celigo tp-connectors list
celigo tp-connectors get <connectorId>

The connector's supportedBy object tells you what's pre-configured and what the user must provide for the connection, EDI profile, and exports/imports. See tp-supported-by-section.yml for the full structure.

If no connector exists, build the connection, EDI profile, and file definitions from scratch.

2. Check for existing resources

Before creating anything, check what the account already has. EDI profiles are per-partner (one profile covers all document types), so duplicates waste control number sequences.

celigo account search "<partner-name>"
celigo edi-profiles list | grep -i "<partner-name>"
celigo file-definitions list | grep -i "<partner-name>"
celigo connections list | grep -i "<partner-name>"

3. Create the connection

Create an FTP, AS2, or VAN connection for the trading partner. Use the connector's supportedBy.connection for pre-configured fields. See configuring-connections for full connection setup.

celigo connections create < connection.json
celigo connections ping <connectionId>

4. Create the EDI profile

The EDI profile defines the interchange envelope -- ISA/GS segments (X12) or UNB segment (EDIFACT). Read edi-profile-request.yml for all fields.

Key X12 fields: tpInterchangeId/myInterchangeId (ISA06/ISA08), tpIdQualifier/myIdQualifier (ISA05/ISA07, e.g. ZZ = mutually defined), isa12 (version, e.g. 00401), isa15 (P = production, T = test), controlNumber (auto-incremented).

celigo edi-profiles create < profile.json

5. Create file definitions

Each document type (850, 810, 856, etc.) needs its own file definition with parsing/generation rules. Read file-definition-request.yml for the rules structure.

Key fields: format (delimited/x12 or delimited/edifact), globalId (standard template reference, immutable), delimited.rowSuffix (segment terminator, ~ for X12), delimited.colDelimiter (element separator, * for X12), rules[] (hierarchical segment/element tree).

celigo file-definitions create < filedef.json

6. Create exports and imports

Inbound EDI export (reading from FTP/AS2): adaptorType: "FTPExport", file.type: "filedefinition", file.fileDefinition._fileDefinitionId, _ediProfileId, ftp.directoryPath.

Outbound EDI import (writing to FTP/AS2): adaptorType: "FTPImport", same file definition and profile references.

See configuring-exports and configuring-imports for full field schemas.

7. Wire into flows

Typical patterns:

• Inbound: FTP export (parse EDI) → transform EDI fields to ERP → ERP import
• Outbound: ERP export → transform to EDI → FTP import (generate EDI)
• 997 FA: auto-generate from file.faAcknowledgement: true on the inbound export