BICMD Cookbook

After launching BICMD for the first time, you can either choose to use the default workspace located in <BICMD Root>/User/bicmd or you can create a new workspace.

When creating a new workspace you can choose the path.

Select the new workspace name from the dropdown list and click OK.

A fresh version of BICMD will only contain the Global_Procedures tree. In order to perform any mapping work, you will have to create projects.

Projects are used to house and organize message structures and mappings. You can create projects by right-clicking anywhere in the project explorer window and selecting New-Project.

Give the new project a name and a description (optional). Click OK.

By default, any newly created project will contain trees for each message standard type supported by BICMD. The more commonly used formats are ANSI_X12, EDIFACT, INHOUSE (fixed length flat files), CSV, XML, and SQL.

To import message structures, right-click anywhere in the project and select import.

Message structures will either be single XML files in a proprietary BICMD format, or zip files that contain the XML and a folder containing element codelists like the example above.

The import results in a new message structure being displayed in the ANSI_X12 message structure tree. The default naming convention for ANSI structures in <message>_<version>.

You can also import Idoc message structures which are generated from SAP using the Seeburger transport transaction /n/seeag/idocstruct. This transport has to be installed in the development SAP environment.

Idoc message structures are single XML files with no codelists. The default naming convention is <Idoc type>_<Idoc release>_<language code>.

It is not uncommon for an autocorrection dialogue to open as a result of importing Idoc message structure. Just choose Commit autocorrection to proceed. Choosing Cancel will result in the message structure not being imported.

Idoc message structures will appear in the INHOUSE message structure tree.

Once you have the appropriate message structures imported for source and destination, you are now ready to create a new mapping. Right-click on the Mapping tree and choose New-Mapping.

Choose the source and destination message structures from the dropdown lists. This will result in a default map naming convention of <source message type>_<source message name>_to_<destination message type>_<destination message name>.

You can alter the default mapping name or just add a prefix or suffix to indicate the trading partner the mapping is intended for. Leave the Programming language option as BIC_BASIC_V2. You can optionally fill out Company, Department, and User fields as well. Click OK.

The result will be a new map under the Mapping tree of the project. Note that the source and destination message structures are indicated under the map name. You are now able to perform mapping instructions in the new map and test the map using the self-contained BICMD test environment to compile and run sample data through for conversion tests.

Once you are ready to load your mapping to the BIS server, right-click anywhere in the project explorer window and choose Repository-Create repository connection to establish a connection to the BIS server mapping repository.

Type the hostname or IP address of the BIS server, leaving the port and logical system values as the defaults (10000 and 000 respectively) and click OK.

Type in your BIS username and password and click OK.

You will receive a message like the one above if you entered in the server information correctly and the BIS server is running and available. Click OK.

After establishing the server repository connection, you can now export the contents of your project to the server. Right-click on your project name and choose Repository-Export to Repository.

Choose your repository connection from the dropdown list and click Browse.

Click New folder to create a new repository project on the server.

Type in the name of the new project folder and click OK.

Select the new project folder name and click OK.

Type in a mandatory comment and click OK.

Choose the BICMD project objects that you want to export to the server and click OK. Note that you cannot export mappings without their dependent message structures.

Once the export is complete, the names of your BICMD project and any items that you exported will be red and will have a repository version indicated to the right in parentheses. The red color indicates that the objects are in read-only mode.

In order to gain exclusive write access on repository objects, you have to check them out by right-clicking on the object and choosing Repository-Check Out.

In the case of a map check out, BICMD will offer to check out the associated message structures as well. It is only necessary to check the message structures out if you intend to alter them. Otherwise, just click OK without selecting them.

You will receive a success message like the one above, but only if the object is not already checked out by someone else. Click OK.

Checked-out objects will be green in color to indicate write access.

If you open a checked-out object, make changes and save those changes, the font of the object name will appear in italics.

After you have made all of the changes you need to make, check the object back in by right-clicking on the object and selecting Repository-Check In.

Enter a mandatory check in comment and click OK.

A dialogue like the one above will indicate that the object was successfully checked in and that a new version number was assigned.

The object will once again appear in red and will display a new version number in parentheses.

In order for a mapping to be accessible in the BIS converter runtime environment, you must activate (compile) the mapping source code by right-clicking on the map and choosing Repository-Activate.

Confirm that the map name is selected, enter a mandatory activation comment and click OK.

You will receive the dialogue above if the activation is successful. Click OK.

Next go to the BIS server frontend and select Mapping Management under the Converter tree of the Configuration tab.

From the file menu choose New.

Select the map from the available activated mappings in the repository folder and click deploy.

Enter a mandatory deploy comment and click Continue.

Your mapping will then appear in the mapping management and is ready to be used in the BIS process solution.

Once Projects and maps are loaded to the server repository, additional BICMD clients can download the objects from the server by creating a repository connection and then right-click anywhere in the project explorer window and choose Repository-Import from repository.

Choose your server connection from the dropdown list and click Browse.

Choose the repository project you wish to import and click OK.

Click OK

You can either choose an existing BICMD project to import into or you can create a new project. Note that in this example, the TEST project in BICMD is already linked to the server and all objects are read only, so an import into that project would fail. Click New.

Type a new project name to link with the server project and click OK.

Click OK.

The new project will be created and linked with the server project.