EDI splitting - AWS B2B Data Interchange
How EDI Splitting WorksKey BenefitsLimits and Considerations

EDI splitting

AWS B2B Data Interchange supports splitting of inbound X12 EDI documents that contain multiple transactions into individually processed single-transaction documents. This capability increases the maximum supported file size for multi-transaction EDI documents from 150MB to 5GB and enables independent processing of each transaction, even when trading partners send them batched in a single EDI file.

With EDI splitting, each resulting single-transaction document is independently validated and processed, emitting its own set of logs and EventBridge events. This enables individual post-processing and downstream business-system ingestions. For example, you can use the "Split Transformation Completed" events to trigger AWS Glue ETL jobs to automatically ingest valid transactions into your purpose-built data lake, while using the "Split Transformation Failed" events to notify your trading partner of issues with individual transactions of their EDI document.

How EDI Splitting Works

When EDI Splitting is enabled, AWS B2B Data Interchange processes each X12 EDI file as follows:

  1. The service parses and validates the EDI file, generates acknowledgement documents for the entire original document (if requested), and identifies the individual transactions within the EDI interchange

  2. The service generates individual, temporary EDI files for each transaction, maintaining all header and trailer-level information from the original EDI interchange within each separated transaction.

  3. The service processes each split file individually, applying validation and any configured transformations.

  4. Individual EventBridge events are published for each post-split file processing, enabling automated downstream workflows.

When splitting is enabled, validation errors are handled as follows:

  • If an inbound EDI document fails validation because of issues in its interchange or functional group header/trailer segments, it will not be split and will fail processing altogether.

  • If an inbound EDI document fails validation because of issues in segments contained in one of its transactions, the document will still be split, and individual post-split documents will be processed by the service.

Key Benefits

EDI Splitting offers several key benefits:

  • Increased File Size Support: With splitting enabled, AWS B2B Data Interchange can handle X12 EDI files up to 5GB, compared to the standard 150MB limit for non-split files.

  • Independent Transaction Processing: Each transaction is processed independently, allowing valid transactions to proceed even if others in the batch contain errors.

  • Granular Event-Driven Workflows: Individual EventBridge events for each transaction enable fine-grained control over downstream processing.

  • Improved Error Handling: Transaction-level validation provides more precise error reporting and enables targeted reprocessing of failed transactions.

  • Simplified Integration: Individual transaction processing simplifies integration with downstream business systems that expect single-transaction inputs.

Limits and Considerations

AWS B2B Data Interchange has the following limits for EDI Splitting:

  • Maximum of 100 transactions per split file

  • Increased file size limit of 5GB for split-enabled files (compared to 150MB for non-split files)

  • Splitting is only available by transaction, not by functional group or other criteria

When implementing EDI splitting, consider the following:

  • Acknowledgments: AWS B2B Data Interchange currently generates only a single functional and technical ACK document for the original inbound X12 EDI document, not individual ACK documents for each post-split document.

  • API Limitations: Direct invocation of a Transformer via StartTransformerJob API does not support splitting. Attempting to use StartTransformerJob to launch a Transformer that is configured to split input documents will result in an error.

  • Billing: There are no extra charges for splitting an inbound X12 EDI document. You will be billed based on the original inbound X12 EDI file and not the individual post-split X12 EDI files.

  • Exceeding Transaction Limits: X12 EDI documents that contain more than 100 transactions will not be split, and AWS B2B Data Interchange will fail an attempt to process such documents, recording a relevant error message into your CloudWatch logs and emitting a relevant error event to EventBridge.

If you have an EDI file that contains more than 100 transactions, you have two options:

  • Pre-process the file and break it down into multiple EDI files, each containing no more than 100 transactions (recommended approach).

  • Request an increase in the quota of the volume of transactions an EDI document could be split by. For more information on how to request a quota increase, see Quotas for AWS B2B Data Interchange.

For more information about service quotas, see Quotas for AWS B2B Data Interchange.