Your EDI Resource

Reprinted with permission from CoEnterprise. Barnes & Noble Education, Inc. (NYSE: BNED), one of the largest contract operators
of physical and virtual bookstores for higher education and K-12 institutions across the United States, one of the largest textbook wholesalers, and a leading provider of digital education services, enhances the academic and social purpose of educational institutions. Through its Barnes & Noble College and MBS subsidiaries, Barnes & Noble Education operates 1,495 physical and virtual bookstores and serves more than 6 million students, delivering essential educational content and tools within a dynamic retail environment.

Photo appears courtesy of University of the Fraser Valley. Millions of people have now found themselves working remotely due to the recent global pandemic. For companies like GraceBlood LLC and the EDI Alliance, this cloud-based, work-from-home model is just business as usual. Often when I tell people that I "work from home" they get this dreamy look in their eyes and say something like, "Wow - you're so lucky." Yes, it does have its perks, but there are some learning curves, too. Read on to learn some best practices and how you can succeed during this unprecedented time.

Photo appears courtesy of Eli Christman.  Many years ago we published a blog entitled Five Reasons to be Grateful for EDI Integration.  I considered reprinting it, because well, I think it is still relevant today.  But then I thought, there are more than FIVE, so here is a brand new blog, with five MORE reasons to be grateful for EDI and B2B integration. As for me, I am grateful to work with an amazing team of talented integration specialists.  What are YOU grateful for this year?

Photo appears courtesy of Trending Topics 2019.  It's #flashbackfriday!  Since I just went shopping for my third graders' school supplies, I thought now was a great time to reprint our "back to school" blog.  Enjoy!  Ever wonder how all those school supplies make it into the extremely crowded "back to school" area of Walmart?  The process involves a tightly connected network of buyers, suppliers, EDI providers, teachers and 29 million households.  The "back to school" supply chain probably starts sometime in the spring, when buyers all over the US predict what will be most in demand for the coming school year.  Will the pre-sharpened Ticonderoga pencils be available or not?  Will pencil top erasers be on the supply lists?  And will there be enough glue sticks for the two dozen each parent will be required to buy?  As I walked around Walmart this year, frantically looking for everything on my twins' supply lists, it occurred to me none of these people have any idea what led up to this chaos.

Photo appears courtesy of Peter. We dropped some hints in previous blogs and the unveiling is finally here!  We are now offering an EDI visibility tool called Syncrofy, and it very well may change the way you do business.  

With the economy heating up and companies out there cooking, our clients are looking to grow and find more efficient ways to deliver their products.  

Over the past three years several of our clients have done something which we really haven’t seen before, at least not quite like this. These changes in strategy seem to come in more like ocean tides rather than in a massive swoosh.

What am I referring to?

Photo appears courtesy of Dawn.  This blog was written by Art Douglas, a member of the EDI Alliance. What is the opposite of "KISS"? The answer of course, is Rube Goldberg. For those of you who have no idea what I just posited, allow me to explain.  "KISS" is an acronym for Keep It Simple, Stupid.  Now if you are sensitive, please don’t get uncomfortable about the "Stupid" part.  It merely allows us to use "KISS," thereby making it memorable.  If you prefer, think of it as Keep It Super Simple.  Rube Goldberg was a cartoonist who delighted readers by drawing overly-complicated mechanical machines that accomplished simple tasks. Think Mousetrap game.

Photo appears courtesy of Thad Zajdowicz.  This week, for a little #flashbackfriday, we are reprinting our fun takeoff on 'Twas the Night Before Christmas.  Just a little holiday humor...with sincere apologies to the original author, Clement Clarke Moore.

'Twas the night before Christmas and all through the store not a PO was issued, and 860s no more. 

RFID tags hung by receiving dock with care, in hopes that the trucks soon would be there.

The clerks were all nestled at registers and stations, while visions of UPC codes danced across nations.

As you may have heard, GraceBlood LLC acquired Aurora Technologies back in October of this year.  We will now be revisiting our Biography Series to include GraceBlood's amazing team of consultants and today we are featuring Lisa Crosley.  Lisa has been an EDI consultant with GraceBlood for 12 years. She initially worked with GraceBlood as a client EDI coordinator so when her company closed their US distribution operation, Karen and AMY wasted no time in bringing Lisa on board.

Photo appears courtesy of www.twin-loc.fr.  Welcome to our 200th blog post!  As I think about EDI through the years, I remember sometime during the early 1990’s taking a class on the structure and workings of XML. XML was all the rage and was supposed to replace EDI at any moment!!! It’s 20+ years later and yes, XML is widely adopted now in web service applications where systems talk to each other, but it’s really still the wild west with XML XSDs (XML Schema definitions) often inaccurate.  And it involves a lot of back and forth with trading partners saying, “…oh, hard code this, and that XML element loop can be executed multiple times, not the once limitation in the XSD, etc. etc. etc.”  Implementing XML with a new trading partner or transaction often feels like black magic to get it all working correctly, and that’s in the best of circumstances – usually it’s teams of technical and business staff on endless conference calls just to get it right.  Did XML replace EDI?  No.