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DBNAlliance (Digital Business Networks Alliance) is a North American standards body for B2B e-commerce. Its AS4 profile is designed for interoperable document exchange between trading partners in North America.

Maven Artifact

phase4-profile-dbnalliance

Profile ID

dbnalliance

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Maven dependency

<dependency>
  <groupId>com.helger.phase4</groupId>
  <artifactId>phase4-profile-dbnalliance</artifactId>
  <version>4.4.1-SNAPSHOT</version>
</dependency>

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Overview

The DBNAlliance profile uses one-way/push messaging, similar to the Peppol profile, but with several key differences:
  • Uses SOAP 1.2 explicitly (not just the AS4 default)
  • Uses AES-256-GCM encryption (stronger than the 128-bit used by other profiles)
  • Configures 5 retries spread across a 6-hour window
  • Uses its own agreement and party type URIs

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PMode structure

import com.helger.phase4.profile.dbnalliance.DBNAlliancePMode;
import com.helger.phase4.model.pmode.IPModeIDProvider;

PMode pMode = DBNAlliancePMode.createDBNAlliancePMode(
    "your-access-point-id",
    "receiver-access-point-id",
    "https://receiver.example.com/as4",
    IPModeIDProvider.DEFAULT_DYNAMIC,
    true  // persist
);
ParameterValue
MEPOne-Way
MEP BindingPush
SOAP versionSOAP 1.2 (explicit)
Agreement IDhttps://dbnalliance.org/agreements/access_point.html
Party typehttp://docs.oasis-open.org/bdxr/AS4/1

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Security requirements

DBNAlliance uses AES-256-GCM for encryption, not AES-128-GCM. This is enforced by DBNAllianceCompatibilityValidator.
SettingRequired value
Signature algorithmRSA_SHA_256
Signature hash functionSHA-256
Encryption algorithmAES-256-GCM (http://www.w3.org/2009/xmlenc11#aes256-gcm)
WSS version1.1.1
PModeAuthorizefalse
Receipt reply patternResponse
Non-repudiationtrue

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AgreementRef and PartyInfo

  • CollaborationInfo/AgreementRef value must be https://dbnalliance.org/agreements/access_point.html
  • CollaborationInfo/AgreementRef/@type must NOT be set
  • PartyInfo/From[0]/@type must be http://docs.oasis-open.org/bdxr/AS4/1
  • PartyInfo/To[0]/@type must be http://docs.oasis-open.org/bdxr/AS4/1

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Reception awareness and retries

DBNAlliance has a significantly different retry configuration compared to other profiles: 
// From DBNAlliancePMode.generatePModeReceptionAwareness():
// receptionAwareness = true
// retry = true
// maxRetries = 5
// retryIntervalMS = (6 hours / 5 retries) in ms = 4_320_000 ms (72 minutes per retry)
// duplicateDetection = true
This spreads the 5 retry attempts over a 6-hour total window with equal intervals.

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HTTP client settings

Phase4DBNAllianceHttpClientSettings provides suitable defaults:
SettingValue
TLS versionTLS 1.2 (minimum)
Connection request timeout1 second
Connect timeout5 seconds
Response timeout100 seconds
import com.helger.phase4.profile.dbnalliance.Phase4DBNAllianceHttpClientSettings;

Phase4DBNAllianceHttpClientSettings httpSettings = new Phase4DBNAllianceHttpClientSettings();

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CRL checking

The DBNAlliance profile module includes DBNAllianceCRLDownloader for Certificate Revocation List (CRL) checking, supporting proper certificate validation for the DBNAlliance PKI.

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Error handling

DBNAlliance requires all three error reporting flags:
  • ErrorHandling.Report.AsResponse = true
  • ErrorHandling.Report.ProcessErrorNotifyConsumer = true
  • ErrorHandling.Report.ProcessErrorNotifyProducer = true
  • ErrorHandling.Report.DeliveryFailuresNotifyProducer = true (mandatory, not just recommended)

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