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BizTalk Developer Interview Questions and Answers - HL7

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Introduction

This article intends to cover the answers to BizTalk HL7 related questions, which a BizTalk developer can face during an interview.

 

Questions and Answers

1. What happens when the HL7 accelerator is installed?

The installation of the HL7 accelerator results in one or more of these items, depending on the selection during installation:

  • Schemas: Contains the XSD representation of HL7 messages which are in flat file format in version v2.x
  • Pipelines: Converts HL7 messages in flat file format into XML on receive and XML to flat file when sending messages and validates the HL7 message
  • Adapter: Minimal Lower Layer Protocol (MLLP) adapter enables BizTalk to receive or send HL7-based messages, which BizTalk Server typically transports using the MLLP protocol. The MLLP adapter ensures that BizTalk Server and BTAHL7 are interoperable with HL7-based messaging applications.Generates acknowledgements for received messages
  • Tools and Utilities: Configuration Explorer, MLLP Test Tool, SDK, Logging framework 

2. What does BTAHL72VXCommon project contain?

It contains Schema for MSH segent and HL7 acknowledgements.

3. What does BTAHL7231common project contain?

It contains the definitional schema referred to by all version 2.31 message schemas.

4. Is it mandatory to configure party for HL7?

Yes, you need to add a party for each application that sends data into BizTalk server.

5. Is it required to specify schema per pipeline?

Unlike default flat file DASM that BizTalk server provides, the HL7 does not require that a schema be specified per pipeline.

6. What consideration is to be taken while dealing with MSH entries?

Entries in MSH are case sensitive.

7. When does DASM generate acknowledgements?

If configured for Acknowledgement or if MSH.15 and MSH16 request them, the DASM generates one or more acknowledgements.

8. Why is it required to have party configured?

The HL7 parser is designed to check the party configuration for each HL7 message. It reads the MSH.3 and checks for whether a party has been defined. If it has then HL7 parser follows the configuration supplied via HL7 configuration explorer.

9. HL7 accelerator runs in which mode?

HL7 accelerator runs only in 32-bit mode. (64-bit support is available in BizTalk 2013).

10. Can we override values in the MSH segment of the outgoing message?

Yes, it is possible to override certain field values in MSH segment of outgoing message.

11. Can we alter the namespace in the MSH schema?

We can, but do not alter because the HL7 parser only looks for single MSH, the standard one that the HL7 accelerator provides.

12. What is the difference between BTAHL72XReceive and BTAHL7XMLReceive?

Both are used to receive HL7 message but former one used to receive HL7 message as flat file and later one to receive HL7 message as XML.

13. What are the acknowledgement types defined by HL7?

The ACK code is found in the MSA-1 field of the ACK message. The following codes are supported by HL7:

  • AA – Application Accept
  • AE – Application Error
  • AR – Application Reject

 

See Also

Read suggested related topics:

Another important place to find a huge amount of BizTalk related articles is the TechNet Wiki itself. The best entry point is BizTalk Server Resources on the TechNet Wiki.