How to Receive Multiple IDOC's in a Custom Pipeline

When integrating different systems using BizTalk Server and SAP, it is often useful to have a single custom pipeline handle multiple IDOC's instead of using multiple receive locations tied to unique SAP Program ID's.

To create a custom pipeline with multiple flat file disassemblers

Load your BizTalk project into Visual Studio 2005.
Add a custom pipeline to the project.
Insert an instance of the flat file disassembler into the pipeline.
Set the flat file schema to the schema of the IDOC you want to handle.
Repeat steps 3 and 4 until all of your IDOC formats are accommodated.

Note
When you add the second flat file disassembler component, the ExecutionMode property of the disassemble stage will change to "First Match."
Compile and deploy the application.
Create a single receive port using the custom pipeline.

Note
When you add the second flat file disassembler component, the ExecutionMode property of the disassemble stage will change to "First Match."

At run time, the correct disassembler component is selected using a pipeline probing mechanism. When a message is received, the custom pipeline will call each flat file disassembler component until the message is successfully disassembled or all components have been called.

If there are many flat file disassembler components in the custom pipeline, or you have many custom pipelines that use probing, you may find that performance degrades. This is because probing for every corresponding disassembler component degrades pipeline performance. If your performance is not meeting expectations, consider implementing a custom schema resolver component. For more information on custom schema resolvers, see Schema Resolver Component (BizTalk Server Sample).