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General Q/A
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field ordering
Colin Cullen / ICAP <>
10 Apr 2008 3:33PM ET I wonder if someone could enlighten me regarding field ordering requirements within FIX messages? The FIX Protocol 5.0 docs (what I am currently using) speaks to field order only in regard to the detailed documentation for Repeating Groups (VOL.1), where it says little about field ordering except for the fact that the first field in the repeating group is always required (because it is used as the repeating group delimiter).
I have also found a number of documents that state a FIX message must be of the form <header fields> <trailer fields> with BeginString-8, BodyLength-9, and MsgType-35, being specified as the first three fields in the header section.
Neither our FIX engine vendor nor our application depend on field order.
I think it makes sense that field order requirements would be minimal given the name=value construction of the message protocol at the field level. The field name is what is needed to parse the message (including any Repeating Groups).
What is definitive with regard to this issue, and where is it stated in the specification? If there is nothing definitive then what is the prevailing consensus out there in the FIX community. Thanks to all.
field ordering
Colin Cullen / ICAP 10 Apr 2008 3:33PM ET
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