Body Length

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Imported from previous forum

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[ original email was from Mike Peters - ]
We are starting to use FIX and have the following some very simple questions :

  1. How do you calculate BodyLength
  2. Do you need a field seperator after the checksum
  3. When do you reset your message sequence number
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> We are starting to use FIX and have the following some very simple questions :
> 1. How do you calculate BodyLength
> 2. Do you need a field seperator after the checksum
> 3. When do you reset your message sequence number
>

  1. There are only four fields in the message header/trailer which must appear in a specific order. The first three are BeginString, BodyLength, and MessageType. The last field must be CheckSum. BodyLength is computed by counting the number of bytes following the BodyLength field (don’t include the BodyLength’s tag, “=”, value, or <SOH>) up to but not including the “10=xxx<SOH>” for the CheckSum.

  2. Yes.

  3. It is pre-arranged and agreed upon by the counterparties. Many implementations do this at midnight EST, however, this causes problems for Asian trading. My recommendation, would be to try to design your system to be as flexible as possible.