# Categories

**URL:** <https://forum.fixtrading.org/t/categories/8986>\
**Category:** General Q&A\
**Tags:** fixml, xid\_164866, imported\
**Created:** [October 21, 2004, 10:23pm UTC](https://forum.fixtrading.org/t/categories/8986 "2004-10-21T22:23:48Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 3\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![samgomez\_x](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/858c86/32.png) [@samgomez\_x](https://forum.fixtrading.org/u/samgomez_x)\
**Post date:** [October 21, 2004, 10:23pm UTC](https://forum.fixtrading.org/t/categories/8986/1 "2004-10-21T22:23:48Z")

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Imported from previous forum

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**Author:** ![samgomez\_x](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/858c86/32.png) [@samgomez\_x](https://forum.fixtrading.org/u/samgomez_x)\
**Post date:** [October 21, 2004, 10:23pm UTC](https://forum.fixtrading.org/t/categories/8986/2 "2004-10-21T22:23:48Z")

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I’m having some trouble understanding how I should be using Category and CategoryAbbrev attributes for fields. I understand that when this field appears in a message that belongs to the Category specified here, I should use the CategoryAbbrev as the attribute name. For all other messages I should use QualifiedAbbrev.

- How do I know what category a message belongs to? I could use the name of the file the message is defined in, but the names don’t exactly match the categories defined in the fields base file… For example, there is no file for “Indications” (note the ‘s’), or “SingleGeneralOrderHandling”. Ideally, I expected a message to have a Category attribute…

- How do I use **BaseCatagory**? If I understand this right, this indicates that the attribute name as specified in the complex type should be used for attributes of this type.

My apologies if these questions have already been answered or if the documentation addresses them already.

Thanks.

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<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![scott.atwell](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/51bf81/32.png) [@scott.atwell](https://forum.fixtrading.org/u/scott.atwell)\
**Post date:** [October 22, 2004, 1:54am UTC](https://forum.fixtrading.org/t/categories/8986/3 "2004-10-22T01:54:13Z")

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If you refer to the table of contents in the FIX 4.4 Protocol specification, you will see which messages fall under which message categories.

> I’m having some trouble understanding how I should be using Category and  
> CategoryAbbrev attributes for fields. I understand that when this field  
> appears in a message that belongs to the Category specified here, I  
> should use the CategoryAbbrev as the attribute name. For all other  
> messages I should use QualifiedAbbrev.
> 
> - How do I know what category a message belongs to? I could use the name  
> of the file the message is defined in, but the names don’t exactly  
> match the categories defined in the fields base file… For example,  
> there is no file for “Indications” (note the ‘s’), or  
> “SingleGeneralOrderHandling”. Ideally, I expected a message to have a  
> Category attribute…
> 
> - How do I use **BaseCatagory**? If I understand this right, this  
> indicates that the attribute name as specified in the complex type  
> should be used for attributes of this type.
> 
> My apologies if these questions have already been answered or if the  
> documentation addresses them already.
> 
> Thanks.