Imported from previous forum
FIX is STANDARD but every venue is DIFFERENT
The FIX protocol is a standard that has done wonders for the industry. Any trading party can connect to any venue or counterparty across the world and begin trading using a common language. The problem is that every exchange, broker and trading platform has slightly different functionality – functionality that differentiates them from competitors. This results in different formats for their FIX messages. These differences manifest themselves as custom message types, custom fields, and different enumerations. There are several reasons for these differences. In some cases Exchanges have information that they need to distribute that is specific to their matching system. In other cases trading venues provide fields to customize algorithmic orders. The most horrendous cases are when trading venues define custom fields without realizing there are existing standard fields that could be used.
How do I see the differences between different FIX specifications?
This is one of the most common questions that we get from anybody who has to deal with connecting to multiple trading venues. Finding the differences between two FIX specifications is essential to getting connected to a new trading venue quickly. When developers start to connect to a new trading venue the first question that pops in their head is “How is this different than the venues we already connect to?” Hopefully the differences are small, and require only minimal configuration. But lots of times, custom development is needed to connect to the new trading venue. Seeing the differences right away allows engineers to spend less time doing trial-and-error experimentation against a trading venue’s test environment.
Despite FIX being a standard there are many inefficiencies in the industry that are the result of poor communication and documentation. These are the driving forces behind our FIX product suite, especially for FIX Explorer. FIX Explorer has a specification comparison feature that shows the differences between any two FIX specifications. These specifications can compare two different venues, different versions from the same venue or a trading venue to the standard FIX specification managed by FPL. Being able to see the differences immediately can save time and frustration and get counterparties connected faster and trading sooner.