Conexxus                       IFSF

Open Retailing: A collaboration between
IFSF and Conexxus

FAQs       Data Dictionary       Design Guidelines       Visit conexxus.org       Visit ifsf.org

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Press Release June, 2024

Conexxus and IFSF Publish White Paper on Joint API Data Dictionary

Conexxus and the International Forecourt Standards Forum (IFSF) proudly announce the release of a comprehensive white paper detailing the benefits of the Joint API Data Dictionary. This core component of the Open Retailing project ensures consistent data terminology across applicable information technology systems.

The white paper builds on the collaborative efforts of IFSF and Conexxus, promoting the advantages of Open Retailing standards and the Data Dictionary. These standards streamline the creation of interfaces and data structures for the Transportation, Energy, and Convenience retail industries.

Linda Toth, managing director of Conexxus, emphasised the significance of this collaboration: "Both Conexxus and IFSF have a long history of providing standards for the Transportation, Energy, and Convenience retail industry. The joint work under Open Retailing was born out of a need for truly global API standards that leverage the expertise of both organisations’ members. Having one standard, no matter the geography of deployment, saves time and ultimately money for suppliers and retailers alike."

By clearly defining common data elements, the Data Dictionary facilitates easy data sharing with partners and accelerates the creation of data lakes, crucial for advancing business analytics, machine learning, and artificial intelligence.

Carl Jones, programme manager and chair of the IFSF board of directors, added, "The Joint API Data Dictionary is at the heart of the Open Retailing project and provides the foundation for all global API standards. It is critically important to communicate the principles behind the Data Dictionary and its benefits to our members to drive the adoption of Open Retailing standards."

David Ezell, director of new initiatives at Conexxus, noted, "The paper outlines the benefits of the joint API Data Dictionary. While maintaining the dictionary requires careful curation, its use results in consistent definitions across systems, reduced development costs, reduced integration costs, and an overall reduction in the total cost of ownership of systems developed using the dictionary."

Download the paper here.

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Press Release June, 2023

Conexxus and the International Forecourt Standards Forum (IFSF) have announced the signing of a Global Standards Development and Cross Licensing Agreement that will pave the way for future global collaboration, resulting in international standards and an API Data Dictionary for the retail fuels and convenience industry. This agreement builds upon the collaborative work that IFSF and Conexxus have been doing and further formalizes the infrastructure and processes for joint work product and resulting API Standards.

“Standards allow implementers to write once, implement many,” said Linda Toth, managing director of Conexxus, “thus reducing the time to market and barrier of entry for core functionality. This allows implementers to focus on innovation and other differentiators.”

The data dictionary, by clearly defining data elements common in our operations, enables easy sharing of data with partners and faster creation of data lakes for the next phase of business analytics, machine learning, and artificial intelligence.

“The large number of global vendors serving this industry – largely with proprietary data meanings and interfaces – creates unnecessary technical debt and inability to quickly innovate,” said Gray Taylor, executive director of Conexxus, “this increases costs and missed opportunities for our retailers.”

This initiative and the formalized agreement are the result of a detailed analysis of how both Conexxus and IFSF can better serve their membership in the face of increasing disruption in our retail segment.

Global standards benefit retailers no matter where they do business. “Even retailers doing business in one country benefit from global standards,” said Ian Brown, API strategy manager, IFSF. “Suppliers can implement one standard no matter the country of use which mean resources are freed from doing multiple developments for the same functionality.”

“Although each market has its own nuances, there are a number of global trends that are impacting our industry; increasingly global standards are becoming more important as we keep pace with fast-moving technologies,” said Carl Jones, programme manager of IFSF. “This agreement ensures that one standard exists, where applicable, for all global markets.”

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Interactive Overview of APIs

Welcome to the interactive overview of the APIs that are shaping the c-store experience. These APIs are being developed by openretailing.org - a joint project of Conexxus and IFSF.

To explore the APIs, either click your way through the forecourt, store, and full site, or use the blinking arrow buttons at the bottom to navigate through each element available. You can make the graphic full screen or scroll and zoom with your mouse.

We hope this interactive experience brings a clarity to the power of APIs for your organization - as well as for the experiences of your employees and customers. For any questions, please reach out to info@openretailing.org.

To begin, click the present button... then scroll and click around!



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Work Product Release to the Public

We have two projects open to the public:

1. API Design Guidelines: These guidelines cover Open Retailing API Design, including guidelines for JSON design, APIs OAS3.0, transport and security. These can be found at https://gitlab.openretailing.org/public-standards/api-design-guidelines

2. API Data Dictionary: The work can be found at https://gitlab.openretailing.org/public-standards/api-data-dictionary
The dictionary is a work in progress. V1.0 has been released to the pubic for consideration. Members of the public are requested to inform us of missing data elements and objects. Requests for corrections, additions, improvements, and clarifications of the existing elements and objects are welcome. All proposed changes will be reviewed by work groups within Conexxus and IFSF, and potentially be accepted into the Data Dictionary. Changes and additions are reviewed to assure consistency throughout the dictionary and to avoid duplications of the same name being used for the identical element or object. Future revisions of the dictionary may be published to the public.

Please send any feedback to support@openretailing.org

Member-only released versions can be found here. Be sure to navigate to the tagged version of your choice. Alternatively, Conexxus members may view/download at https://conexxus.org/standards/api-data-dictionary.

Last updated May 12, 2023

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FAQs       Data Dictionary       API Design Guidelines       Visit conexxus.org       Visit ifsf.org

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About Conexxus

Elevate your innovation and competitiveness with Conexxus, a dynamic non-profit driven by our visionary and passionate members. Our primary commitment lies in driving technologies supporting operational innovations, advocating for the industry’s needs and success, and creating meaningful standards for the ever-evolving industry of convenience stores and retail fueling. Conexxus’ mission is to improve your time to market, reduce cost and risk associated with innovation, empower cutting-edge solutions that redefine the retail landscape, define technology roadmaps, and prepare our industry for the fast-changing landscape of retail and consumer experience.

About IFSF

IFSF is a community dedicated to enabling technology standards for the benefit of retailers of automotive fuel and energy. IFSF’s approach is to collaborate with other standards organisations and relevant institutions to achieve common standards for interoperability of forecourt and convenience devices and services. IFSF depends on support from retailers, suppliers and other industry stakeholders who contribute to, and benefit from, shared standards. To date IFSF has set many standards which have been adopted on thousands of forecourts in an ever increasing number of countries world wide.

© Open Retailing (Conexxus and IFSF) 2020-2023. All rights reserved. info@openretailing.org