Hire someone or learn to do it myself

[roktis]

I am a self-taught filemaker developer. Have been doing filemaker for years and recently learned PHP to use CWP. My site is up and running on the web and doing well. In fact, it is doing so well we need to automate the order entry process with our supplier. Our supplier recently added the ability to accept electronic orders via XML. They use the automotive industry standard.

I need to do 3 things with XML: 1. Enter quote requests and receive the answer. 2. Enter a new order and receive confirmation. 3. Check order status and receive confirmation.

My question is whether XML is fairly easy to learn or whether I would be better off hiring someone to just integrate the XML into my system. If I should hire someone, any idea what the cost would be and any suggestions on who does this?

Thank you in advance.

[webko]

"automotive industry standard" - this needs some actual specs to determine how 'standard' that actually is...

Now, remember that a lot of CWP (especially if you're using FX) is actually XML as well. So what we need is a transformation of a FileMaker XML export to the sort of XML structure that the other system is expecting.

And also whether you're doing this with web inputs or from FileMaker.

IMO, if this is done properly the first time, it will just work and keep doing so until one end or the other changes something - I've got a few I wrote several years ago that are still chugging along just fine. I would probably get someone else to do it. All depends on how much you think your time is worth - my first effort (trivial as it was in hindsight) took me a week to get working.

Feel free to contact me back channel if you want more info

[roktis]

I sent you an email back channel on Friday. Did you get it?

[webko]

Yep - will reply shortly...