When to close and reopen a socket after sending an HL7 message

Question

I am trying to open a basic connection to an HL7 server, where I send a request and get an ACK response. This will be done continuously.

• If this runs continuously, when do I close the socket? Am I implementing this correctly in this case?
• If I close the socket, how do I open it again? The javadocs for ConnectionHub states the following:

attach(java.lang.String host, int port, Parser parser, 
       java.lang.Class<? extends LowerLayerProtocol> llpClass) 

Returns a connection to the specified address, opening this connection, if necessary.

However, in real life, he will not open a new connection if it is already closed.

Patient patient = appt.getPatient();
Parser parser = new GenericParser();
Message hl7msg = parser.parse(wlp.getORMString(appt));

//Connect to listening servers
ConnectionHub connectionHub = ConnectionHub.getInstance();
// A connection object represents a socket attached to an HL7 server
Connection connection = connectionHub.attach(serverIP, serverPort, 
                            new PipeParser(), MinLowerLayerProtocol.class);
if (!connection.isOpen()) {
   System.out.println("CONNNECTION is CLOSED");
   connection = connectionHub.attach(serverIP, serverPort, new PipeParser(),         
                                     MinLowerLayerProtocol.class);
  if (!connection.isOpen()) {
    System.out.println("CONNNECTION is still CLOSED");
  }
}
Initiator initiator = connection.getInitiator();
Message response = initiator.sendAndReceive(hl7msg);

String responseString = parser.encode(response);
System.out.println("Received response:\n" + responseString);
connection.close();

: , , ACK. java.net.SocketException: Socket closed " . connection.close(), , .

Answer 1

HL7 2.X, - . , HL7 , -, . , , . , . , , , .

, HL7 (MLLP MLP) HL7 2.X. , HL7 . , HL7 Ack.

:

MLP - http://www.hl7standards.com/blog/2007/05/02/hl7-mlp-minimum-layer-protocol-defined

Acks - http://www.corepointhealth.com/resource-center/hl7-resources/hl7-acknowledgement