Setup Guides - POSTman Web Services

This comprehensive guide is designed to help programmers effectively implement POSTMan web services.

Getting Started

Before you can start using POSTman Web Services, you must sign up for a subscription. DMS are happy to provide you with a trial subscription allowing limited usage to get you up and going or to evaluate POSTman Web services if you wish.

To sign up, email info@dmsw.com.au or call 07 3510 9555.

Once your registration is completed, you will be sent a username and password. This username and password is used to both sign-in to the https://postmanws.com site and also to utilize the Web Service itself.

Make sure you keep this username and password secure as any usage attributed to it will be taken from your account.

If you believe your login has been compromised, contact DMS to change your password immediately.

In order to modify your account details, purchase credits or to check on your account’s current usage, go to the https://postmanws.com page and login

The next step is to integrate POSTman Web Services into your website. To do this, first review the interface examples in the Interface Examples section of this document to get a feel as to how you might wish to implement POSTman Web Services. Next review the Reference Manual section to familiarize yourself with POSTman Web Services and its methods. Finally refer to the Program Examples section to see source code examples in C#, Java, PHP and other languages.

POSTman Web Services itself is available from; https://webservice.dmsw.com.au/postman/

To login into the web service, utilize the username and password that DMS has provided.

Finally, it is important that you monitor your usage from time to time, usage can be checked on the web service website or via a method call in POSTman Web Services itself. If you believe you are going to run out of usage in the current usage period and do not wish to risk having the service unavailable, then contact DMS immediately via support@dmsw.com.au or by phoning (07) 3510 9555 to top-up your web service usage in the current period or to adjust your subscription.

Interface Examples

POSTman Web Services can be integrated into virtually any web form or application where an address is captured.

Minor corrections to an address or reformatting of an address to Australia Post standards can be done automatically without a user knowing.

Here you see an address was entered in the web form but was written slightly differently into the underlying database. This happens without the operator knowing it has occurred and improves the consistency of the data in your database.

If an address cannot be corrected automatically using Australia Post’s AMAS rules, the operator will be taken to a near matches list such as this one.

Usually at this point, you provide your operators with three options;

Select the correct address from the list
Leave the address as it is (a small percentage of valid addresses are not in the PAF, mainly in distant rural communities and new estates)
Go back and edit the original address

This type of interface is simple, intuitive and can have a dramatic effect improving the quality of the address data coming from your website.

Reference Manual

Set Log in

The SetLogin function is the first call made to the Postman KEngine to set the username and password. Other web methods are valid only if the user set a valid username and password by calling this web method.

Input Parameters

Parameter Name	Value	Description
username	string	DMS username
password	string	DMS password

Return Structure

The call to setLogin will return unique string which needs to be saved by the user for the further use.

SetAddressFormat

The SetAddressFormat function is the first call made to the Postman KEngine to change the way the POSTman formats and returns address data.

Input Parameters

Parameter Name	Value	Description
sessionID	string	Has to set to the string returned by the setLogin function
mixedCase	boolean	Whether or not the search address can contain Mixed cases
expandAbbreviations	boolean	Whether or not Postman engine expands the search address’s abbreviations

Return Structure

The call to SetAddressFormat will return nothing; it only will set the settings for next search addresses

ScanAddress

The ScanAddress function is the first call made to the Postman KEngine to validate and correct an Australian postal address.

Input Parameters

Parameter Name	Value	Description
sessionID	string	Has to set to the string returned by the setLogin function
address1	string	First line of the address to search for
address2	string	Second line of the address to search for
address3	string	Third line of the address to search for
address4	string	4th line of the address to search for
address5	string	5th line of the address to search for
address6	string	6th line of the address to search for
suburb	string	Suburb of the address to search for
state	string	State of the address to search for
postcode	string	Postcode of the address to search for
country	string	Country of the address to search for

Return Structure

The call to ScanAddress will return an XML packet with a table in it, POSTmanAddressRecord. The field structure for it is shown below

Parameter Name	Value	Description
address1	string	First line of the address to search for
address2	string	Second line of the address to search for
address3	string	Third line of the address to search for
address4	string	4th line of the address to search for
address5	string	5th line of the address to search for
address6	string	6th line of the address to search for
Barcode	string	Barcode of the address to search for
BSP	string	BSP of the address to search for
BSPState	string	BSPState of the address to search for
DPID	string	DPID of the address to search for
postcode	string	Postcode of the address to search for
POBoxNo	integer	PoBox number of the address to search for
POBoxprifix	integer	PoBox perifix of the address to search for
poBoxsuffix	integer	PoBox suffix of the address to search for
UnitNo	string	Number of the unit of the address to search for
unitType	string	Type of the unit of the address to search for
IsCorrectedAddress	boolean	Whether or not the address is corrected
IsValidAddress	boolean	Whether or not the address is valid
IsStreetAddress	boolean	Whether or not the address is an street address

ScanAddress2

The ScanAddress2 function is the simpler version of ScanAddress, allows mode settings to be passed directly.

Input Parameters

Parameter Name	Value	Description
sessionID	string	Has to set to the string returned by the setLogin function
address1	string	First line of the address to search for
address2	string	Second line of the address to search for
address3	string	Third line of the address to search for
address4	string	4^th line of the address to search for
address5	string	5^th line of the address to search for
address6	string	6^th line of the address to search for
suburb	string	Suburb of the address to search for
state	string	State of the address to search for
postcode	string	Postcode of the address to search for
mixedCase	boolean	Whether or not the search address can contain Mixed cases
expandAbbreviations	boolean	Whether or not Postman engine expands the search address’s abbreviations

Return Structure

The call to ScanAddress2 will return an XML packet with a table in it, POSTmanAddressRecord. The field structure for it is shown below.

Parameter Name	Value	Description
address1	string	First line of the address to search for
address2	string	Second line of the address to search for
address3	string	Third line of the address to search for
address4	string	4^th line of the address to search for
address5	string	5^th line of the address to search for
address6	string	6^th line of the address to search for
Barcode	string	Barcode of the address to search for
BSP	string	BSP of the address to search for
BSPState	string	BSPState of the address to search for
DPID	string	DPID of the address to search for
postcode	string	Postcode of the address to search for
POBoxNo	integer	PoBox number of the address to search for
POBoxprifix	integer	PoBox perifix of the address to search for
poBoxsuffix	integer	PoBox suffix of the address to search for
UnitNo	string	Number of the unit of the address to search for
unitType	string	Type of the unit of the address to search for
IsCorrectedAddress	boolean	Whether or not the address is corrected
IsValidAddress	boolean	Whether or not the address is valid
IsStreetAddress	boolean	Whether or not the address is an street address

NearestMatches

The NearestMatches function is the first call made to the Postman KEngine to return possible addresses near or similar to the one just scanned.

Input Parameters

Parameter Name

Value

Description

sessionID

string

Has to set to the string returned by the setLogin

function

maxNumberOfMatches

integer

The maximum number of the returned recode of

possible addresses near or similar to the one just scanned

Value Description

Return Structure

The call to NearestMatches will return an XML packet with an array of the tables in it, an array of POSTmanAddressRecord. The field structure for each POSTmanAddressRecord is shown below

Parameter Name	Value	Description
address1	string	First line of the address to search for
address2	string	Second line of the address to search for
address3	string	Third line of the address to search for
address4	string	4th line of the address to search for
address5	string	5th line of the address to search for
address6	string	6th line of the address to search for
Barcode	string	Barcode of the address to search for
BSP	string	BSP of the address to search for
BSPState	string	BSPState of the address to search for
DPID	string	DPID of the address to search for
postcode	string	Postcode of the address to search for
POBoxNo	integer	PoBox number of the address to search for
POBoxprifix	integer	PoBox perifix of the address to search for
poBoxsuffix	integer	PoBox suffix of the address to search for
UnitNo	string	Number of the unit of the address to search for
unitType	string	Type of the unit of the address to search for
IsCorrectedAddress	boolean	Whether or not the address is corrected
IsValidAddress	boolean	Whether or not the address is valid
IsStreetAddress	boolean	Whether or not the address is an street address

CurrentBalance

The CurrentBalance function is the first call made to the Postman KEngine to return the user current balance.

Input Parameters

Parameter Name	Value	Description
sessionID	string	Has to set to the string returned by the setLogin function

Return Structure

The call to CurrentBalance will return an XML packet with an integer value in it. This integer is your current balance which is decremented by 1 every time you use an address validation.