Abstract: A method for restructuring input data having a prespecified input data structure with a data management engine, such as a translation engine, which is dynamically configured by the input data to conform the input data to an output data structure. When the data management engine takes the form of a translation engine, capability exists to translate data to and from various electronic data interchange (EDI) formats. Because the data management engine is dynamically configured by the input data, the translation process is independent of the specific details of EDI protocol and capable of coordinating multiple data sources/destinations without requiring any recoding of the engine. Initially, data protocol utilized in the data interchange system is ascertained. Then, the protocol data related to the data protocol and protocol processing instruction data is initialized.