Patent ID: 8527429

Claim:
A method in a shipment preparation computing system, comprising: facilitating, by the shipment preparation computing system, preparation of a shipment of an order, by: receiving shipment preparation information from a bar code in a packing list, the shipment preparation information including a network resource identifier that identifies a code module that is remote and separate from the shipment preparation computing system, wherein the shipment preparation information from the bar code in the packing list is structured according to a shipping protocol that defines a syntax for shipment preparation information and corresponding item shipment actions taken by a computing system that complies with the shipping protocol, wherein the shipment preparation information includes one or more property names that specify one or more item shipment actions and that are expressed according to the defined syntax for shipment preparation information defined by the shipping protocol; communicating, using the network resource identifier from the received shipment preparation information from the bar code, with the remote code module to obtain information for the preparation of the shipment of the order; communicating, using the network resource identifier from the received shipment preparation information from the bar code, with the remote code module to cause the remote code module to persistently store in a data repository status information about the preparation of the shipment of the order; and performing the specified one or more item shipment actions expressed according to the defined syntax for shipment preparation information defined by the shipping protocol, wherein the specified item shipment actions include an instruction to obtain from the remote code module a destination shipping address, an instruction to replace a field in the shipment information with a data item associated with the shipment of the order, and an instruction to transmit to the remote code module the status information about the preparation of the shipment of the order; and initiating the shipment of the order based on the shipment preparation information received from the bar code in the packing list.