Patent ID: 7203658

Claim:
In a vendor order server, a method of processing order messages by a predetermined sequence of instructions tangibly embodied on an instruction medium executable by a processor responsive to the instructions via an ordering network from a customer ordering application comprising: defining an order message format having order data elements and order type elements, the order message format adaptable to a plurality of order type elements, each order type element corresponding to a different ordering application; defining an order response format corresponding to a response expected by the customer ordering application, the order response format corresponding to the ordering application; receiving, via the ordering network, an order message in the order message format corresponding to a previous order message, the order message having an order data set in the order data elements and an order type in the order type element, the order message having a customer ID indicative of the customer ordering application and an order ID indicative of the previous order message; parsing an order type from the order type element to identify an order type, the order type indicative of an ordering function performable by at least one of a plurality of order processing modules; selectively invoking, based on the parsed order type, a particular one of the plurality of order processing modules corresponding to the order type, the invoking operable to route the order data set in the received order message to the invoked order processing module, identifying the order type including parsing according to the predetermined format to identify tagged attributes indicative of the order types, and processing by the order server further comprises indexing a mapping of order types to order processing modules; interacting with an order database coupled to the order server based on the message type, the order database responsive to the order processing module for transferring data corresponding to the parsed order type, the order id and the customer ID; processing, based on the interacting, the routed order data set by the order processing module to generate an order response message corresponding to the order ID in the order response format; and transmitting the order response message to the customer ordering application corresponding to the customer ID, the order response format corresponding to an application database maintained by the ordering application, the defined order message format and order response format accessible to the ordering application and the order server from predetermined types indicative of a predetermined format; processing further comprising processing in an automated manner that maps data items from the response message at the application database according to application instructions.