US 6,021,202 AGranted

Method and system for processing electronic documents

AssigneeFinancial Services Technology Consortium

InventorsMilton Anderson, Frank Jaffe, Chris Hibbert, Jyri Virkki, Jeffrey Kravitz, Sheveling Chang, Elaine Palmer

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Abstract

The invention includes a markup language according to the SGML standard in which document type definitions are created under which electronic documents are divided into blocks that are associated with logical fields that are specific to the type of block. Each of many different types of electronic documents can have a record mapping to a particular environment, such as a legacy environment of a banking network, a hospital's computer environment for electronic record keeping, a lending institution's computer environment for processing loan applications, or a court or arbitrator's computer system. Semantic document type definitions for various electronic document types (including, for example, electronic checks, mortgage applications, medical records, prescriptions, contracts, and the like) can be formed using mapping techniques between the logical content of the document and the block that is defined to include such content. Also, the various document types are preferably defined to satisfy existing customs, protocols and legal rules.

Claims9

Dependent claims

A method for allowing distributed production of an encrypted document, comprising

providing a computer network having a first and a second workstation and being capable of transferring an electronic document between the workstations,
providing each of the workstations with an editor capable of modifying an electronic document to include blocks of information including a content block representative of content, and a signature block representative of a signature signal associated with the content block, and having a hash operator for processing data to generate a hash signal,
allowing a user at the first workstation to operate the respective editor to modify a first electronic document to include a first content block and an associated first signature block, and to employ the hash operator to generate a first hash signal as a function of the first content block and to insert the first hash signal within the first signature block and to generate a first signature hash signal as a function thereof,
transferring the first electronic document to the second workstation,
allowing a user at the second workstation to operate the respective editor to modify the first electronic document to include a second content block and an associated second signature block, and to employ the hash operator to generate a second hash signal as a function of the second content block and to insert the second hash signal within the second signature block and to generate a second signature hash signal as a function thereof,
and allowing a third user to operate the editor to generate a third signature signal as a function of the first signature hash signal and the second signature hash signal.

3 more elements

Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.