Electronic catalogs that provide hierarchical access for buyers of goods and services

摘要

An improved catalog system for Internet commerce that supports a hierarchy of buyers specified by a customer includes: a general catalog, a buyer attributes database, and a terms and conditions database. A contract catalog is created for a customer by filtering the general catalog according to customer-specific information stored in the terms and conditions database. The customer-specific information includes hierarchical attributes for the items in the contract catalog. When a buyer enters the catalog system, the buyer's hierarchical level is determined by reading the buyer attributes database, and compared with the hierarchical attributes of the items in the contract catalog. The buyer is granted access to those items in the contract catalog that have hierarchical attributes which do not exceed the buyer's hierarchical level.