Toward a new type of language for electronic commerce

Abstract

This paper surveys practical issues in the design of a formal language for business communication (FLBC) in which transactions are put together by combining meaningful elements, much as a programming language encodes algorithms. Such a language is preferable to existing codes such as ANSI X.12 and UN EDIFACT because of its much greater versatility. The new language is tentatively named LEC (Language for Electronic Commerce).