Documentary Petri Nets: A Modeling Representation for Electronic Trade Procedures

Abstract

This paper introduces the concept of an electronic trade scenario (executable transaction model) as a potential solution to "open´´ electronic commerce - trade among parties that have no prior trading relationship. The basic idea is that these trade scenarios would be stored in a "global repository´´ and downloaded by trading parties as needed for a particular trade. A representation, called Documentary Petri Nets (DPN) is used to represent such trade scenarios. The InterProcs system is described as a prototyping environment to support the design and execution of such trading systems using this representation. Given that the parties are often trading at "arm's length´´, a key focus is the development of trustworthy trade scenarios that have sufficient controls and evidentiary documentation.