END-TO-END TRANSACTION PROCESSING AND STATUSING SYSTEM AND METHOD

A system and method for end-to-end transaction processing and statusing is disclosed. In one embodiment, an application server computer is used to house a variety of applications. An application accessed by a user converts a user request into an eXtensible Markup Language (XML) document. The application server computer uses a high level protocol to pass the XML document to a back office server which has access to a business' enterprise resource planning (ERP) database. The back office server performs the functions requested in the XML document, which may include complex database manipulations. Once the requested function has been performed, the back office server generates a response XML document which is passed to the application server computer using a high level protocol. The information within the response XML document is then presented to the user. According to one aspect of the invention, a navigational interface is provided which incorporates a hierarchical display of business documents based upon a dominant-subordinate relationship between the documents, the relationship between the documents being established according to a progression based on how documents are encountered in a typical business environment. The selection of a specific document constitutes the user request and the response comprises user specific information from the business entity ERP database.