Process builder for a routable electronic document system and method for using the same

1. In a computer system comprising multiple distributed enduser workstations, a method for controlling the routing of electronic documents, said method residing in a computer readable medium comprising the computer implemented steps of:

receiving an electronic document;

wherein receiving an electronic document comprises:

receiving a scanned version of a paper document; and

creating an electronic document from the scanned version;

building a reverse cone of logic from each possible routing approval signature for an electronic document to every input that would affect it;

toggling between boolean-AND and boolean-OR functions graphically represented by a label to join every datum field or groups of data fields;

selecting data fields;

connecting the data fields with the boolean functions:

adding as many data elements as necessary;

grouping data elements by drawing a bounding box to represent the function of parentheses;

creating programmatic elements equivalent to the boolean group;

inserting the programmatic elements into the electronic document;

determining if a routing approval signature for a role or level of approval is required or not required for each possible routing approval signature given the values of the data fields;

setting the visibility of each signature form field if it is determined to be required; and

routing the electronic document to a required approving enduser for signature signifying approval.

2. A computer implemented electronic document comprising computer readable files stored on a computer readable medium authored using the method of claim 1 wherein said electronic document is in a format selected from the group consisting of portable document format (PDF), Microsoft Word, hypertext markup language (HTML), XML/XSLT, Xforms, XHTML, WML, and extended markup language (XML) format; and further wherein said programmatic element is selected from the group consisting of Pascal, Java, JavaScript, C, and Visual Basic for Applications (VBA) programming languages.

3. In a computer system, a method for controlling the routing of electronic documents, said method residing in a computer readable medium comprising the computer implemented steps of:

creating an electronic document;

building a reverse cone of logic from each possible process for an electronic document to every input that would affect it; wherein a process comprises one or more methods selected from the following group:

affixing a routing approval signature,

changing a graphical display,

controlling visibility of a field,

controlling editability of a field,

initiating another process,

triggering an event,

requiring data entry,

prompting an interactive response,

enabling the attachment of another document,

querying a database, and

routing the document to a certain user, and

wherein building comprises:

selecting data fields;

connecting the data fields with one or more boolean functions;

creating programmatic elements equivalent to the boolean group; and

inserting the programmatic elements into the electronic document;

determining if the process is required or not required given the values of the data fields;

and routing the electronic document to the process if required.