An External Broker Interface Based on Existing Trading Protocols

This paper presents an approach to the specification of external interfaces of an electronic broker used in the Architecture for Electronic Brokerage Systems (AEBS). The external interface specified by the AEBS architecture provides both rich functionality and backward compatibility with trading methods that are currently in use in the electronic marketplace. This is achieved by defining the interface at two levels: the external protocol interface and the external object interface. The external protocol interface has been defined in terms of traditional protocols in order to provide access to basic brokerage services for customers and suppliers that already operate in the electronic market. This facilitates the easy introduction of a broker to the market since no modifications are required on the customer or supplier side to use the new brokerage services. The advanced external object interface has been designed and defined using the CORBA model. This provides other actors that need advanced brokerage services with access to the full functionality of a broker. This paper focuses on the design of the external protocol interface of a brokerage system.