Method to Initialize a Physical Identification System for a Physical Item Identifier

This invention is related to electronic information transfer between trading partners and more particularly to the use of a physical item identifier affixed to a physical item for tracking the item using physical identification systems. The invention further discloses the catalogs, catalog queries and processes to provide the information to initialize the item in the physical identification systems. In the present invention, a machine-readable item identifier is affixed to a physical item. The identifier is unique and is used to identify the item. The item identifier has three segments: 1) catalog identifier, 2) item description identifier, and 3) physical item identifier. The catalog identifier is used to determine the catalog that provides the item description and a description specific to the physical item. The item description identifier is used to query the catalog, which returns the description of the item. The physical item identifier is used to query the catalog, which returns a more detailed description of the physical item. The item identifier and the item description are used to initialize item in the physical identification system. The description specific to the item is added to the physical identification system and associated with the item identifier.