A catalog system for Internet commerce that supports a hierarchy of buyers specified
by a customer includes: a general catalog, a buyer attributes database, and a terms
and conditions database. A contract catalog is created for a customer by filtering
the general catalog according to customer-specific information stored in the terms
and conditions database. The customer-specific information includes hierarchical
attributes for the items in the contract catalog. When a buyer enters the catalog
system, the buyer's hierarchical level is determined by reading the buyer attributes
database, and compared with the hierarchical attributes of the items in the contract
catalog. The buyer is granted access to those items in the contract catalog that
have hierarchical attributes which do not exceed the buyer's hierarchical level.
