A system and method for creation of virtual electronic containers for documents in electronic form. The system permits scanning and or electronic creation of documents together with a machine readable graphical code. The graphical code contains informational bout the documents that can be read without having to read the documents themselves. System components review the graphic code and determine contents, processing options and other workflow steps. Tolls associate with the creation of the electronic document container enforce creation rules to insure that electronic container conform to a structure that allows electronic dissemination of the container. Documents stored in the electronic container maintain the characteristics of the application that created them thereby allowing the documents to be viewed and manipulated using the application in which they were created.