A method and system for creating an electronic file to be used in an online auction are described herein. In one embodiment, an exemplary process includes creating a header portion and a data portion of a computer file, where the header portion provides meta-data about data stored in the data portion. The header portion includes multiple header fields. For each header field, a data tag is stored in the header field and the data tag indicates a header field type associated with the respective header field. For each header field, a meta-data item is stored and defined by the data tag, where the meta-data item references to content associated with the meta-data item and stored in the data portion of the computer file. At least one header field contains a meta-data item used by an online auction application to categorize the computer file, such that the content stored in the data portion associated with the meta-data item is presented in a proper form during an online auction, based on information derived from a combination of the data tag and the meta-data item.