Lecture E-Commerce - Chapter 7: Building e-commerce web sites (part II)

In this chapter, the learning objectives are: Describe the major issues surrounding the decision to outsource site development and/or hosting, Identify and understand the major considerations involved in choosing web server and e-commerce merchant server software, understand the issues involved in choosing the most appropriate hardware for an e-commerce site, identify additional tools that can improve Web site performance.

CSC 330 E-Commerce

Teacher

Ahmed Mumtaz Mustehsan

GM-IT CIIT Islamabad

• Virtual Campus, CIIT

• COMSATS Institute of Information Technology

• T1-Lecture-7

Building E-Commerce Web Sites

Chapter-3 Part-II

T1-Lecture-7

For Lecture Material/Slides Thanks to:

Copyright © 2010 Pearson Education, Inc

Objectives

Describe the major issues surrounding the decision to outsource site development and/or hosting

Identify and understand the major considerations

involved in choosing Web server and e-commerce

merchant server software

Understand the issues involved in choosing the most appropriate hardware for an e-commerce site

Identify additional tools that can improve Web site

performance

Testing, Implementation, and Maintenance

acceptance testing verifies that the business

objectives of the system as originally conceived are in

fact working

Testing, Implementation, and Maintenance

Implementation and maintenance:

Maintenance is ongoing, with 20% of time devoted to debugging code and responding to emergency

situations, 20% with changing reports, data files and links to backend databases; and 60% to general

administration and making changes and

Factors in Web Site Optimization

Web site optimization requires that you consider three factors:

page content, page generation , and page delivery.

Spectrum of Tools for building your own site

Web Site Budgets

From $5,000 to millions of dollars/year Depends on

what you can afford

and increase speed but, the modifications required to fit the

package to your business needs rise exponentially A $4,000

package can easily become a $40,000 to $60,000 development

project.

Web Site Budgets contd

Components of Web Site Budgets

1-Simple versus Multi-tiered Web Site

Architecture

System architecture

Arrangement of, software, machinery and tasks in an information system needed to achieve a specific

functionality is called the system architecture

Single tier Architecture

it consisted of a server computer running basic Web

server software

Two-tier

Web server and database server

Multi-tier

Web application servers

Backend, legacy databases

1-Two-Tier E-commerce Architecture

1-Multi-tier E-commerce Architecture

1-Privativate Lines Internet

Load balancer

Load balancer Load balancer

Load balancer

Server Server Server

Server Server Server

Application Server farm

Server Server Server Server

Msg Server Farm

CSU/DSU ROUTER CSU/DSU ROUTER

CSU/DSU ROUTER CSU/DSU ROUTER CSU/DSU ROUTER CSU/DSU ROUTER

Firewall

Firewall

CSU/DSU ROUTER CSU/DSU ROUTER Switch

Switch Switch

Switch Switch

1-Web Server Software

Apache

Leading Web server software (47% of market)

Works only with UNIX, Linux OSs

Microsoft’s Internet Information Server (IIS)

Second major Web server software (25% of market)

Windows-based

1-Functionalities of Webserver

1-Site Management Tools

Basic tools

Included in all Web servers

Verify that links on pages are still valid

Identify orphan files

Third-party software and services for advanced site

1-Dynamic Page Generation Tools

Dynamic page generation:

The contents of a Web page are stored as objects in a database, rather than being hard-coded in HTML When the user requests a Web page, the contents for that

page are then fetched from the database

Examples: Tools include CGI (Common Gateway

Interface), ASP (Active Server Pages), JSP (Java Server

Advantages

Lowers menu costs

Permits easy online market segmentation

Enables cost-free price discrimination

Enables Web content management system (WCMS)

1-Application Servers

Web application servers:

software programs that provide the specific business functionality required by a Web site

Type of middleware

◦Isolate business applications from Web servers and databases

Single-function applications increasingly being replaced

by integrated software tools that combine all functionality needed for e-commerce site

1-Functionalities of Application Servers

1-E-commerce Merchant Server Software

Offers an integrated environment that provides most or all of the functionality and capabilities needed to develop

a sophisticated, customer-centric site

Online catalog

List of products available on Web site

Shopping cart

allows shoppers to set aside desired purchases in

preparation for checkout, review what they have

selected, edit their selections as necessary, and then

actually make the purchase by clicking a button

1-E-commerce Merchant Server Software

Credit card processing

Shopping cart works in conjunction with credit card

Otherwise, you need to make arrangements with a

variety of credit card processing banks and

intermediaries

Like PAYPAL PAYPAL now available in Pakistan

1-Merchant Server Software Packages

Integrated environment with most or all of functionality needed Key factors in selecting a package:

Functionality

Support for different business models

Business process modeling tools

Visual site management and reporting

Performance and scalability

Connectivity to existing business systems

Compliance with standards

Global and multicultural capability

Local sales tax and shipping rules

1-Thank You