E-commerce Web PortalE-commerce Web Portal

Plan of the talkPlan of the talk

• Architecture of e-commerce applications

• Bookstore example• Perspectives for e-commerce• What We offer

Taxonomy of e-commerce Taxonomy of e-commerce applicationsapplications

• Three main categories:– Business to consumer (B2C)– Business to business (B2B)– Consumer to consumer (C2C)

• Other categories:– Business to government (B2G)– Mobile Commerce

B2C applicationsB2C applications• Offer directly to the customer an interface of

activity– Typical examples:

• Online book store (e.g. amazon.com)• Booking and purchase of airline tickets

• Correspond to retail sale • Growth of B2C applications thanks to Internet• A new kind of B2C applications are the

Cybermalls

B2C applications:B2C applications:advantages and disadvantages advantages and disadvantages

• Advantages:– Allow company to extend existing services to

customers– Allow company to increase its customers– Offer a wider choice and allow cheaper prices – May give to the company a worldwide visibility– Online shops are accessible 24h a day

B2B applicationsB2B applications

• Realize transactions needed to perform financial or commercial activities by companies over the Internet

• Some typical applications:– E-procurement– E-Marketplace

• The turnover is much greater than that dealed with B2C applications

B2B applications:B2B applications:advantages and disadvantagesadvantages and disadvantages

• Advantages:– Help to automate communications between

companies making them easier and quicker

– Allow to cut prices drastically– Help in reducing mistakes

C2C applicationsC2C applications

• Concern the consumers who run negotations with other consumers sometimes utilizing as intermediary a company– Examples:

• Ebay• Autotrader.com

C2C applications:C2C applications:advantages and disadvantagesadvantages and disadvantages

• Advantages– Allow consumers to interact directly among

them– Give to the consumers a new way of

purchasing and selling services and goods

• Disadvantages– Little earning capacity

B2G applicationsB2G applications

• Correspond to all kind of transactions between company and public administrator

• Utilized mostly in the USA

Mobile commerce applicationsMobile commerce applications• Concern doing businesses by means of mobile

wireless devices• Can be both B2B and B2C• Have a growing importance in the future of e-

commerce applications• Will introduce completely new forms of electronic

commerce– E.g. E-tickets

• The development of such applications faces some of the greatest challenges in the security area to secure the trust of consumers

Plan of the talkPlan of the talk

• Introduction to e-commerce and e-commerce applications

• Issues in developing e-commerce applications

• Architecture of e-commerce applications• Bookstore example• Perspectives for e-commerce• References

Issues in developing e-commerce Issues in developing e-commerce applications (1/2)applications (1/2)• Many of the following issues:

– Security– Flexibility– Scalability– Fault Tolerance– Integration– Interfaces– Time-to-market

are common to many applications, but they are all critical in the case of e-commerce because of its nature

Issues in developing e-commerce Issues in developing e-commerce applications (2/2)applications (2/2)• A state-of-the-art application always fail if

people do not utilize it– A constant attention must be payed to the users

over the whole development process

• A close integration with every business aspect is needed:– For an online buyer security and easy access to

the informations are the primal needs– A manager will need a flexible application to adapt

the business to the new trends in a faster way

Security IssuesSecurity Issues

• Security is a crucial feature– Most transactions take place in a fully

automated way– Restricted data are transmitted through a

public network

• Users must be sure that their money will not be lost or stolen

Flexibility IssuesFlexibility Issues

• E-commerce systems are subject to frequent structural changes because of mutations of:– Products and services provided by the firm– Commercial partnerships

ScalabilityScalability

• Capability to support a certain number of users (thousands, even millions) without compromising performances

• It is important because a slow application often means to lose customers (especially in B2C) since they have very small patience

Fault toleranceFault tolerance

• A less fault-tolerant application will be less available to the user

• Every minute that a site is not available costs 1400$ to the company (survey on 400 major companies by Oracle)

• It is easy to lose customers forever• It is necessary to redirect the users

without they perceive it

Integration Integration

• Always needed since no application offering every commercial functionality can be realized

• Critical because the commercial funcionalities are often realized by many different legacy and third-party applications– Examples:

• ERP systems• Legacy systems

User InterfacesUser Interfaces

• Must be intuitive,easily comprehensible and of simple utilization

• In the case of B2C must support profiling in order to anticipate the customer requests

• They also need to be customizable

Time-to-marketTime-to-market

• Has greater importance than elsewhere

• Development Process

• Implementation of Open Source

• Frameworks Integrations

Three-tier architectureThree-tier architecture

• Separates the business logic of the application from user interfaces and from data access

• Middle tier can be furtherly divided• In this case we call it multi-tier architecture:– Easier to modify one component– Lower cost to deploy and maintain

Three-tier architectureThree-tier architecture

Application serverApplication server

• Software that runs on the middle tier of a three-tier environment

• In multi-tier environments it is often a distributed and complex software

• Commercial implementations exist:– Microsoft Commerce Server– Sun iPlanet– IBM WebSphere Application Server

Application Server-basedApplication Server-basede-commerce platform architecturee-commerce platform architecture

Presentation

Layer

Business

Logic Layer

Data & Legacy

Access Layer

ERP

Legacy

systems

Database

Application Server

Transactions Security SessionResource

Pooling

Load

balancing

E-commerce platform

Horizontal Services

Client tier Server tier Data tier

Use Case ModelUse Case Model

E-Commerce Portal

What We offer

Web site development PROCESSES

• Our E-commerce website services are well defined and we follow a set of time-tested processes and strict quality parameters to make sure that we meet both the deadline and the quality standards.

• Following details are just a summary of our core-ecommerce custom design and web site development processes.

Visually Appealing Custom Design

• Understanding online business requirements specifications.

• Drafting High-Level Features Specification

• Wire Framing for Search Engine friendly web design

• Implementing WEB 2.0 Technology• Ecommerce capable site design

Requirement Analysis

• Our first step is to analyze key project details regarding project goals, Design and visuals, target audience, special system requirements, desired timeline, and budget range provided through a QUESTIONNAIRE.

Pre-production Planning

• Alt Web Media Project Manager and production team discusses in-depth your target audience, Home Page design ideas, samples and facilitates several rounds of mockups between you and our designers till the final

High-end Scalable Development

• Intuitive website navigation• Scalable Features development using suitable web

technology• Customized Shopping Cart design and development• Payment Gateway Integration• A highly customized and SCABALE Content

Management System, CMS development Product Management System

• Testing and Quality Analysis

Content & Production• Content Delivery• Unless contracted for content creation, clients

provide finalized text, images, logos, graphics, data, and other necessary content for the project.

• Production start• Upon receipt of all content, our designers create

mockups with several rounds of feedback. Programmers than translate finalized designs into web pages (HTML Pages) and integrate with necessary backend tools (server side programming).

Testing – Beta Release• Testing and Debugging• Project is divided into various Modules. Each module/

feature is Tested and debugged on time. Once all the modules are created and tested the whole system is put on the local server and TESTING is done.

• Beta Release• After all deliverable are completed and signed off, we

complete the production process. The website is launched on the hosting server and a final usability TESTING is done

The EndThe End

Thank You