Module 3. Web presence : Architecture, Infrastrucutre, & Technology Options

System Analysis/Planning
Business objectives: List of capabilities you want your site to have

System functionalities: List of information system capabilities needed to

achieve business objectives

Information requirements: Information elements that system must produce in

order to achieve business objectives

Systems Design:
Hardware and Software Platforms

-System design specification:

-Description of main components of a system and

their relationship to one another

-Two components of system design:

1. Logical design:Data flow diagrams, processing functions, databases

2. Physical design: Specifies actual physical, software components, models, etc.

Build/Host Your Own versus Outsourcing
-Outsourcing: hiring vendors to provide services

involved in building site

-Build own vs. outsourcing:

-Build your own requires team with diverse skill set; choice of software

tools; both risks and possible benefits

-Host own vs. outsourcing

-Hosting: hosting company responsible for ensuring site is accessible

24/7, for monthly fee

-Co-location: firm purchases or leases Web server (with control over its

operation), but server is located at vendor’s facility

Web Site Budgets
-From $5,000 to millions of dollars/year

-Components of budget:

-System maintenance

-System development

-Content design & development

-Hardware

-Telecommunications

-Software

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

-Two-tier

-Web server and database server

-Multi-tier

-Web application servers

-Backend, legacy databases

E-commerce Merchant Server Software
-Provides basic functionality for online sales

-Online catalog

-List of products available on Web site

-Shopping cart

-Allows shoppers to set aside, review, edit selections, and then make purchase

-Credit card processing

-Typically works in conjunction with shopping cart

-Verifies card and puts through credit to company’s account at checkout

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

1950's
- President Eisenhower creates ARPANET as a direct response to Sputnik launch

- Aim to increase US lead in science and technology

1960’s / 1970’s

 * Computer/Network Evolution
 * Hard drives
 * Operating Systems
 * Integrated Circuits
 * TCP/IP Protocols
 * Home computing now a reality

1980’s - The PC Revolution

 * 1981 - 213 Internet users (+1 every 20 days)
 * 1984 - Canadian Universities go “online”
 * New jargon: FTP, DNS, Token Ring, Ethernet, TELNET, IRC...
 * 1989 - 100,000 Internet users

1990’s - The New Internet
Development of new Internet offerings:
 * Yahoo! (1994)
 * Craigslist (1995)
 * MSN (1995)
 * Amazon (1995)
 * Google (1998)

2000’s - *pop*

 * Mass speculation
 * Soaring stocks
 * Free spending

Ex: Geocities
 * Purchased by Yahoo! for $3.57 billion USD
 * Closed down October 2009

Web 2.0
YouTube, twitter, face book and flicker advantages more customer integration, large quantities of users-disadvantages-no business model-have a hard time covering costs, privacy concerns-willingness to give up info., E-Bullying, struggle to make $ and Open Source.

Web 3.0
The predicted 3rd generation of the www, usually conjectured to include semantic tagging of content”The semantic web a web that can allow machine to read the web as humans do-and present info to us in a meaningful way.Will use RDF (resource description framework) are like large databases, combining info-ex. Plain schedules, car prices from different resellers.

SOA(Service Oriented Archetecture)
a paradigm for organizing and distributing data across a domain-using sintacs to communicate(used by Oracle, Microsoft)àwe are moving into a era of…

Mashups
A mashup is parts of code that have been written by companies like Yahoo!, Google, Amazon, Ebay, EVDBA(often mashups are made up of parts from many different companies) and the end user takes and puts together to create a useful customized application-some drawbacks are that if one site is down ex. Google maps out of all the sites needs for the app-it will not work-and no personal ownership*fastest growing application ecosystem*

=Google Store/Checkout= Google entered the online payment market to take market share from PayPal. With their google checkout express cart fulfilment for online purchases, google also introduced a consumer end - google store. This enables merchants to easily create online stores using something as simple as a google docs spreadsheet. As Google improves these services, the Google suite becomes a more and more viable threat to commercial developments. For the price its a option worth considering for small businesses.

Traditional Web Hosting(Fatcow Vs. Justhost)
Fatcow- small to medium, just starting out, personal website, DIY type companies, large web design companies

Fatcow-$66 US/year, domain is only free for one year, $0 set up fees, 30 day $ back garuntee, unlimites, e-mail accounts, secure online selling, “moocrew” support, e-gift cards, PayPal, unlimited disk space/bandwidth

Justhost-$41/year, domain is free, $0 set up fees, anytime $back grantee, unlimited disk space (for pacific size companies) and bandwidth, secure online selling, 24/7 support

Fatcow has a competitive advantage as they rune completely on wind power.

Both have coupon codes on the internet.

RASSP-Reliability, Accessibility, Serviceability, Scalability, Profitability

=Mash Ups= Web applications that combine functionality, data, etc, from more than one source or website. “Web application Hybrid” Frequently uses APIs and data sources to produce results that were not the original intent. Most common is aimed at the general public: Alert map (weather conditions, biohazard threats, seismic info, placed on a map of the world. Another example is the Chicago Crime Map. Works well with Agile development (which is what was used at Abebooks.)

AJAX
Ajax(shorthand for asynchronous JavaScript and XML) is a group of interrelated web development techniques used on the client-side to create interactive web applications. With Ajax, web applications can retrieve data from the server asynchronously in the background without interfering with the display and behavior of the existing page. The use of Ajax techniques has led to an increase in interactive or dynamic interfaces on web pages.

API
An application programming interface (API) is an interface implemented by a software program to enable interaction with other software, much in the same way that a user interface facilitates interaction between humans and computers. APIs are implemented by applications, libraries and operating systems to determine the vocabulary and calling conventions the programmer should employ to use their services. It may include specifications for routines, data structures, object classes and protocolsused to communicate between the consumer and implementer of the API.

RSS
RSS(most commonly expanded as "Really Simple Syndication") is a family of web feed formats used to publish frequently updated works—such as blog entries, news headlines, audio, and video—in a standardized format. An RSS document (which is called a "feed", "web feed", or "channel") includes full or summarized text, plus metadata such as publishing dates and authorship. Web feeds benefit publishers by letting them syndicate content automatically. They benefit readers who want to subscribe to timely updates from favored websites or to aggregate feeds from many sites into one place. RSS feeds can be read using software called an "RSS reader", "feed reader", or "aggregator", which can be web-based, desktop-based, or mobile-device-based. A standardized XML file format allows the information to be published once and viewed by many different programs. The user subscribes to a feed by entering into the reader the feed's URI or by clicking an RSS icon in a web browser that initiates the subscription process. The RSS reader checks the user's subscribed feeds regularly for new work, downloads any updates that it finds, and provides a user interface to monitor and read the feeds.