TECHNOLOGY FOR E-COMMERCE
Instructors (and links to overheads):
Andrew Rau-Chaplin
- Carolyn Watters - Evangelos
E. Milios
Description of the Module
The Technology Module will cover the basic technology required for electronic commerce, without assuming a technical background (e.g. computer programming).
- Web-page design (ARC)
- Internet basics, HTML, Client-Server concept, XML, CGI, Perl, Servlets, cookies, Push-Pull concept. (CW)
- Domain names and addresses, Domain name servers, IP addresses, IPv6 (CW)
- Basic Network concepts, Network protocols, Dealing with packet errors, Local Area Networks, Packet switching,
Scaling up to the Internet, TCP/IP (EEM)
- Security & Payments: Encryption algorithms, Using encryption, Secure Transactions, Secure Hosts in Networks,
Electronic Payments (EEM)
- Software Agents: Overview, Agent Examples, E-commerce Agents, Mobile Agents (EEM)
Course Outline, Timetable and Readings
DAY 1 - Monday
09:00 Internet basics, HTML, Client-Server concept, CGI, Perl, Servlets, cookies, Push-Pull concept.
(C. Watters)
10:30 Break
10:45 Domain names and addresses, Domain name servers, IP addresses, IPv6 (C. Watters)
12:00 Lunch
01:00 XML (C. Watters)
03:00 Break
03:15 Web Site Usability and Design Principles (A. Rau-Chaplin)
Web Site Usability
- Intro to Human Computer Interaction (HCI)
- Conceptual models, Visibility, Mapping, Feedback, Navigation, Service
Web Site Design
- Types of Sites, Who is the target audience?, Main page design, Navigation
Tools and techniques
- Storyboards, Scenarios, Site maps, Site structure, Page layout grids
05:30 End of Day 1
DAY 2 - Tuesday
09:00 Web site design (A. Rau-Chaplin)
Hands On
- HTML, Converting word documents, Putting your pages online
10:15 Break
10:30 Basic Network concepts (E. Milios)
Network protocols, Dealing with packet errors, Local Area Networks, Packet switching, Scaling up to the Internet,
TCP/IP
12:00 Lunch
01:00
Security & Payments: Encryption algorithms, Using encryption (E. Milios)
03:00 Coffee Break
03:15
Secure Transactions, Secure Hosts in Networks
Electronic Payments
Software Agents: Overview, Agent Examples, E-commerce Agents, Mobile Agents (E. Milios)
05:30 End of Day 2
Assignment for the technology module
Select an e-commerce topic from the list or feel free to select your own topic.
Search for two key references (research articles) on the topic available on the Web. It is important to select
high-quality references. Peer-reviewed journal or conference articles are high-quality (most likely). Not all conferences
are peer-reviewed. Reports by consulting organizations may or may not be suitable. Good starting places are articles
and technical reports in university web sites (e.g. MIT). Pursue the references in these articles. Searches using
web search engines (e.g. Altavista) with your topic as keywords may provide some useful pointers (and most likely
a lot of useless stuff, as well).
Articles from the popular press (e.g. Newsweek, McLean's, Economist, newspapers) are useful as a supplementary
source, but they should not be among your key references.
Write a critical review of the selected key references (in HTML format), and transfer it into your group's web
site on borg according to the instructions on how to use your borg computer account. Length of the review should
be a minimum of two pages and a maximum of 15. As a guideline, you may want to first summarize the main points
of your key references, and then review them critically. The best reports will be self-contained, easy to read,
focussed, and highly informative (of tutorial value) for the reader.
Make sure that you give a technology orientation to your assignment. Discuss resource issues, implementation issues,
security issues, sizes of databases, etc.
The quality guidelines for the Business Assignment are also applicable to the technology assignment.
If you select your own topic or if you are in doubt about the quality of a reference you have identified, you may want to send a short description of your topic or URL to the reference to igip@cs.dal.ca.