Agenda for eCommerce Class 5

Wayne State University College of Lifelong Learning Interdisciplinary Studies Program Fall, 2000 http://www.cll.wayne.edu/isp/drbowen/inetf00	Instructor: David R. Bowen 2311 A/AB Wayne State University Detroit, MI 48202	Daytime tel: (313) 577-1498 Evening tel: (248) 549-8518 FAX: (313) 577-8585 Email: d.r.bowen@wayne.edu
Instructor's home page (David R. Bowen) at http://www.cll.wayne.edu/isp/drbowen
eCommerce: Using the Web to Find and Service Customers AGS 3360 Section 986 Call Number 92073 or ISP 5500 Section 982 Call Number 92136	Computers, the Internet, and Society AGS 3340 Section 981 Call Number 96761 or ISP 5990 Section 982 Call Number 99915

Last updated: 10/25/00
Link back to course Welcome

Agenda for eCommerce Class #5
October 25, 2000

Announcements
1. If your name is listed below, puh-LEAZE go to the course web site and fill in the course information form.
  1. Nafeesah Abdullah
  2. Paul Mungar
  3. Mary Phelps
  4. Chandra Williams
2. The computer tutor is available at no charge (paid directly by ISP). His name is Matta Vijay Kumar and he is available as follows:
  1. Tel 313-832-6585
  2. Lab hours (also lab is open and you can work in there): Fridays 10 - 12 and 3 to 7 PM
Reminder of what you should be doing online on a regular basis -- these are part of the grade
1. Signin, from the lab, only on days for the class(es) you are taking
2. Weekly course report (if you are taking both classes, a single report will do)
3. Conference postings (one for eCommerce, two for Computers, the Internet, and Society, three if you are taking both)
4. Not required, but do it anyway - check your email on at least a weekly basis. Don't have email: use hotmail - it's easy and free. See me if you need help.
Review of eCommerce Team worksheet
Team time
1. I want to talk to each team by itself, Team 1 and then Team 2. While I am talking to one team, the other should go to Room 151 (Bryson D. Horton Room) and work on the worksheet. There will be additional worksheet time afterwards.
Adding and multiplying in iHTML to find the total cost to the customer
1. Fill in form and submit for iHTML demonstration for calculating total cost of order link on course web site under Agenda 4.
  1. Note use of radio buttons. Radio buttons, check boxes and drop-down lists do not allow your customers to make mistakes - these save money, time and frustration. Text lines and Text areas do allow your users to make mistakes. Sometimes, customers are malicious.
  2. Use the back button to go back to the form, and View / Source. Notice that each input element has a different name (radio buttons are grouped by name). Note that radio buttons (and check boxes and drop-down lists) must specify the value also. Note that the action is demo.iht.
  3. Look at the demoiht.txt file. This is exactly the demo.iht file, only renamed. If the file were named iht and you went to get it from the server, it would execute the iht file first and send you the remainder. But a file named with a txt extension just gets sent.
    1. Crash protection section. Put this in all of your iht files from now on.
      1. You will have to download demo.iht or use demoiht.txt. Whichever you use, open it is Wordpad or Notepad. On the whole, Notepad is less of a hassle.
      2. Open your iht file, or start to create it, using Wordpad or Notepad (does not have to be the same file).
      3. You can copy and paste between these copies using the clipboard.
    2. Notice how the total is created. You must use iEQ tags to create new variables. then you refer to them using the colon in front of the name, just as with the form variables.
      1. expr is the mathematical expression used to calculate the new variable. It can be more involved than the ones shown here. for example, we could say
        expr=":FirstNum * :First + :SecondNum * :Second + :ThirdNum * :Third"
      2. Note how the dollar sign goes in front when the dollar values are printed out. This is simply formatting to make it easier for the user to understand. $ is not part of the name or variable.
Options for the ten requirements

Item	What we are using	Alternatives
1. Web Server, or access to one.	The CLL web server, O'Reilly WebSite (runs under Windows OS)	Windows: MS IIS (Internet Information Server) and Netscape Enterprise server Unix/Linux: Apache and NCSA are free, Netscape Enterprise Server Also, lease space
2. Programming capability. Some people regard producing static web HTML pages to be programming, but here there is something beyond that. To process user input from text boxes etc., you need an active system to store and act on the user's input, and to respond to that input.	iHTML, editing by Wordpad and/or Notepad	MS Active Server Pages (ASP), Perl, PHP, Java, ColdFusion. FrontPage Server Extensions have a point-and-click interface for CGI, instead of a programming interface, but not as general purpose.
3. Email management (ability to send email, perhaps automatically, and receive it. (For sending automatic email, iHTML)	Mercury Mail mail server running on web server computer	Any mail server. Needs to respond promptly.
4. Access Restriction. If you are selling content, you need some way to restrict access by people who haven't paid yet.	No restriction	Several possibilities here: "blind URLs" with no links to them, you email your paid-up customers the URL. Also, access can be allowed only with a User Name and Password.
5. Access Logs. All web servers keep logs of hits. This is vital marketing information showing what customers and potential customers are interested in, where they are coming from, how many there are and whether or not they can use your web site. These days, you have about thirty seconds to provide a new user with what they are looking for. Then it's click and goodbye!	You will have access to the server logs for your web site. You will be using Microsoft Access database to analyze them.	There is a standard web server log file format.
6. Secure transactions. You must be able to demonstrate that you take customers' security seriously. The attitude that, "I don't care if they are really secure just as long as they think they are" is a marketing disaster waiting to happen. In practice, today this means encrypted (encoded) transmissions for personal information such as addresses, telephone numbers and credit card numbers. (I am currently trying to get this set up on the CLL web server. There is a chance it may not happen this semester. If it does happen, its use will just be to provide links using shttp -- Secure HyperText Transport Protocol -- instead of http.)	At this point, we are not using secure transactions.	shttp protocol and digital certificates
7. Credit Card Validation. Don't ship until you know the card is good! How do you get paid if the customer purchases by credit card?	I haven't really sorted this one out yet, and I may not. But there are services that will do this for you on a per-transaction basis, using email. read McComb here. We are assuming that you do the validation in person.	Buy, lease
8. Ability to upload files to the web server	Upload page, FTP	email, publish, drive mapping
9. Ability to create static web pages (HTML)	We are primarily using MS FrontPage98	Netscape Composer, HotMetal, Word (be careful!), Claris HomePage - many
10. Ability to create web graphics (GIF or JPEG/JPG file formats). Strictly speaking, this is not required, but cool graphics are a part of the web culture, and also of selling goods.	We are not doing this. I use PaintshopPro 7, about $100 or less	Adobe Photoshop is the standard for professionals.

Web security
1. Users care about the security of their information, and online merchants must respond to this.
2. Proprietary Vs public standard security
3. Symmetric encryption - same key to encode and decode
4. Asymmetric, or public key / private key
5. Prime numbers
6. Examples
7. Security of information after it has been securely transported to the merchant (Dyson, Release 2.1)