The document discusses technologies and infrastructure that enable e-commerce. It covers topics like online stores, shopping carts, payment processing, shipping management, order fulfillment, and personalization. It also describes models of e-commerce technology architecture, including the five-layer EC Technology Architecture model and client-server architectures. Key elements that influence e-business architecture are the organization's business strategies, IT environment, and emerging technologies.

1. E-COMMERCE ENABLING TECHNOLOGIES AND INFRASTRUCTURE
Technology rules the world. With time and advancement, it makes the business sector to adopt
the changes to stay ahead in the throat-cut competitive world. E-commerce technology trends
have a significant impact on online shopping. It will continue to have the influence of new
technology, new consumer demands, and the constant shift from desktop to mobile devices.
Electronic commerce allows businesses and consumers to purchase goods and services, and
exchange information on business transactions online. The growth of the Internet as a viable
business vehicle for conducting these transactions is one of the phenomena of modern
information technology and has already had a significant impact on the business community,
providing new methods of conducting business on a global basis.
Several technologies must be in place for electronic commerce to exist. The most obvious
one is the Internet, which is revolutionising the way commerce is performed. Beyond that
system of interconnected networks, many other sophisticated software and hardware
components are needed to provide the support structure: operating systems, distributed
computing environments, middleware, user-interface technologies, server-side facilities and
services, languages, software development methodologies, and of course the World Wide
Web.
Overview of Internet Technologies
In its simplest form the Internet exists to facilitate the reading of ordinary documents that are
physically located on other people’s computers. With the emergence of electronic commerce,
the Internet has evolved into an infrastructure capable of supporting major commerce enabled
applications. To understand this transition it is necessary to review the basic mechanics of
the Internet and its major application, the World Wide Web (WWW).
The set of protocols that underlie the basic operation of the Internet are the Transmission
Control Protocol (TCP) and the Internet Protocol (IP). The common acronym TCP/IP refers
to the two protocols. The Hypertext Transfer Protocol (HTTP) is the Internet protocol
responsible for transferring and displaying Web pages.
HTTP runs in the application layer of the TCP/IP model and employs a client/server architecture
in which the user’s web browser (the client) opens an HTTP session and sends a request for a
web page to a web server. The format of the web page is controlled by the Hypertext Markup
Language (HTML), a document production language that includes a set of tags that define the
appearance and style of a document. This combination of technologies provides the
fundamental mechanism for the retrieval and display of information on the Web.

2. Dynamic Web Content
Web pages can be either static or dynamic. "Static" means unchanged or constant, while
"dynamic" means changing or lively. Therefore, static Web pages contain the same prebuilt
content each time the page is loaded, while the content of dynamic Web pages can be generated
on-the-fly.
Standard HTML pages are static Web pages. They contain HTML code, which defines the
structure and content of the Web page. Each time an HTML page is loaded, it looks the same.
The only way the content of an HTML page will change is if the Web developer updates and
publishes the file.
The preceding description is concerned with static content, which is permanently stored on a
web server. Static content does not have the ability to personalise the end-user’s web
experience. This experience is provided by server side applications which produce
dynamically generated web content.
Web Client/Server Architecture

3. The division of labour between web clients and web servers is quite distinct and is an
example of a client/server architecture. This type of architecture allows the distribution of
computing tasks between two or more computing resources. Essentially the client requests a
service that is provided by the server. These clients can be browsers running on personal
computers, network devices, personal digital assistants, cell phones, and other pervasive
computing devices.
Technologies behind E-commerce
Online Store
An online store is a virtual shop over the Internet. To complete the e-commerce cycle Internet/
network is required. An online virtual store can be of two types usually. One is over World-
Wide-Web and usually referred to as a web store and another is in the form of mobile apps which
can be installed on mobile devices and then can be used to process e-commerce activities. The e-
commerce activities completed using mobile devices are called m-commerce or mobile
commerce. M-commerce is possible through a web store and also through a mobile app. A
responsive e-commerce website is used on mobile devices to carry out commerce activities. M-
commerce has many advantages and increases the chances of a sale manifold.
Shopping Cart
A shopping cart is a software system integrated into the online store which helps in completing
an online order. Usually, it is seen on the product detail pages, from where the product can be
added to the cart, and after reviewing the cart, customers checkout to process payment and
complete the order. The shopping cart captures all the order details of the product together with
the shipping charge as set by the merchant and tax fees if incurred any. Shopping cart after
capturing all the details, send to payment processing interface. The payment processor after
executing payment successfully, send the order details and payment confirmation to the
merchant’s screen. The merchant receives an email for the order and also it is reflected in the
back-end.
Payment Processing
Payment processing is a crucial part of an e-commerce business. Nowadays, payments are
getting processed both online and offline. To make online payments secured, online stores use
payment gateways. Payment gateways are the intermediaries between the merchant’s store and
the payment issuing authority (usually a bank). After receiving the details of the order with order
amount, the payment gateway sends users to their bank’s server, after payment from the bank
users is thrown back to the merchant’s site with order confirmation details. Payment gateways
are secured and free from any DDoS attack. Offline payment facilities are available mostly in
developing countries where people still have to digitalize their activities. Merchants offer Cash-
On-Delivery for convenience.
Shipping Management

4. There can be various ways to send the products ordered to the customers. In the e-commerce
industry, there are various logistics companies across the world to care about this part of the
process cycle. The Shipping companies collect the packaged products ordered from the
merchant’s outlet. Shipping companies offer the status of the shipment and live GPS location of
the product in an online map. Users can track their shipment using a tracking number or
consignment number. The tracking link is provided by the shipment companies.
Order Fulfillment
Most of the merchants of the world are a reseller of other product procuring companies. They
receive the product details to use in their online store. After receiving the orders, small business
e-commerce retailers send the order details to the product procuring company. The product
procuring company sends the order to the customer directly through the shipping company. This
saves inventory management costs to the retailer. Dropshipping is an example of it’s an
improved version.
E-commerce Personalization
Providing a personalized experience to the users of the store captures more conversions.
Personalization is the process of showing the products or things that the user is already looking
for. This is possible with modern-day technologies like AI and ML. The combination of artificial
intelligence and machine learning reads the data behavior of users and presents users with
personalized experiences.
New technologies are adding new milestones in e-commerce. Data processing through AI & ML,
delivery using drones and the list goes on. Data processing has become vital for the success of an
e-commerce venture. There are many online e-commerce platforms like Builderfly to
automatized the whole e-commerce business.
Model of Electronic Commerce Technology Architecture
Electronic commerce architectures use web technologies to implement mission-critical ebusiness
applications. These architectures use small-footprint clients to access services provided by
resource managers that can be accessed across a strong and reliable network.
The e-business architecture is more than just a collection of technologies and products. It
consists of several architectural models and will adapt to changing business and technology
requirements.
The following key elements that influence e-business architecture:
• The organisation’s overall business strategies.
A range of business drivers
• IT environment
• IT vision, objectives and strategies

5. • Organisational constraints
• New and emerging technologies.
The process of developing an effective strategy for implementing an operational system
requires a clear understanding of both the systems requirements and constraints, and must be
based on a conceptual model that provides a layout of the basic architectural components that
deliver the services required to support e-business applications. The EC Technology
Architecture, a five layered application model, developed by Techknowledge Australia
provides such a basis.
Layer 0 – Foundation Layer
This forms the basic platform on which the e-business operational system is built. The
foundation layer includes all of the infrastructure hardware and its associated hardware
management equipment. Infrastructure hardware consists of, at least, the payments systems
hardware (eg credit card reader), security hardware (eg proxy servers) and networking
hardware (eg routers)
Layer 1 – Internal Applications Layer
Provides an access interface to the various applications systems (eg data warehousing system,
legacy systems requiring data translation) required to provide functionality to the e-business
system. These interfaces often play the role of proxy for individual transactions within backend
legacy systems and shield other components from the proprietary technologies used by
these systems.
Included in this level is the enterprise resource planing (ERP) applications used to provide
management of the operational business processes (eg product planning, purchasing,
inventory management.

6. Layer 2 – Middleware Layer
Middleware is a framework for building (typically distributed) application systems.
Middleware frameworks provide common services, such as network communication
primitives (eg RPC and distributed objects) naming and locating services and security
support. Middleware is meant to abstract away the underlying environment from applications
and present a homogeneous interface to application programmers and users.
Layer 3 – EC Application Layer
Based at this level is the online e-business application. Software is required for two distinct
purposes, the commerce server and the web server. The web server provides online access to
the commerce server. The commerce server will require a range of software to implement
and manage the actual storefront.
Layer 4 – Relationship Layer
The presentation mechanism such as a browser based front end to accept and process user
input data. This layer interacts with visual components to handle presentation related tasks
and with non-visual components to handle the interface with back-end applications.

7. Architectural Framework of E-Commerce
Architectural framework of e-commerce means the synthesizing of various existing resources
like DBMS, data repository, computer languages, software agent-based transactions, monitors or
communication protocols to facilitate the integration of data and software for better applications.
The architectural framework for e-commerce consists of six layers of functionality or services as
follows:
1. Application services.
2. Brokerage services, data or transaction management.
3. Interface and support layers.
4. Secure messaging, security and electronic document interchange.
5. Middleware and structured document interchange, and
6. Network infrastructure and the basic communication services.
5.1 Application services
In the application layer services of e-commerce, it is decided that what type of e- commerce
application is going to be implemented. There are three types of distinguished e-commerce
applications i.e., consumer to business application, businessto-business application and intra-
organizational application.
5.2 Information Brokerage and Management Layer
This layer is rapidly becoming necessary in dealing with the voluminous amounts of information
on the networks. This layer works as an intermediary who provides service integration between
customers and information providers, given some constraint such as low price, fast services or
profit maximization for a client. For example, a person wants to go to USA from Bangladesh.
The person checks the sites of various airlines for the low-price ticket with the best available
service. For this he must know the URLs of all the sites. Secondly, to search the services and the
best prices, he also has to feed the details of the journey again and again on different sites. If
there is a site that can work as information broker and can arrange the ticket as per the need of
the person, it will save the lot of time and efforts of the person. This is just one example of how
information brokerages can add value.
Another aspect of the brokerage function is the support for data management and traditional
transaction services. Brokerages may provide tools to accomplish more sophisticated, time-
delayed updates or future-compensating transactions.
5.3 Interface and Support Services
The third layer of the architectural framework is interface layer. This layer provides interface for
e-commerce applications. Interactive catalogs and directory support services are the examples of
this layer.

8. Interactive catalogs are the customized interface to customer applications such as home
shopping. Interactive catalogs are very similar to the paper-based catalog. The only difference
between the interactive catalog and paper-based catalog is that the first one has the additional
features such as use of graphics and video to make the advertising more attractive.
Directory services have the functions necessary for information search and access. The
directories attempt to organize the enormous amount of information and transactions generated
to facilitate e-commerce.
The main difference between the interactive catalogs and directory services is that the interactive
catalogs deal with people while directory support services interact directly with software
applications.
5.4 Secure Messaging Layer
In any business, electronic messaging is an important issue. The commonly used messaging
systems like phone, fax and courier services have certain problems like in the case of phone if
the phone line is dead or somehow the number is wrong, you are not able to deliver the urgent
messages. In the case of courier service, if you want to deliver the messages instantly, it is not
possible as it will take some time depending on the distance between the source and destination
places. The solution for such type of problems is electronic messaging services like e-mail,
enhanced fax and EDI.
The electronic messaging has changed the way the business operates. The major advantage of the
electronic messaging is the ability to access the right information at the right time across diverse
work groups.
The main constraints of the electronic messaging are security, privacy, and confidentiality
through data encryption and authentication techniques.
5.5 Middleware services
The enormous growth of networks, client server technology and all other forms of
communicating between/among unlike platforms is the reason for the invention of middleware
services. The middleware services are used to integrate the diversified software programs and
make them talk to one another.
5.6 Network Infrastructure
We know that the effective and efficient linkage between the customer and the supplier is a
precondition for e-commerce. For this a network infrastructure is required. The early models for
networked computers were the local and long distance telephone companies. The telephone
company lines were used for the connection among the computers. As soon as the computer
connection was established, the data traveled along that single path. Telephone company
switching equipment (both mechanical and computerized) selected specific telephone lines, or

9. circuits, that were connected to create the single path between the caller and the receiver. This
centrally-controlled, single-connection model is known as circuit switching.
E-commerce is based on the client-server architecture.
A client can be an application, which uses a Graphical User Interface (GUI) that sends request to
a server for certain services.
The server is the provider of the services requested by the client.
In E-commerce, a client refers to a customer who requests for certain services and the server
refers to the business application through which the services are provided.
The business application that provides services is deployed on a Web' server.
The E - Commerce Web server is a computer program that provides services to "other computer
programs and serves requested Hyper Text Mark-up Language (HTML) pages or files.
In client-server architecture, a machine can be both a client as well as a server.
There are two types of client server architecture that E-commerce follows: two-tier and three-
tier.
E- Commerce System Architecture: Two-tier architecture:
In two-tier client-server architecture the user interface runs on the client and the database is
stored on the server. The business application logic can either run on the client or the server. The
user application logic can either run on the client or the server. It allows the client processes to
run separately from the server processes on different computers.
The client processes provide an interface for the customer that gather and present the data on the
computer of the customer. This part of the application is known as presentation layer. The server
processes provide an interface with the data store of the business.
This part of the application is known as data layer. The business logic, which validates data,
monitors security and permissions and performs other business rules, can be kept either on the
client or the server. The following Figure shows the e commerce system two-tier architecture
diagram.

10. E- Commerce System Architecture: Three-tier architecture:
The three-tier architecture emerged in the 1990s to overcome the limitations of the two-tier
architecture. In three-tier architecture, the user interface and the business application logic, also
known as business rules and data storage and access, are developed and maintained as
independent modules.
The three-tier architecture includes three tiers: top tier, middle tier and third tier.
The top tier includes a user interface where user services such as session, text input, and dialog
and display management reside.
The middle tier provides process management services such as process development, process
monitoring and process resourcing that are shared by the multiple applications.
The third tier provides database management functionality. The data management component
ensures that the data is consistent throughout the distributed environment, the centralized process
logic in this architecture, which makes administration easier by localizing the system
functionality, is placed on the middle tier.

11. The following Figure shows the outline of the e commerce system Three - tier architecture
diagram.
The client server architecture advantages:
The client-server architecture provides standardized, abstract interfaces to establish
communication between multiple modules. When these modules are combined, they become an
integrated business application. Each module is a shareable and reusable object that can be
included in another business application.
In the client-server architecture, the functions of a business application are isolated within the
smaller business application objects and so application logic can be modified easily.
In "the client-server architecture, each business application object works with its own
encapsulated data structures that correspond to a specific database. When business application
objects communicate, they send the data parameters as specified in the abstract interface rather
than the entire database records.
This reduces the network traffic. In the client-server architecture, a programmer can develop
presentation components without knowing the business application logic.
Additional Notes
The application servers in the mid-tier are responsible for:

12. • Process management
Running different application modules in different processes, passing data between
them and distributing them across physical processors and machines. Good process
management is key to a high performance, high throughput application.
• Access and security
Authenticating users (or connecting processes) and customising the interface to
application services according to the user's profile.
• Transaction management
Grouping data updates in transactions and ensuring that they are properly committed
to the data layer.
• Session management
Web browsers and servers are essentially stateless, but if for example you want the
user’s shopping trolley to keep filling up as they select items to buy, then the state of
the user session has to be maintained between mouse clicks in the browser.
• Application Logic
The processing and logic that makes up the core of the application is executed in the
mid-tier, isolated from the thin client and the data access layers.

13. The three-tiered model is being replaced with a multi-tiered model, where the third tier is
modified to consist of an integration server and any number of specific back-end applications.
The major disadvantage associated with this type of system is the higher level of complexity,
which requires a well-disciplined development and testing environment for effective
implementation.
A multi-tiered, as opposed to a three-tiered architecture, splits the application layer into any
number of separate tiers, which may be just a logical separation or may reflect a physical
separation between processors or machines.