1. Microsoft .NET
Customer Solution
SeekNet Technologies
Smart Client Application Searches Multiple Airline
Sites from the Desktop, Updates Automatically
Published: September 2004
SeekNet's vision is to create desktop-based personalized, intelligent search agents that assist
users in their online shopping experience. SeekNet wanted to build a comparison shopping
engine to run on a user's desktop, with an initial target market of airfares. After considering Java
and Gecko/Netscape, SeekNet developed SmartRover with Microsoft Visual C#, Microsoft
Windows Forms, and the Microsoft .NET Framework as a smart client application. They estimate
a 30 percent savings in development time.
"There are numerous suppliers of goods and services
on the Internet," says Swapnil Shrivastav, founder of
SeekNet Technologies. "The information they provide
about those goods and services may change fairly
frequently. Airfares
and hotel rates are
good examples. In
these fragmented
markets it is not
practical for a user to
manually search
across all the
suppliers several
times a week."
SeekNet saw this as
an opportunity to
provide an
automated search
tool to run on the
desktop. "We explored using Java with Netscape
Gecko," says Shrivastav, "but after careful research
chose the Microsoft® .NET Framework. The
development environment we now use includes
Microsoft Visual Studio® .NET 2003 and the .NET
Framework SDK [software development kit]."
SeekNet designed SmartRover as a smart client
application, an easily deployed and managed client
application that provides an adaptive and rich
interactive experience by utilizing local resources and
intelligently
connecting to
distributed data
sources. They chose
to write the code in
Microsoft Visual C#®
development tool and
build their user
interface with
Microsoft Windows®
Forms. Seven
developers were able
to complete
SmartRover in only 15
months, saving an
estimated 30 percent on development time compared
to Microsoft Visual C++®.
"SmartRover provides a comparison shopping
experience that extends to the consumer's desktop,"
says Shrivastav. ”The first target market segment is
comparing for airfares. Currently over 16 Web sites
are searched for airfares at one click of the button.
"SmartRover technology provides automated search
across several Web sites to get a result for the user's
query. The current implementation is specific to air
For more information about Microsoft products and services, call the Microsoft Sales Information Center at (800) 426-9400. In Canada, call the Microsoft Canada Information
Centre at (877) 568-2495. Customers who are deaf or hard-of-hearing can reach Microsoft text telephone (TTY/TDD) services at (800) 892-5234 in the United States or
(905) 568-9641 in Canada. Outside the 50 United States and Canada, please contact your local Microsoft subsidiary. To access information using the World Wide Web, go to
http://www.microsoft.com/.
For more information about SeekNet Technologies products and services, visit the Web site at http://www.seeknettech.com/.
© 2004 Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved.
This case study is for informational purposes only. MICROSOFT MAKES NO WARRANTIES, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, IN THIS SUMMARY.
Microsoft, MSDN, the .NET logo, Visual C++, Visual C#, Visual Studio, the Visual Studio logo, and Windows are either registered trademarks or trademarks of Microsoft
Corporation in the United States and/or other countries. The names of actual companies and products mentioned herein may be the trademarks of their respective owners.
Fast Facts
Number of developers to build application 7
Number of months to build application 15
Lines of code 200 KB
Solution Overview
Customer Profile
SeekNet Technologies is a privately
held company headquartered in San
Jose, California. SeekNet's vision is to
bring value by automating and
personalizing searches and thereby
eliminating inefficiencies.
Business Situation
SeekNet wanted to build a comparison
shopping engine to run on a user's
desktop, with an initial target market of
airfares. SeekNet considered
implementing its engine with Java and
Netscape Gecko.
Solution
SeekNet developed SmartRover with
Microsoft® Visual C#® .NET and the
Microsoft .NET Framework, as a smart
client application, using Microsoft
Windows® Forms.
Benefits
 At least 30 percent less development
effort from Visual C# .NET and .NET
Framework
 Faster time-to-market
 Rich desktop interface
 Automatic updating

Software and Services
 Microsoft Windows XP
 Microsoft SQL ServerTM 2000
 Microsoft .NET Framework 1.1
 Microsoft Visual Studio .NET 2003
 Microsoft Visual C# .NET
 Microsoft Windows Forms

2. travel, but the SmartRover platform is generic and
applicable to many market segments.
"By using a smart client and not a browser we are
able to provide rich functionality to the consumer.
For example, while choosing a nearby airport as the
user types in characters we match possible cities
and auto-fill the dialog box. This quick response and
rich functionality cannot be provided via a browser.
The Windows Forms control for this was custom
created based on user feedback, and can be
accessed by clicking on the airplane icons on the
airport fields on SmartRover.
"Most of the computation and application logic of the
application resides on the desktop of the consumer.
The consumer’s network resources and computation
power are used to do the searches. Such
functionality would be expensive, not scalable, and
tough to provide via a browser-based server-side
application. The fact that the searches execute on
the desktop makes searching for various
permutations of nearby airports and adjacent dates
possible. This is the additional functionality made
available to the user as he shares his network and
computation resources. The application logic reaches
the desktop via smart client deployments.
"We have a subscription model that is implemented
for SmartRover. This includes a trial period and a
monthly subscription. The subscription model
requires native DLLs [dynamic-link libraries] to be
used for security. The application uses COM Interop
to talk to the native DLLs.
"We have two levels of secure update that can be
pushed down to the consumer from central
management servers," says Shrivastav. "First, as the
layout changes for any Web site, parsing logic is
updated transparently to the user. Second, as new
features are available they can be pushed down to
the user.
"Our Application Update implementation is based on
the AppUpdater component available at [Microsoft]
MSDN®. It has been modified to suit our
requirements. We combine several executables and
configuration files together in a compressed state, we
added more security features, and we enhanced the
update logic.
"Microsoft Visual C# provides a much easier and
quicker development environment than [Visual] C++
or Java. This has saved us at least 30 percent on
development time, compared to C++. In addition,
we're seeing improved stability. Now, instead of
fighting the programming language, we can focus on
trying to better design the application.
"We believe that the .NET smart client is an evolving
trend that will bring the desktop and Internet closer,
in our case in the context of searching. The smart
client architecture opens up a host of possibilities."
Solution Overview
Customer Profile
Brief paragraph including
industry, organization
size/stature, and business
objectives
Business Situation
One paragraph to set up the
problem/opportunity.
Solution
Brief paragraph describing how
the customer solved the problem.
Benefits
Bullets describing business
benefits.
Software and Services
(Include trademarks and list
software in following order as
appropriate)
Microsoft® Windows®
Microsoft Office
Microsoft SQL Server™
Microsoft Visual Studio®
Microsoft Exchange Server
Microsoft Commerce Server
Microsoft Internet Security and
Acceleration Server
Microsoft Host Integration
Server
Microsoft BizTalk® Server
Microsoft Application Center
Microsoft Mobile Information
Microsoft Consulting Services
Hardware
List hardware (specific brand
and version)
Partners
List partners