Download Analysis on Techniques of Designing E-Business System

Analysis on Techniques of Designing E-Business System
DENG Zhonghua1,2, HUANG jun2, GUO Liang2
1 Center for Studies of Information Resources of Wuhan University, Wuhan, P. R. China, 430072
2 School of Information Management, Wuhan University, Wuhan, P. R. China, 430072
Abstract: The Techniques of E-Business System and the Techniques of Web are closely correlative.
That is because that the Internet (mainly the Web) is the basic platform on which E-Business Systems
running. There are many solutions for Web applications nowadays, in this paper; we mainly discussed
Java based techniques for E-Business System including logical model, system architecture, language,
and standards, etc.
Key Words: E-Business, System, Java
1 Introduction
Internet is the basic platform on which E-Business systems running, some scholars referred the
E-Business as the Internet-Business, and from this we can see the importance the internet to the
E-Business. But from technology, nowadays E-Business systems mainly utilize World Wide Web
(WWW, or simplified Web). That is to say that most of E-Business Systems are built on Web. As the
view of business and service, Web site can be accessed easily all over the world; users can visit Web
business sites interesting them through browser conveniently.
As mentioned above, the techniques of E-Business system and the techniques of Web are closely
correlative. When discussing the techniques of E-Business system, we should focus on Web techniques
involuntarily. But then, E-Business system is merely not a Web site to supplying information, but also a
service system equipped with necessary functions.
2 The Technique Architecture of E-Business System
Web is built on the Client/Server (C/S) model. As the client is a unified Browser, therefore, the
structure of Web is often referred as Browser/Server (B/S). For the variety of users, the client application
they use is browser, and the services they obtained are from ISP. As a matter of fact, ISPs are entrances
the browsers into Web.
2.1 System Architecture
As a whole, the structure of E-Business system is composed of two parts, one is the client application
and the other is the server application, which is a typical C/S pattern. The browser is mostly chosen as
the client application directly, which is that ready-made commercial software is utilized and we need not
to develop client applications. The browser is a useful software which is used to search and to display
documents, it processes client’s inquires of WWW service, it connects WWW server, it sends client’s
WWW requirements, it analyses HTML marks, and it supplies GUI interface etc. But then, browsers
are made by commercial software developers (such as, the browsers widely used at present are
Navigator from Netscape and Internet Explorer from Microsoft), so they supply general functions of
browsing information merely. In order to make browsers be suitable for E-Business system, some
necessary functions should be appended to them.
Applications on Web server (server applications) are more complicated than applications on client
side, and there are many solutions of formation and implementation. The manner of organizing and
managing server applications is following to implementing techniques. For example, the CGI (Common
Gateway Interface) the traditional server application is organized as processes at runtime. The
Supported by National Social Science Fund (Project code: 04BTQ016),China
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applications developed from .NET or Java can be organized and managed according to the style of
object (or component).
2.2 Technique Architecture
From concrete implementing technology, the technology developing E-Business system can be
divided to client application technology and server application technology. But then, technique solutions
are influenced by programming language, Therefore, before discussing technique system the
programming languages should be considered at first.
2.2.1 Programming Language
The protocol what Web used is HTTP, and the data transferred on Web are documents marked by
markup languages such HTML or XML, that are called Web Pages frequently. HTML and XML are
commonly used markup languages, the mainly purposes of them are marking and defining data
exchanged by networks, but not programming. So, if you want to build commercial logics, you need
programming languages, for example, CGIs are coded by C or Perl etc. . . .
Many languages can be used to programming the World Wide Web, for example, in order to expand
client’s functions, we often write scripts in Web pages using VBScript or JavaScript, we also can write
Applets using Java, or we can use ActiveX components yet. There are so many technology solutions for
client’s applications, there are more solutions for server’s applications either, what used widely for
server applications are PHP, ASP.NET, and Java, and so on. To program client’s and server’s
applications, it is not restricted in one single language, but, for simplifying the development project,
limited in one language series is a better way generally. Every language has a set of technologies of
itself, limited by the length of this paper; Java based Web techniques are discussed merely.
2.2.2 Client Application Programs
To reach business system’s needs, some special functions should be appended to browser, and it is the
special functions that are the client’s programs. The central actions of client’s programs are to add some
interactive functions to Web Pages and to make the Pages activated. Corresponding technologies to that
are JavaScript, Java Applet, and so on.
2.2.3 Server Application Programs
The basic function of server’s programs is to respond the requests from clients. Besides of that, as a
part of business system, server’s applications should be provided with functions to access database,
which also are the key technologies for generating Web dynamically. Traditional server’s application is
CGI, and technologies of Java based server’s applications are Servlet and JSP.
3 Base Languages of E-Business System
The Web Page is the primary form of documents on Web, Web Pages can be written with HTML as
well as XML. Otherwise, CSS and XSL are usually used to format the documents.
3.1 HTML
HTML (Hyper Text Markup Language) is the primary base language of Web Pages, it organize the
data to documents exchanged through Web, and the documents can include some non-text elements
such as links, images, music, and even procedures etc. On austerely, HTML is not a programming
language, for it is short of necessary programming statements such as iterative statement and IF …
THEN statement, so it is a markup language merely.
HTML is a descriptive language under the definition of SGML (Standard General Markup Language),
or, HTML is an application form of SGML. Since Tim B Lee defined the first specification of HTML as
part of World Wide Web at CERN, HTML have developed quickly, there have been versions such as
HTML1.0, HTML2.0, HTML3.0, HTML4.0. At same time, DHTML, VHTML, SHTML are also
developing rapidly.
Facility is HTML’s important virtue, which makes HTML easily learning and using. On the other
hand, HTML documents are text files, that is to say, it is easy to create a HTML document and a simple
text editor is enough for the works. Besides of that, HTML is independent of platform. Therefore, as
long as a browser can explain HTML tags, then it can be used to display Web documents on any
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platform.
3.2 DHTML
DHTML (Dynamic HTML) is one of the solutions expanding HTML, DHTML make HTML
programmable through integrating several technologies. DHTML technique includes JavaScript,
VBScript, DOM (Document Object Model), Layers and CSS, and so on.
DHTML divided elements of HTML document to objects, and the objects are open to programming
languages, so that the objects can be coded with programming language such as JavaScript and
VBScript.
3.3 XML
XML (eXtensible Markup Language) is a markup language as same as HTML, but the XML’s
intention is different to HTML’s. HTML endeavor to retain the documents’ original style after
transferred from Web. For that, HTML can be referred as a language for describing format of documents.
And XML is used to define data, so that, XML is a language for describing data, its general purposes are
exchanging data across platforms.
From the view of application, XML is a standard of format of storage and transformation. Under the
standard, the data whatever different platforms and locations can be exchanged and need not to do any
adjustment of format. In XML standards, there are not tags for format of display; therefore, to display
XML documents according to one’s willing other technologies are needed; XSL is such a technology of
display style for XML documents. No display tags is not a weakness of XML, but contrary, the display
style of XML document is more flexible, in respect that applications can decide the display style
according to desire and circumstance.
3.4 CSS and XSL
CSS (Cascading Style Sheet) is a special technology of controlling document style; it can be applied
in HTML documents as well as XML documents. CSS provided flexible ways to control detail displays.
XSL (eXtensible Style Language) is a style language developed for formatting XML documents. In
fact, XSL is mostly used to transform XML document codes to HTML codes, but then this is a small
part of XSL’s functions. XSL is provided with control statements such as iterative statements, condition
statements, and selection statements etc, so XSL is closer to programming language. More importance,
XSL is a type of XML document syntactically; therefore it is easily called by scripts, in turn, to make
dynamically controlling style come true.
4 Techniques of E-Business System
4.1 Web Pages
The Web Page is the primary form of document on Web; and as well as the primary forms of
E-Business system. Web Page is transformable information from Web server, these information are text,
image, and also non-text objects such as voice, videos and so on. The documents are organized under
hyper-links; a Web document can include hyper-links which can point any other document. That is, the
hyper-link is an important property of Web document.
The Web Page can be divided to three types according as the time the Pages generated: static pages,
dynamic pages, and active pages. Among of them the static pages are files saved on Web servers, they
will not be updated until they are modified. The dynamic pages are generated when the Web server is
triggered by client’s request. There are no existing formats for dynamic pages before generating, when a
browser visit a dynamic page, a request is produced, then Web server returns an answer which is outputs
from server programs. The active pages are not entirely defined by Web server, they are generated by
Web server when Web server receives a request from client browser; and they include some programs of
computing and displaying. An active page can interact with users and can update itself automatically, as
long as in running state, the active page will be changing always. Actually, from the view of browser, an
active page is not different from a static page: they all are Web documents (HTML files or XML files
etc.).
4.2 JavaScript
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HTML is basic technology of Web application, it solved the problems how to transform, display, and
link documents. Although HTML has supplied the way jumping to another document, but the documents
themselves are “static”, if need some operating functions, it will be difficult for HTML to do anything.
In order to make HTML be provided with active functions, it is needed to expend HTML; one of the
solutions is to embed script language. JavaScript is one of the script languages, which is same as Java on
synthetic. Another script language commonly used is VBScript, which is same as Visual Basic on
synthetic.
JavaScript is one of the technologies of the Active Page, which provide Web Pages some functions of
computation, such as response to mouse, process of transactions, etc.
The pieces of scripts are transmitted to clients along with HTML documents that contain them, and
running on clients translated by browsers. So that, only browsers that support JavaScript can run these
scripts. That is to say, whether HTML documents embedded scripts of JavaScript can run normally or
not, is affected by browsers and their versions. This should be regarded at the time developing systems.
4.3 Java Applet
Java Applet technology is another solution for fulfilling Active Pages; it is Java based client’s
technology. Java Applets are executable programs coded by Java, which are usually called “Applet”.
Every Applet is an application provided with full functions; and it can be invoked by statement in
HTML document to run on clients. So, Applet can be regarded as plug-in component of browsers, to
expand browser’s ability, and to make Web Pages activating.
But then, Applet can not supply whole abilities of Java. For example, an applet can not access files on
local disk directly. The restrictions are considered for security, and to protect leaks of safeties. Under
such mechanism of safety, Applet will not bring on dangers unknowingly.
4.4 Java Servlet
Java Servlet is Java based server’s application technology. Like Java Applet running on client, a Java
servlet is a program running on Web server and coded by Java, which is generally referred as “Servlet”.
Servlets can interact with Applets, and also can be invoked by HTML, and so on. Servlets can
generate HTML documents according to client’s requests: when a servlet receives requests from clients,
it returns to clients an answer in the form of HTML document (transmitting a Web Page).
Nowadays, Servlets are applied to replace traditionally CGI in many Web application systems.
Compared with CGI, Servlet has several merits as followed:
Servlet is independent of platform;
Servlet is simply to code relatively, but Servlet can utilize whole abilities of Java;
Servlet is faster;
Servlet can run continuously, and can retain state information.
4.5 JSP
JSP (JavaServer Pages) is Java based server’s application technology, too. In fact, JSP is closely
correlative to Servlet, they are complementarities of technologies each other. JSP uses Java language as
well, and are running in same way. That is to say, JSP and Servlet are same on the aspect of function
and running. The difference of JSP and Servlet is style of implementation and format of file.
Servlet is good at programming lower logics, but for display style. When the display interface needs
little adjustment, then all files about the Servlet must be coded, compiled, tested, packaged, and
deployed, etc.
However, JSP regards display as a central technology. JSP document is edited in format of HTML
document which is acquaintance with everyone, so, it is very convenient for us to design display when
generating pages actively. From this point of view, JSP is an expansion of HTML either, besides of
abilities of HTML, it can code programs using Java directly within the documents. This makes JSP be
provided with strong capabilities of computation, because that, in a JSP document, we can insert java
components and developer defined tags, and so on.
4.6 Database Technique
Almost all applications correlative to processing information are involved database, of course,
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database technology is one of the basic technologies of E-Business applications. When developing Web
applications, the database technology means the technology of data management supported by DBMS
(Database Management System). The database technology contains two parts of contents: connecting
database, and manipulating data.
Connecting database is the precondition of manipulating data, none but connected to database
manipulation can be fulfilled. ODBC (Open Database Connections) made it come true to connect
database with a unified way, that is, we connect database with same method whatever a DBMS comes
from. What Java programs used is JDBC (Java Database Connectivity). The principle of JDBC is same
as the principle of ODBC, or, JDBC is an ODBC of Java. Supported by JDBC, when connecting to a
database, we need not to consider the details of the DBMS, but to connect to JDBC directly, and after
connection, any operations are to interact with JDBC. In this way, to programs, JDBC corresponds to a
DBMS; all operations are objected to JDBC but not a concrete DBMS, for any detail of lower
transactions are implemented by the JDBC.
Manipulating data means the operations about accessing database, include read/writing of data from
database, processing of data such as index, filter, etc. As mentioned above, Java programs are to connect
database by ways of JDBC, and the JDBC can be looked on as DBMS, so it is called as “JDBC
database” directly for conveniently. JDBC database also uses SQL (Structured Query Language) to
access data.
4.7 CORBA
CORBA (Common Object Request Broker Architecture) is a design and realization solution of
distributed system, the mainly properties of it are independent of environment and language; and it can
be used to develop OO distributed systems.
CORBA made the network become a single system. Supported by CORBA, client and server connect
automatically; therefore, the whole network system looks like a unified Operating System, and in this
way, when developing application systems we just need to focus on the problems we need to solve, and
need not to pay any attention on the state of network.
The course of developing CORBA application can be divided to two layers, the first layer is defining
interfaces, and the following layer is implementing interfaces. What used to define interfaces is
CORBA’s IDL (Interface Definition Language); and the implementing language can be Java according
to desire. Because of that implementing programs can be coded in variety of environment, so, CORBA
application is independent of platforms as well as of languages.
In E-Business systems, CORBA can be used to code business logics; it can simplify programming,
and enhance adaptability as well.
5 Summaries
Most of E-Business systems are built on Web; therefore, the technologies of E-Business systems are
correlative to Web technologies. Web is based on C/S model, so that, technique system is divided to
client’s technology and server’s technology.
Technologies are dependent on language; many languages can be used to program Web, limited by
the length of this paper, Web programming technologies based on Java are discussed. The basic
languages of Web are HTML and XML, besides of that, CSS and XSL can be used to format the Web
documents.
Java based client’s technology is Applet; and Java based server’s technologies are Servlet and JSP,
they are complementarities of technologies each other. A servlet is an executable program coded with
Java, which can generate Web Pages dynamically; and a JSP file is a document like HTML document
into which some Java procedures are inserted, so, JSP is more convenient to edit. CORBA applications
can be implemented with Java, in this way: CORBA components implemented by Java can be used in
E-Business system.
Techniques for Web of E-Business system are developing rapidly, along with time passing; there will
be more new technologies and new solutions coming forth.
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Reference
[1] G.Winfield Tresse, Lawrence C. Stewart. Designing Systems for Internet Commerce. Published by
Addison-Wesley. 1998
[2] http://www.omg.org/news/whitepapers/wpjava.htm
[3] http://www.omg.org/gettingstarted/specintro.htm
Introduction to OMG's SpecificationsCORBA/IIOP Specification
[4] http://www.hongen.com/pc/homepage/css
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