Seminar report

On

Submitted in partial fulfillment of the

Requirements for the award of the degree of

MASTER OF COMPUTER APPLICATIONS

By
K.Krishna Prasad
Regd No: 1000109
Under the valuable guidance of
Mr. A.Shiva Kumar
Asst. Prof. in Computers

DEPARTMENT OF COMPUTER APPLICATIONS

J.B.INSTITUTE OF COMPUTER TECHNOLOGY
(Affiliated to Sri Venkateswara University)
TIRUPATI – 517 506 (A.P.), 2001.
 CONTENTS

Introduction
1
History of E-Commerce
2
The Business process
2
3.1 The Buyer
3.2 The Seller
Traditional Vs Electronic
Commerce 4
Role of E-Commerce in
reducing 5
transaction costs
6. Technology Overview
7
6.1 Packet Switching Network
6.2 The Mark-Up languages
 6.3 Firewalls & Network Security
Pros & Cons
9
Conclusion
10

E-COMMERCE

INTRODUCTION:

Business/Commerce is an act where buyer and seller

agree upon and make transactions each exchanging with
some compensation.
E-Commerce is like a shop which is permanently
open all the days in the year. This makes the Internet
the ideal place to do Business in. Electronic commerce is
much broader and encompasses many more business
activities than just Web shopping. Some people and
businesses use the term electronic business or e-business,
when they are talking about electronic commerce in this
broader sense.
 In addition to buying or selling online, companies
engage in many other activities that keep them in business.
In many cases, sellers will customize or create a product to a
customer's specifications. They must examine their needs,
identify products that might meet those needs, and evaluate
those products. Next, buyers must order the selected
product, arrange for delivery, and pay for the product. In
many cases, buyers have to maintain contact with the seller
for warranty and other maintenance on the product. When
you think broadly about commerce, you see that it can
involve individuals, business companies, not-for-profit
organizations, and governmental entities as both buyers and
sellers.

HISTORY:

Electronic Commerce (or e-commerce) really began as

Electronic Data Interchange (EDI), the application-to-
application transfer of business documents between
computers. Many companies use EDI to exchange business
documents. EDI uses telephone lines as a fast, inexpensive,
and safe method for sending purchase orders, invoices,
shipping notices, and other frequently used business
documents. It eliminates the need for sending paper
documents via mail, faxes, or telexes. EDI is a major
contributor to creating a paperless office environment.
Companies that exchange documents by EDI are called
"trading partners". EDI requires that its trading partners
evaluate business procedures and invest in and learn about
special software and hardware, communications, standards,
audit issues, and legal support necessities. EDI does require
investment up front.

THE BUSINESS PROCESS:

The Buyer:

You can examine any commercial transaction from

either the buyer's or the seller’s viewpoint. The elements of
commerce in which a buyer will engage are shown.

The Seller:
 Each action taken by a buyer engaging in commerce
has a corresponding action that is taken by the seller. Shown
are the elements of commerce from a seller's viewpoint.

TRADITIONAL Vs ELECTRONIC COMMERCE:

 In many cases, business processes use traditional
commerce activities very effectively, and these processes
cannot be improved on by technology. Retail merchants
have years of traditional commerce experience in creating
store environments that help convinced customers to buy.
This combination of store design, layout, and product display
knowledge is called merchandising. Many salespeople have
developed skills that allow them to identify customer needs
and to find products or services that meet those needs. The
arts of merchandising and personal selling can be difficult to
practice over an electronic link.

Role of E-Commerce in Reducing

Transaction Costs:
Businesses and individuals can use electronic
commerce to reduce transaction costs by improving
information flows and increasing coordination of actions to
reduce uncertainty.
 Consider an employment transaction. The agreement
to employ a person has high transaction costs for the seller.
Individuals make a high investment in learning and adapting
to the culture of their employers. If the job involves a move,
the new employee can incur very high costs, including actual
costs of the move and related costs, such as the loss of a
spouse's job. If a sufficient number of employees throughout
the world can telecommute, or perform their job tasks from
any location by using electronic commerce technologies,
then many of these transaction costs can be eliminated.
TECHNOLOGY OVERVIEW:

HARDWARE SUPPORT (PACKET SWITCHING

NETWORK):
Several technologies must be in place for electronic
commerce to exist. The most obvious one is the Internet.
Beyond that system of interconnected networks, many other
sophisticated software and hardware components are
needed to provide the required support structure: database
software, network switches and hubs, encryption hardware
and software, multimedia support, and, of course, the Web.

Although circuit switching works well for telephone

calls, using the same technique for sending data across a
large network or a network of networks does not work well.
Establishing point-to-point connections for each pair of
sender/receivers is both expensive and difficult to manage.
The Internet employs a less expensive and more easily
managed technique to move data between two points. This
method is called packet switching. In a packet switching
network, files and messages are broken down into packets
that are labeled electronically with codes that indicate both
their origin and destination. Packets travel from computer to
computer along the network until they reach their
destination. The destination computer collects the packets
and reassembles the original data from the pieces in each
packet. The diagram illustrates a packet-switched network.
Computers performing this task are often called routers, and
the programs that determine the best path to follow are
called routing algorithms.
SOFTWARE SUPPORT (THE MARKUP
LANGUAGES):
Of course, the most popular use of the Internet is the
Web. Web pages number in the millions and this topic
discusses how Web pages are constructed.
Historically, the term markup has described
annotations and handwritten notes found on manuscript
pages that tell a compositor or typist how a particular page
should be laid out or typeset. A universally used set of
copyedit symbols exists for marking up paper manuscripts.
Similarly, electronic pages are marked with tags to govern
the display and formatting of text elements.

Three markup languages are:

SGML (Standard Generalized Markup Language), the
grandfather of the markup languages.
HTML (Hyper Text Markup Language), a derivative of SGML.
XML (Extensible Markup Language), the newest derivative of
SGML.

SGML, HTML, and XML are the three most important

markup languages:
SGML is the parent language from which both HTML
and XML were derived. Each language has a unique purpose.
SGML is a Meta language that is useful for defining an
almost endless supply of markup languages.
HTML is particularly useful for displaying Web pages.
XML-currently the least visible language-defines data
structures important for a wide range of data exchange
activities, including electronic commerce.

FIRE-WALLS AND NETWORK SECURITY

A fire-wall is defined as software or hardware that

allows only those external users with specific
characteristics to access a protected network. Typically
a fire wall allows insiders to have full access to
services on the outside while granting access from the
outside on a selective basis, based on user names and
passwords, internet IP address, or domain name. Fire-
walls are an important consideration for those in the
financial services industry.
PROS & CONS:

Merits:
• Advertising can be done well on the Web.
• The costs of handling sales inquiries, providing price
quotes, and determining product availability can be
reduced.
• It increases purchasing opportunities for the buyer and
seller.
• Increases speed and accuracy with which businesses can
exchange information.
• Provides buyers with a wider range of choices and is
available 24 hours a day, every day.
• Provides buyers with an easy way to customize the level
of detail in the information they obtain about a prospective
purchase.

De-merits:
• Many companies have had trouble recruiting and
retaining employees with the technological, design, and
business process skills needed to create an effective
electronic commerce presence. The difficulty of
integrating existing databases and transaction-processing
software designed for traditional commerce into the
software that enables electronic commerce.
• Many businesses face cultural and legal impediments to
electronic commerce.
• Some consumers are still fearful of sending their credit
card numbers over the Internet.
• Consumers are simply resistant to change and are
uncomfortable viewing merchandise on a computer screen
rather than in person.

CONCLUSION:
Most of the disadvantages of electronic commerce
stem from the newness and the rapidly developing pace of
the underlying technologies. These disadvantages will
disappear as electronic commerce matures and becomes
more available to and accepted by the general population
and takes E-Commerce towards the winning post of a
challenging journey.