Transcript presentation source

Enabling Technologies for EC
Requirements, Standards, Problems
A Min Tjoa
Vienna University of Technology
[email protected]
http://www.ifs.tuwien.ac.at/ifs
Gerti Kappel
Johannes Kepler University of Linz
[email protected]
http://www.ifs.uni-linz.ac.at
XV. IFIP World Computer Congress
Vienna/Budapest, 31.8-4.9. 1998
Enabling Technologies for EC
Outline
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Introduction
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Enabling Technologies for EC
 Workflow
Management Systems
 Database Systems and Open Hypermedia Systems
 Data Mining and OLAP
 EDI
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Conclusion
© 1998 by IFS
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Enabling Technologies for EC
Introduction (1/3)
Electronic Commerce
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EC comprises all selling and buying activities on the Internet
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Businesses in virtually every sector of economy are
beginning to use the Internet to
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commercial transactions between businesses
retail sale of tangible goods
digital delivery of goods and services, etc.
manage supplier relationships
streamline logistics and inventory
reach new and existing customers, etc.
According to a study of the International Data Corporation
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© 1998 by IFS
$ 8 billion worth of business was transacted in 1997
that figure will grow to $ 333 billion by 2002
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Enabling Technologies for EC
Introduction (2/3)
Requirements on EC Enabling Technologies
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A major challenge is to identify appropriate enabling
technologies for EC and to integrate them into a common
application framework
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in this respect, the existence of standards constitutes an important
selection criteria
Numerous requirements origin from the unique nature of EC
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distributed, autonomous and heterogenous information sources
vast amounts of hypermedia data
a wide range of user‘s specialties and abilities
various services which should be supported
e.g., suppliers search and negotiation, establishment of initial contracts, sales,
pre- and post-sales support and secure electronic payment
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Enabling Technologies for EC
Introduction (3/3)
Exemplary EC Enabling Technologies Concerning ...
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Business process aspect of EC
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Pre-sales phase of EC
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Workflow Management Systems (WFMS) could serve as the
backbone of EC business processes
Database Systems (DBS) and Open Hypermedia Systems (OHS)
could be employed for realizing electronic catalogues
Post-sales phase of EC
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Data Mining and OLAP (Online Analytical Processing) Technology
could be used to establish web usage tracking
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Enabling Technologies for EC
Outline

Introduction

Enabling Technologies for EC
 Workflow
Management Systems
 Database Systems and Open Hypermedia Systems
 Data Mining and OLAP
 EDI

Conclusion
© 1998 by IFS
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Enabling Technologies for EC
WFMS for EC Processes (1/3)
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WFMS support the design, execution and monitoring of
long-lasting business processes that typically involve
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multiple activities,
multiple collaborating persons,
in a distributed environment
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With respect to EC, WFMS can be seen as the glue between
previously independently modelled business processes of
different organizations, thereby realizing inter-organizational
workflows
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All phases of an EC business process ranging from pre-sales
via sales to post-sales activities could be supported by WFMS
© 1998 by IFS
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Enabling Technologies for EC
WFMS for EC Processes (2/3)
Adaptability Requirement
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EC processes, especially their pre-sales and post-sales phases,
are to a certain extent unstructured and unpredictable
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therefore, deviations from a predefined workflow type capturing a
sequence of tasks should be allowed at runtime
meanwhile, consistency and correctness of the whole business process
has to be preserved
EC processes have to adapt to rapid changes in the business
environment
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therefore, there is a need to dynamically reengineer and optimize the
workflow type itself while possibly several workflow instances of that type
are active
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Enabling Technologies for EC
WFMS for EC Processes (3/3)
Interoperability Requirement
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EC workflows involve multiple, possibly heterogeneous
and autonomous parties
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Different levels of interoperability should be supported
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thus, interoperability between WFMS is of major concern
tight coupling with strict synchronization needs
loose coupling for the electronic exchange of business documents on
the basis of protocols such as EDI or OTP
Two standardization groups deal with these problems
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© 1998 by IFS
the Workflow Management Coalition (WfMC)
the Object Management Group (OMG) aims at integrating a workflow
management facility into CORBA
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Enabling Technologies for EC
DBS and OHS for Electronic Catalogues (1/2)
Electronic Product Data Management
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Clients of EC systems should quickly and easily obtain all the
product data needed to make informed purchase decisions
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Many existing electronic product data is stored together with
HTML commands in files
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this leads to problems concerning maintenance, consistency, concurrency
and authorization
DBS could be employed to support the consistent multi-user
management of distributed hypermedia information
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product data can be highly structured by means of the DB schema
retrieval can be done by precise Boolean queries possibly based on the
SQL standard
many DBS support multimedia datatypes
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Enabling Technologies for EC
DBS and OHS for Electronic Catalogues (2/2)
Interoperability of OHS
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Content providers and consumers should be enabled to easily
locate and acquire whatever product data they desire from
other catalogues
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By means of the link server functionality of OHS, every link can
perform arbitrary behavior on remote catalogues such as
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querying
controlling access
presenting the remote product data in context of the original local catalogue
On the basis of standard protocols, similar or complementary
products can be easier located in other catalogues
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cf., e.g., the XML and RDF initiatives of the W3C consortium
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Enabling Technologies for EC
Data Mining and OLAP for
Web Usage Tracking
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The analysis of how users are accessing a Web site is critical for
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User access patterns can be discovered out of Web transactions
by means of data mining techniques such as
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determining effective marketing strategies
generating user profiles for personalizing a site
optimizing the logical structure of a site
path analysis
association rules
classification rules
The analysis of access patterns may be served by OLAP
techniques
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Enabling Technologies for EC
Interfaces in EC - EDI
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Human - Human
e.g. e-mail
Human - Machine
e.g. electronic forms (WWW)
Machine - Human
e.g. computer-generated e-mail
Machine - Machine
only EDI
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Enabling Technologies for EC
Definition of EDI
Enterprise 1
Application 1
electronic exchange
of structured data
between
Enterrpise 2
Applicaation 2
Independent from
Hardware
Software
Communication Networks
© 1998 by IFS
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Enabling Technologies for EC
Definition of EDI
… is the exchange of electronic business
data between applications via a network
based on a format which is understood by
both (all) business partners
© 1998 by IFS
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Enabling Technologies for EC
EDI Standard
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Syntactic rules defining the allowed symbols and
the sequence in which they may be used
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Vocabulary of allowed words, Definition
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Message design that structures the information in
a defined sequence
© 1998 by IFS
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Enabling Technologies for EC
EDI Standards
sector dependent
sector independent
ODETTE
SWIFT
ANSI X.12
EDIFACT
national
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international
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Enabling Technologies for EC
EDI Components
Modem
Modem
Communikationsconnection
ConverterSoftware
ConverterSoftware
Computer
Mapping
&
Application
Computer
Supplier
© 1998 by IFS
Mapping
&
Application
Customer
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Enabling Technologies for EC
EDI Process
SENDER
‘In-house’
Application
Database
Interface
File
Exported
Files
Programs
Tables
Profile
Converter
Transmission
File
EDI Format
Communications
Interface
Communications
Protocol
RECEIVER
Communications
Interface
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Transmission
File
Programs
Tables
Profile
Interface
File
‘In-house’
Application
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Enabling Technologies for EC
Advantages of EDI
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More efficient use of personnel
Faster transactions - shorter transaction time
Recent, quickly accesible information across the
whole enterprise
Better planning
Just-in-Time (JIT) Production
Smaller amount of merchandise in the
warehouses
Smaller amount of interest
© 1998 by IFS
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Enabling Technologies for EC
Summary
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EC can largely benefit from already existing
enabling technologies
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A major challenge in successfully designing EC
applications is to identify and combine these
technologies
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Thereby, standardization efforts play a major role
© 1998 by IFS
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Enabling Technologies for EC
„The nice thing about standards ...“
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... there are so many of them to choose from
... by the time things become standards, they‘re
obsolete
... real standards are set by the market, not
committees
Standards - the only way that everyone can play
tragedy of the common
„where do you want to go today?“
[Larry Masinter, Tutorial at the 7th WWW Conference, April 1998]
© 1998 by IFS
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Enabling Technologies for EC
Standards follow Innovation
Innovation,
Standardization,
Divergence
Convergence
[Larry Masinter, Tutorial at the 7th WWW Conference, April 1998]
© 1998 by IFS
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Enabling Technologies for EC
Standards vs. Design
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Design
 choose between alternatives (A, B, or C)
 optimize function, performance, reliability
Standard
 choose one, some, all, „undefined“,
„implementation dependent“, „discoverable“
 optimize flexibility, interoperability, politics,
extensibility, enforced operation
[Larry Masinter, Tutorial at the 7th WWW Conference, April 1998]
© 1998 by IFS
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Enabling Technologies for EC
Who writes (Web/EC) standards?
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Standard organizations
Consortia
Companies
Individuals
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IETF
W3C
ISO
IEEE
ANSI
[Larry Masinter, Tutorial at the 7th WWW Conference, April 1998]
© 1998 by IFS
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