COMP3121 E-Commerce Technologies Richard Henson University of Worcester December 2009

Week 10: Making the WebXeL shopping cart www available n Objectives:  Understand in greater depth how dynamic web data interacts with.net web pages  Understand how ftp can be used effectively with or without specialised ftp client software  Document a practical assignment appropriately

Datasets and Databases n You should use a single database definition for the connection in web.config n For the shopping cart that means:  carefully designing your database to be able to store product data, customer data, order lines, and order data as separate, linked tables  matching fields from database tables with the relevant dataset, including field types

Connection between Database and ASP.net Server Scripts n Dreamweaver makes this task easy, if you are developing on a local machine n The Dreamweaver “path to database” mechanism is more troublesome on a truly remote machine  easier to edit a copy of web.config file and send to remote server directly

Set up for the.NET framework on a remote machine n.NET needs to be appropriately configured…  discussions with asp-host last year clarified the set up; shouldn’t be a problem if some simple rules are followed…  make sure you can log on to your area using ftp:// in Internet Explorer  copy “remote” files directly to /httpdocs folder in your user area  edit web.config file to point to the absolute path for your database

Alternative Uploading Methods n n FTP using username/password logon is generally considered to be the best option n n Can easily be set up in Dreamweaver:   remote site, becomes ftp server URL, httpdocs folder needs also to be specified   username & password settings saved directly into Dreamweaver   but difficulties with web.config means this will have to be edited separately as previously explained…

FTP and TCP/IP n Reminder about the TCP/IP stack : HTTPFTP NFSDNS SNMP TCP UDP IP SMTP

How FTP works n Like most Internet services, FTP is a client-server protocol  FTP Server should have a unique IP address and domain name  needs to be specified to send packets on an FTP client to their destination n TCP/IP sends files from one IP address to another…  file turned into IP packets at the client end  IP address used by IP protocol to manage transfer of data packets from client site to server site  TCP at the server end: »listens on port 21 (HTTP packets use port 80…) »arranges incoming packets into the correct order  FTP rearranges data received into the correct format for screen presentation and display

FTP Servers n Any Internet Server can provide an FTP service to allow remote users to gain access to specified directories under its control n Typical FTP session:  FTP client tools attempt to log on to the server, and get access to the directory or directories provided by the service  If logon is successful, FTP client tool receives/sends selected files from/to appropriate directory on the FTP server  communication channel is terminated

Anonymous FTP Service »It is possible for an FTP service to be set up so that no username/password is needed »This is usually quite safe, because the user is automatically logged on with minimum access and privileges »e.g. “ftp-guest” »It is possible to access anonymous ftp sites using an Internet browser, and then use the Desktop to click and drag files between windows representing the local and remote machines

“Free” ftp clients n n Many available through the web n n All the FTP client needs to do is enable username/password entry for the server as well as its IP address/domain name   alternatively, can use Dreamweaver or even Front Page…

Using Dreamweaver as FTP client n n “local site” remains unchanged n n Choose ftp as the data transfer option n n “remote site” and “application server” will both need:   the IP address/domain name of the ftp server   username/password of your web space n n Use “put” option to send website to remote site

Documenting a Client-Server System n n Slightly more challenging than a conventional website/set of programme coding n n Some of the code resides on a server   marker views the site using http   cannot view server scripts… n n Essential that all server code and database is included on the media handed in with the assignment write up!!!

How to document… n n Project usually have four phases:   Analysis   Design   Implementation   Evaluaation n n Your assignment 2 can be considered to be a mini-project…

What to include in the write up n n You already have a spec (no analysis section therefore necessary!!!) n n Need “Design”, “Implementation” and “Evaluation” sections

Design n n Should include some of:   design diagrams   screen dumps   test plan   should refer to code (e.g. scripts) by filename so marker can check on media

Implementation n n Should include some of:   code sections that you may want to explain or bring to attention of the marker n n A description of problems encountered and how overcome n n URL for website n n Completed test plan

Evaluation n n What others (i.e. prospective shoppers) think of the site n n How well the completed site meets the spec n n Personal reflection of your experiences in doing the assignment, and anything else you’d like to have done with it, if you had more time…