1. Database-Driven Web Sites
Presented by Xueying Bai
Nov

2. Overview 1. Introduction
2. When and why to build a database-driven Web site?
3. Choosing a database
4. Choosing a scripting language
5. Why information architects should be concerned?
6. Conclusion
7. References

3. Static Web pages vs. dynamic Web pages
Data is stored in .html files
Won't change until someone changes their source codes
Dynamic Web pages
Web pages that respond to users' requests and gather information from them. Oftentimes, they have built-in links to a database, from which they extract data based on input from the users
Created in real time

4. What is data and database?
Data: a general term meaning the facts, numbers, letters, and symbols processed by a computer or communications system to produce information. In a computer system these items are stored in files.
Database: A collection of related files is a database

5. What is a database-driven Web site?
Definition: A database-driven Web site is a Web site that uses a database to gather, display, or manipulate information
Example:
News sites: CNN.com and MSNBC.com
E-commerce companies: Amazon.com, which is a Web interface of a big-sized database system containing customer and transactional information.

6. When do we need a database-driven web site?
We would need a database-driven Web site if our information changes very often, just like in a banking site
Most organizations have a great deal of information in databases and could benefit if this information is made available online
When the content on a site reaches critical mass, it's time to stop managing it as “resources embedded in static HTML" and start to create a database-driven Web site

7. Why do we need database-driven Web sites? (I)
Web pages of database-driven Web sites are created dynamically (in real time) thus giving a Web site visitor an up-to-date view of information stored in the database.
Users can do their own maintenance via a set of Web-based data entry forms
Such as we can change our address, credit card information of our Amazon account by ourselves
The information that the Web site visitor sees on a dynamic Web page can be quickly customized
For example, the sort order of the items can be changed or certain database fields can be shown or hidden

8. Why do we need database-driven Web sites? (II)
The look & feel of the database-driven pages can be easily changed vs. having to redo dozens if not hundreds or thousands of static Web pages in the event that a site's design needs to be modified
Several different views of the database information can be presented in the same time
For example, the items could be presented in alphabetical order by name but then could also be sorted and presented by cost
The site visitor can do a search on the items in the database
It is easy for Web masters to maintain the Web sites

9. 3. Choosing a database Commercial databases: Oracle, SQL Server
Cost: expensive
Hardware requirements: high
Target customers with more specific needs than open source databases (enterprise edition and standard edition)
Have an impressive array of advanced features
Open source databases: MySQL, PostgreSQL
Cost: cheap
Hardware requirements: low
Be lack of some advanced features

10. Oracle
Oracle databases are used by the big-sized businesses which stored data >= 100GB
Strengths
full of features
fast
reliable
Weaknesses
Very expensive
High hardware requirement

11. SQL Server SQL Server caters to small and mid-sized businesses
Strengths
Overtakes Oracle as the No. 1 DBMS on Windows
Cheaper than Oracle
Weaknesses
SQL Server can't scale.
SQL Server is not very secure.
Prices comparison between Oracle and SQL Server
Number of CPUs
Oracle 10g Enterprise Edition
SQL Server 2000 Enterprise Edition 1
$40,000 US
$19,999 US 2
$80,000 US
$39,998 US 4
$160,000 US
$79,996 US 8
$320,000 US
$159,992 US 16
$640,000 US
$319,984 US 32
$1,280,000 US
$639,968 US

12. MySQL vs. PostgreSQL
MySQL is the most popular open source database vs. PostgreSQL is the most advanced open source database
MySQL is faster than PostgreSQL
MySQL is used more often than PostgreSQL
MySQl has stronger community and resource support than PostgreSQL
MySQL lacks some advanced features that PostgreSQL has.

13. Choosing a Scripting language
Open-source scripting languages
PHP
JSP
Perl
Proprietary scripting languages
ASP.NET
Cold Fusion

14. PHP Strengths Weaknesses Cost: PHP is free.
Portability: can be compiled for any operating system
Ease of Maintenance
Maturity: mature enough to be used in any production environment
Weaknesses
Be lack of exceptions, event-based error-handling instances
Its function names are case insensitive

15. JSP (Java Server Pages)
Strengths
Platform independent: write once, run anywhere
Developers can extend the JSP language
Easily write and maintain pages
Weakness
One significant disadvantage of JSP documents is that no XML-compliant version of JSP comments exists. A JSP document developer can use client-side (HTML-/XML-style) comments or embed Java comments.

16. Perl Strengths Weakness
There is a big developer community and a great deal of support for Perl
Perl is good for quick, single Web sites
Weakness
Some of the syntax is quite frightening

17. ASP.NET ASP.NET is the product of Microsoft Strengths Weakness
Developers can choose many programming languages (ASP.NET works with scripted languages such as VBScript, JScript, Perlscript, and Python, as well as compiled languages such as VB, C#, C, Cobol, Smalltalk, and Lisp)
Developers can use many development environments (such as WebMatrix, a community-supported tool, Visual Studio .NET, or various Borland tools such as Delphi and C++ Builder) to create
ASP.NET pages
Weakness
It needs more memory usage and more execution time.

18. Cold Fusion Cold Fusion is the product of Macromedia Strengths
A very nice development environment called Macromedia ColdFusion MX 6.1
Fewer lines of code than ASP, PHP, and JSP
Easy to learn and write
Weakness
Harder to maintain

19. Why information architects should be concerned? (1)
How to show retrieval results from databases: sorting and ranking
Sorting: helpful to users who want to make a decision or take an action
Example: Amazon.com
Ranking: there is a need to understand information or learn something
Example: UTNetCAT

20. Why information architects should be concerned? (2)
Show retrieval results in sets of pages
Example: Google

21. Why information architects should be concerned? (3)
"Hidden Web“ problem
Valuable data is buried alive in isolated databases
Information architects need to work together with developers and system integrators to provide users with intellectual access to information and data, independent of format

22. Why information architects should be concerned? (4)
"deep Web" search engine
The information inside Web databases is called the "deep Web".
Information architects of database-driven Web sites should provide Web sites' users the "deep Web" search engine to easily and quickly access data in database (such as search engine of Amazon.com, users can use it to search information about books, DVDs etc. that is stored in the database).

23. Why information architects should be concerned? (5)
Proper database and scripting language choice
Increase of data size: according to the Web site's longtime requirements
Now: 5000 users
2 years later: users
Speed: if there are thousands of users per second visit your Web site, you can’t use ASP.NET because it needs more memory usage and more execution time

24. Conclusion
The exponential increase of the number of database-driven Web sites on the Internet
Information architects should know:
When and why they need to build database-driven Web sites and
How to build good database-driven Web sites.

25. References (1)
Boulton, C. (2003). Are Open Source Databases Following in Linux' Footsteps? Retrieved Oct. 22, from
Building database driven Websites using Dreamweaver (n.d.). Retrieved Oct. 22, from
Cold Fusion Overview (n.d.). Retrieved Oct. 22, from
Database-driven Web Sites (n.d.). Retrieved Oct. 20, from
Database driven websites (n.d.). Retrieved Oct. 20, 2004, from
Definition of PostgreSQL(n.d.). Retrieved Nov , from
DevGuy(2002). Avoid PHP code leaks - Source Guardian. Retrieved Oct. 21, from
Gary, R. (2000). Designing a Database-Driven Web Site, or, The Evoluation of the INFOIGUANA. Retrieved Oct. 20, 2004, from EBSCOhost database.

26. References (2)
Gesker, D. (2001) Alternatives for Dynamic Web Development Projects. Retrieved Oct. 20, 2004, from ACM database.
Ghanem, T. & Aref, W. (2004). Databases Deepen the Web. Retrieved Oct. 20, 2004, from IEEE Xplore database.
Hull, S (n.d.). PHP and ASP.NET Go Head-to-Head. Retrieved Oct. 22, from
Ian Gilfillan (2003). PostgreSQL vs MySQL: Which is better? Retrieved Nov. 13, from
JavaServer Pages Overview (n.d.). Retrieved Oct. 22, from
Lowe S. (2002). Selecting a database: Open source or commercial? Retrieved Nov. 13, from
Macromedia ColdFusion MX 6.1(n.d.). Retrieved Nov. 13, from
Rosenfeld, L. & Morville, P. (2002). Information Architecture for the World Wide Web (2nd ed.). Sebastopol, CA: O'Reilly and Associates, Inc.

27. Questions?
Thank you!