Given our outsourcing business model, choosing a platform with staying power and strong support in the developer community was critical. The Microsoft Web solution platform, besides meeting these needs, also happened to be the most cost-effective platform. Another factor in choosing the Microsoft Web solution platform was the availability of third-party software over time. The Microsoft platform is one of only a few that you know all the major vendors will support. Approximately a dozen creative and production staff worked on the creative design, information architecture, and production of the presentation layer, while the business logic and database tiers were handled primarily by three developers.
End users access the interface through most popular Web browsers.
The ASPs display formatted data, provide navigation functionality, and ensure that the cookies are set on each page brought up by the user. These COM components can be called from the site's ASP pages. COM objects handle a wide range of functions, including login and registration, and transactions involved in creating a home inventory and keeping track of existing insurance policies in the site's Personal Organizer tool. Web pages for other insurance lines come from other online quoting partners, plus there are direct links to insurance carriers. The Web servers are dual CPU Compaq computers.