The column has gone on indefinite hiatus. A couple of years ago, the Internet was a place where we all had fun publishing HTML pages, figuring out ActiveX controls, talking in newsgroups, and surfing around to find what everybody else was up to. Then management became convinced that we have to make some money with these sites. Now we've got to think about revenue models, advertising, and all the rest. Let's talk about which e-commerce technologies are being built, what you need to put them in place, some of the more interesting recent developments, and where you go to find out more.
Online retailing is the obvious first answer.
It's using technology to take online the traditional retail model of businesses selling wares to the public. Solid customer experiences, online catalogs that are usable, quick reaction, solid security, good inventory management and reporting processes, and solidly performing systems are all key to success in this type of business. A couple other key types of e-commerce are major users of the newer technologies. For instance, corporate-purchasing systems assemble catalog information from multiple suppliers and offer it for purchase by corporate employees. Let's touch on how the Microsoft Windows NT operating system and Microsoft's e-commerce technologies help meet the needs of the systems defined above.