Integration of Database and Internet Technologies for Scalable End-to-End E-Commerce Systems

The content of many Web sites changes frequently. Especially in most e-commerce sites, Web content is created on request, based on the current state of business processes represented in application servers and databases. In fact, currently 25% of all Web content consists of such dynamically generated pages, and this ratio is likely to be higher in e-commerce sites. Web site performance, including system up-time and user response time, is a key differentiation point among companies that are eager to reach, attract, and keep customers. Slowdowns can be devastating for these sites, as shown by recent studies. Therefore, most commercial content-providers pay premium prices for services, such as content delivery networks (CDNs), that promise high scalability, reduced network delays, and lower risk of failure. Unfortunately, for e-commerce sites, whose main source of content is dynamically generated on demand, most existing static content-based services are not applicable. In fact, dynamically generated content poses many new challenges for the design of end-to-end (client-to-server-to-client) e-commerce systems. In this chapter, we discuss these challenges and provide solutions for integrating Internet services, business logic, and database technologies, and for improving end-to-end scalability of e-commerce systems.