Exercise 2: Technology and the evolution of business options

1. Web quest: Find a range of five sites each offering different business options: online shopping, electronic payments, database access, WAP sites for mobile phones. Key words for your search engine: M-commerce, T-commerce and E-wallet.
You may be interested in building Web applications, or in network design. This subject has you researching and working with using some technologies for designing and/or building client server applications. At the same time, you are asked to consider examining the big picture – how each application contributes to the large scale needs of an organisation – planning, policy, competitive edge, knowledge management and the need for secure electronic transactions. You may want to do some research into Object-oriented UML design work and project management that is needed for e-business applications, or into the use of extreme programming (XP) methods. One useful approach is to use rapid evolutionary prototyping.

Rapid evolutionary prototyping approaching

A case history

In 1996, a partner and I built an inaugural e-commerce site and intranet for a national insurance broking business, with over ninety branch offices across the nation. A lot of new Web technologies have developed since that time. We used a professional graphics designer for all logos, buttons and image maps and used PERL and CGI for all server-side interactivity. This was the beginning of a developing e-systems infrastructure for the company.
For the work breakdown structure, I used the “builder metaphor” for developing Web applications. This is similar to a project homebuilder sub-contracting work to others, e.g. carpenter, electrician, concreter, cabinetmaker, carpet layer and painter. This approach was easier for me to handle as project manager and easier for the business client to understand the apparent costs associated with the Web site development. It was used in tandem with a Rapid Evolutionary Prototyping Approach.
The Rapid Evolutionary approach is recommended for small projects as a fluid approach consisting of two main phases:
1. evolutionary application prototyping; and
2. implementation.
After capturing the business requirements and the system specifications (the most important step to me), the object modelling focuses on what the systems should do, rather than the how to. One of the attractions of this approach is that users see a visible, tangible system as construction takes place. One of the pitfalls occurs if the system becomes unstable or hard to maintain, once it is moved to the production site. Make sure that you include proper project management and quality techniques in your e-business application development.
In my final report I recommended that any maintenance or site makeover be done with an outsourcing company. Our intranet was in constant use, with some “fine tuning” until 2001. A new site was released in early 2002. The reason the first design lasted for five-six years was that the site did what was required.