Web development 101

When asked to write a blog on topics I have learned in Web Development I was not sure even where to start!  So many great topics in one class!  There were a variety of students in the class some that came in knowing all you could know about web development and others that only knew what the general term of "eCommerce was.  I was in the middle which meant I had so much to learn!

In high school I took a web class but it only taught us HTML.  I came into this class barely knowing anything beyond the HTML world.  Coming to find out there were so many other ways to create a website.  Our class at first learned HTML which then translated into web expressions which was very much like visual basic.  It was crazy to me that you could insert a button, comment box, etc and it inserted the code for you!  I thought coding was great from there! 

And then the class learned about Content Management systems.  The ones we concentrated most on were Drupal, Joomla and Wordpress.  Each group had to do a group project creating a website using one of the content management systems.  After much research my group selected Joomla to use.  Thinking it would be in between Drupal (being the hardest) and wordpress (which seemed very easy and we thought it would not have many capabilities because it started off for blogs).  We were about 2 weeks into the project and quickly realized that Joomla was much more difficult than we were lead to believe.  We changed to Wordpress, which was a breeze compared to Joomla!  We built a website for a custom home builder.  We added great plugins such as a photo gallery, google maps, and email that connected to outlook.

What is Ecommerce?  I am sure almost all of you have purchased an item off the internet before.  For example on ebay when you use paypal.  This is ecommerce!  Using the "shopping cart" to load your items and then purchasing them on the internet.  This has become so hardy on the web- allowing many store to be strictly web based.  (Talk about a way to save money!).  One of the groups for our group project even created a shopping cart as part of their website!

Our class also learned about Systems Analysis and Design.  I had previously taken a class on learning everything you could know about the SDLC but it was very interesting to see how eCommerce tied into this topic. 

In conclusion, there was so much we learned in this class- way too much to write in a blog.  I so encourage you to come take the class with Drake at ECU!! He even offers an online class.  My favorite part of the class was definitely the group project were we got to learn how to create our own website.  Maybe one day I can even start my own business creating websites!  This was one of my favorite classes within the MIS major because it applies so much to the real world.  There was nothing in the class where you were wondering "am I ever going to use this ever again?".

Paypay vs. Google Checkpoint vs. Microsoft Wallet

Have you ever bought an item off ebay? (one of my favorite sites for online shopping!) If you have them you most likely have used paypal.  Much like others I have only heard of Paypal-and Google checkpoint (what the android software uses) but have never heard of Microsoft wallet.  All are digital payment services but they cater to different kinds of people.

Both google checkpoint and paypal provide you a secure site to pay for your purchases with and also have a refund policy if fraud were to happen. 

Google checkpoint just holds your credit or debit card information while you shop making sure they protect your personal information.  If you would like to sell an item on a website google checkpoint allows you to cut and paste code that will allow whoever wants to purchase your item use google checkpoint.

Paypal on the other hand lets for more advanced features!  Paypal allows you to transfer money from bank accounts.  You can also use paypal to wire money to people. 

Microsoft wallet allows users to use a digital wallet on internet explorer.  Users fill out all of their information which is then stored on Microsofts servers which allows users to log back on to the system and retrieve their data without having to fill anything out again.  Very Convenient! 

As I was reseraching about Paypal, Google checkpoint and Microsfot wallet I found that Microsoft wallet has been through many name changes and it was very diffcult to find information about the system.  I may be biased becasue of all of my Ebay shopping and using Paypal but I would recommed using Paypal if you were given the choice.  It has been very reliable and safe!


Here is a chart that compares PayPayl and Google Checkout

	PayPal	Google Checkout
Merchants	eBay, thousands of retailers	Hundreds of retailers, including Buy.com
How to make payments	Your credit card, debit card, or bank account	Your credit or debit card
Rate merchants	Yes, on eBay	Yes
International shopping	55 countries, 6 currencies (EU, CA, pound, US, yen, Australian)	No; U.S. only
Hide your e-mail address from merchants	No	Yes
Peer-to-peer payments	Yes	No
Security	SSL, same used by banks	SSL, same used by banks
Fraud protection	100 percent refund for fraudulent transactions of $50 or more	100 percent refund (must report within 60 days) for fraudulent transactions
Fee for accepting payments on your own Web site	1.9 to 2.9 percent of sales plus 30 cents per transaction	2 percent of sales plus 20 cents per transaction (less for AdWords customers)
Items you can't sell	Illegal items, weapons, adult goods, copyrighted media	Illegal items, weapons, adult goods, copyrighted media
Calculates shipping and tax	Yes	No
Users	More than 100 million	n/a

Drupal vs. Wordpress vs. Joomla

For the group project section of my web development class we were asked to pick a CMS to use.  Our three choices: Drupal, Wordpress, and Joomla.  So the hunt began to find the best information on which one to choose!  Here is what I found.

Drupal
Is great for advanced developers or people that love to hand-code their own websites!  This CMS system is very advanced and many say it very much resembles a developer platform more so than a CMS system. 

Wordpress
Many people instantly think that wordpress is only for blogging.  But recently it has become one of the easier CMS for users to make websites, etc. Good web practices states "Since WP is already developed to work as a blog, though, it can be setup to do so without any hesitation. Comments are already built into the system, as well as pinging services, multiple blogger profiles, trackbacks and more. Most of the time nothing needs to be done to those systems either, because they already work the way that the user would want them to."   However there are some cons.  Wordpress is hard to setup a shopping cart on your site because Wordpress was set up to be very simple and easy to use.  Adding advanced features using wordpress can be very difficult.  

Joomla
"If Wordpress is more for end-users and Drupal is more for developers, then Joomla! must be more for designers, right? If that's the conclusion that you came to then you're on the right track, but I would venture to say that Joomla!" states Good web practices.  Newcomers to the website have found that it is getting easier and easier to use because developers have added more tools to the website, making it easy to customize a great website!  There are downfalls though, it is not as easy to manipulate the code as drupal.  There are still parts of the system that you cannot customize as well as drupal. 


(image from shoutex)

Here is a video I found that should: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Onf_SUv61i4

Resources:
http://www.goodwebpractices.com/other/wordpress-vs-joomla-vs-drupal.html
http://shoutex.com/blog/wordpress-vs-joomla-vs-drupal-choosing-a-cms/

Employers demanding facebook password

Recent stories have been spreading across the web that employers are asking job applicants for their Facebook password during interviews so employers can check their backgrounds.  This has startled many (for good reasons may I add!) 

Facebook does not have any immediate plans to take action but they have stood up to make their voice heard about the matter.  www.newsandobserver.com states ""As a user, you shouldn't be forced to share your private information and communications just to get a job," wrote Erin Egan. "And as the friend of a user, you shouldn't have to worry that your private information or communications will be revealed to someone you don't know and didn't intend to share with just because that user is looking for a job."". 

Facebook allows employers information such as sex, gender, religion, etc which is all covered under the federal employment law.  www.foxnews.com states  "A Facebook executive cautioned that if an employer discovers that a job applicant is a member of a protected group, the employer may be vulnerable to claims of discrimination if it doesn't hire that person."

Resources:
http://www.newsobserver.com/2012/03/23/1953436/facebook-warns-employers-not-to.html
http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2012/03/25/senators-call-for-federal-probe-over-employers-asking-for-facebook-passwords/

Read more here: http://www.newsobserver.com/2012/03/23/1953436/facebook-warns-employers-not-to.html#storylink=cpy

Apache Vs. Microsoft IIS Server

Through this blog I hope to share with you a feature-by-feature walk through of the differences between Apache and Microsoft IIS Servers.  Apache and Microsfot IIS operate very different so you will notice many differences between the two!

Apache Server was originally started in http code.  Up until 2002 Apache was largely used by UNIX and sometimes windows.  Serverwatch.com states "Apache 2.0 is now supported under a wide array of potential operating systems, including all versions of Windows, Linux, Unix, and Mac OS X, in addition to an array of nonmainstream OSs, like BeOS and VMS."  The core of the Apache Portable Runtime (APR) is " which enables the Apache core to run on more or less any system with a C compiler. A number of multi-processing modules (MPMs) then provide the support for actually accepting and processing requests. Under Unix, this can be the traditional "forked" model or a newer threaded model making use of the threading built into most modern kernels."

Microsoft IIS Server- This is only able to run on windows.  When it started it was optional with the Windows NT 4.0.  They upgraded to 5.1 with windows 2000 but the changes were minor.  In 2003 Windows NT 6.0 was created and was a complete re-do.  Serverwatch.com states " It sports a new execution model, better management facilities, and significantly increased performance".  
Advantages include:  easy to work with the host operating system and easy to navigate through different tools

Feature	IIS	Apache
Independent Request Handler	Yes	Yes (limited)
Multiple Process Request Handlers	Yes	Yes
Thread Support	Yes	Yes (on a suitable OS)

Hope this information helps!!
http://www.serverwatch.com/tutorials/article.php/3074841/IIS-vs-Apache-Looking-Beyond-the-Rhetoric.htm
Resources used:

Making Money on Pinterest

Pinterest is the new social media website.  It is a website where you have your own "pinboard" where you can save your favorite pictures.  You log onto the site and it has tons of pictures organized by type: food, drinks, weddings, etc (talk about addicting! Myself and almost all other woman in the world can sit on Pinterest for hours at a time!)  It is the best social media website right now...if I do say so myself!

After reading an article on Mashable.com I foudn that pinterest is a great way for companies to get their name out there and get items sold!  "Did this Pinterest Spammer make $30,000 a month?" was one of the most interesting articles I have read about pinterest.

A gentleman named "steve" pins Amazon products and makes close to $1,000 per month!! (Sounds like a great job if anyone is looking for a job!)  Steve has thousands of spambots that go and pin all over the website.  Steve states that this is "by far the easiest website to spam right now".  Which does scare me and I am sure many others that Pinterest is so vonerable on the web right now.  Pinterest has acknowledge this and said " As a growing service, Pinterest is not immune to challenges faced by sites across the web, including spam. However, it is a tremendous priority for us to quickly address them. Our engineers are actively working to manage issues as they arise and are revisiting the nature of public feeds on the site to make it harder for fake or harmful content to get into them."

Hopefully Pinterest clears up any issues found, but until then hats off to Steve for making tons of money using the website!

Resohttp://mashable.com/2012/03/28/pinterest-amazon-spam/urces:

Amazon battle: State over sales tax

Amazon.com is an online retailer striving to achieve low prices, quick delivery, and a secure environment for customers to shop in.  This company has not charged sales tax since it opened in 1994 and wants to take a stand to keep it that way! (Althought Amazon.com does have to add sales tax to states where they have actual retail operations).

Amazon feels that not charging a sales tax is a way to be one step above their competing retailers.  In nine states legislatures have passed a new legislation banning online retailers from charging sales tax.  As stated on www.wsj.com "  Credit Suisse recently estimated that if Amazon were forced to collect sales taxes in all states, it would lose as much as $653 million in sales this year, or 1.4% out of an estimated $45.5 billion in revenue". 

To play devils advocate- www.wsj.com stated "State and local governments nationwide this year will lose $10.1 billion to $11.3 billion in sales taxes not collected by Web retailers, estimated University of Tennessee researchers in a 2009 report."  These laws will eventually have to be sorted out because the "state-by-state" laws are very complicated and seem to frustrate customers and business owners.

Are you Linked?

One of the newer social media sites is LinkedIn.  This is business professional site which allows the user to "link" with other professionals or businesses that they have interest or connection with.  It is a form of social media that allows the user to connect with friends and family, find ideas and experts on certain topics, and explore career opportunities.

Here is a site that gives an overview of Linked in and the basic's of the site: http://learn.linkedin.com/profiles/overview/ 

A few of the basic elements of a LinkedIn profile:

1. Upload a photo
2. Headline- according to LinkedIn it is “Your headline gives you a way to sum up your professional ‘identity’ in a short phrase.”
3. Job  History
4. Education
5. Websites
6. Public Web Address- which under the Edit Profile option you can change the address to something shorter that you can stick on a business card or in your signature on an email.
7. Summary- LinkedIn states "“give a brief description of what you have done, what you are doing and the kinds of things in which you are interested.”

LinkedIn is a great resource to use for networking!  I recently created a LinkedIn account and am excited to starting "linking" to professionals! 

Thank you to the below resources:
http://learn.linkedin.com/what-is-linkedin/
http://learn.linkedin.com/what-is-linkedin/

Industry Consortium vs. Private Company Marketplace?

Have you ever wondered the difference between Private Company Marketplaces and Industry Consortia-sponsored Marketplaces?  I will explain the differences and similarities of both.

Private Company Marketplace

Electronic Commerce states " private company marketplace is a marketplace that provides auction, request for quote postings, and other features (many of which are similar to those of e-procurement software) to companies that want to operate their own marketplaces."  United Technologies was one of the first companies to start a private company marketplace in 1996. 

• One buyer, many sellers
• Harley Davidson, supply net
• Sellers bid on major buyer's business

 

Industry Consortia-Sponsored Marketplaces

Electronic Commerce states "is a marketplace formed by several large buyers in a particular industry".   One was the first created was in 2000 by Covisint.  Included was DaimlerChrysler, Ford, and General Motors.   Another example was the hotel industry including Marriott, Hyatt, and three other major hotel chains created the Avendra marketplace.

•  Few buyers, many sellers
• Covisint, Exostar
• Buyer control
• Fixed pricing

Thank you to the below resource:
Schneider, Gary. Electronic Commerce.