Building on a Business Platform in Java

Generator Code 3/9 in Java Building on a Business Platform

If building your whole business from scratch while designing a Web site to boot seems like a big task, you might want to consider using an existing business platform to build on There are malls online just as there are in suburbia, and they provide you with a ready stream of traffic the same reason stores cluster in malls in the real world Many online malls also provide merchant-account services (such as Yahoo! Merchant Solutions

from Yahoo! Stores, as shown in Figure 15-5) And most of the virtual and dedicated server providers (see 5) have some sort of shopping-cart software available as well If you re looking for an all-in-one solution to your e-commerce needs, you should check out some of the sites in Table 15-3

Table 15-3

Web Address wwwamericartcom wwwclockwatcherscom/ shoppinghtml http://wwwcode9softwarecom/ fastecart-shopping-carthtml wwwcoreavecom wwwemscorporatecom wwwstorefrontnet http://wwwveriocom/products/ web-hosting/ http://smallbusinessyahoo com/merchant

Americart Shopping Cart Service Clockwatchers Code9 Software Coreave Electronic Merchant Systems StoreFront Verio Yahoo! Merchant Services

Many of the malls offer complete e-commerce solutions Web sites, merchant services, integrated shopping carts, and so on and have some pretty sophisticated antifraud capabilities In fact, they may be better options for many small companies than going the traditional route

Whatever you re up to with e-commerce, your audience is global Even if that s not your intent, you re going to have potential customers who aren t necessarily familiar with the current value of the US dollar Is there a solution Oh, yeah A really good one The Universal Currency Converter (UCC) from XEcom is a must-have for any commercial site that expects to handle international business Like most free services, it has a banner ad built into it, but you can negotiate with XEcom to remove it for a fee The converter lets anyone convert any amount in any currency to the equivalent amount in any other currency The basic module has only the major world currencies in it Don t sweat it, though; if you need to include others, it doesn t cost you anything This limitation is only for practical reasons After all, nearly every transaction takes place in one of the top currencies, and the more options you add, the slower things get Really, how often do you need to figure out how many Seborga luiginos are equal to 800 Uzbekistan soms

To add the converter to your Web page, follow these steps: 1 Go to wwwxenet/ucc/customizephp 2 Read through the terms of use 3 Fill out the required form with your URL and contact information Notice that the URL must be the address of the Web page on which you will actually put the converter, not just the general URL of your domain 4 Click the Go! button You need to register each page you use the converter on 5 On the resulting page, click the Fast Track Instructions button Now, you re back on the earlier page, right below the form you filled out Yes, it s a roundabout way to get there, but the registration process is legally required if you want to use the converter

From here, you have two options Both of them work fine, so it s just a matter of how you like to do things 6 Use one of the following methods to get the code for the converter: Download the compressed file for either Windows or Mac You then need to unzip it and load the resulting HTML page into an editor before you can use the code Click the Click Here to See the Raw HTML link and just copy the code off your browser screen If you download the file, you see that the enclosed Web page, sampucchtm, has none of the usual elements you re used to HTML, HEAD, and BODY Yet it will still load into any browser and will work just fine That s because, as useful as those elements are for envisioning the structure of your Web page, they re not technically required under the HTML standard I m not recommending that you leave them out of your pages, and I m sure that XEcom did it just because the purpose of that page is only to hold the code for you to copy and paste But it s a decent bit of tech trivia you can use to amaze and amuse your friends 7 Whichever way you get your hands on the code, paste it into your Web page and save the file 8 Upload the page to your Web server and try it out Figure 15-6 shows the converter on a Web page

Figure 15-6: The UCC enables your visitors to convert an amount in one currency to the equivalent amount in another