G
Griff
Hi
I'm after some advice about the architecture to employ for a web front-end.
First, I'll describe the system. We host several customers' back-office
systems (which are identical) and which are accessed by our customers'
employees by remote connection. Our customers now wish us to host an
eCommerce front-end to their back-office systems on which *their* customers
will place orders.
By and large, the business rules for all our customers will be identical.
So, my thought was to build a single n-tier system to handle this.
The bottom tier is obviously our customers back-office systems.
The next vertical tier would be a data-services tier that knows which
back-office system to query.
The next would be the business tier.
And then we get to the UI.
It's the UI tier that I'm most confused about.
Each of our customers will require a unique look and feel - some may want a
frames solution, another may want a tabular display, some may want the
navigation buttons along the top whilst another will want them down the
side. Yes, I'm sure that I could program this in to a system, but I'm not
sure the best approach to take. Any/all suggestions most welcome.
Also, I don't know yet whether to employ a single web site with virtual
directories for each of our customers or to employ a separate web site for
each customer. (A single web site seems sensible just in terms of
incorporating SSL security). Either way, my guess is that I'd like all
customers sites to use as much common code as possible. Could anyone talk
me through ideal architectures for this?
Alternatively, if anyone has any great book suggestions that will help me in
this venture, I'd be really glad to hear of them.
Many thanks in advance
Griff
I'm after some advice about the architecture to employ for a web front-end.
First, I'll describe the system. We host several customers' back-office
systems (which are identical) and which are accessed by our customers'
employees by remote connection. Our customers now wish us to host an
eCommerce front-end to their back-office systems on which *their* customers
will place orders.
By and large, the business rules for all our customers will be identical.
So, my thought was to build a single n-tier system to handle this.
The bottom tier is obviously our customers back-office systems.
The next vertical tier would be a data-services tier that knows which
back-office system to query.
The next would be the business tier.
And then we get to the UI.
It's the UI tier that I'm most confused about.
Each of our customers will require a unique look and feel - some may want a
frames solution, another may want a tabular display, some may want the
navigation buttons along the top whilst another will want them down the
side. Yes, I'm sure that I could program this in to a system, but I'm not
sure the best approach to take. Any/all suggestions most welcome.
Also, I don't know yet whether to employ a single web site with virtual
directories for each of our customers or to employ a separate web site for
each customer. (A single web site seems sensible just in terms of
incorporating SSL security). Either way, my guess is that I'd like all
customers sites to use as much common code as possible. Could anyone talk
me through ideal architectures for this?
Alternatively, if anyone has any great book suggestions that will help me in
this venture, I'd be really glad to hear of them.
Many thanks in advance
Griff