Back Office Processes page 140

1.) An example of a back office process is stock control. The purpose of back office processes is to keep the company systematic and efficient. Without these processes, the business would not be efficient and would lose customers.

2.) Stock control is a real-time process, making sure that the company always has enough of an item and not too much. This is controlled by a database to keep record of what is in stock, the stock demand etc. They can have all the other fields necessary in the same place too, e.g. who the supplier is, what the item description is etc.

3.) Active Server Pages (ASPs) access a database to keep the website up to date. These pages show up everytime you wish to access information about a product; (checking it's in stock so you can buy it) the ASP code is sent to the database, which then sends back the data to the webpage to tell you whether a product is in stock or not.

4.) Organisations can maintain a virtual shopping basket for a customer so that you're aware of how many items you have in your basket as you browse the site. You can also see the total cost of the basket, and this helps customers to stay aware of how much they are planning to spend. You can add/subtract items from this virtual shopping basket. To add/remove items, the totals need to be refreshed. Stock is reserved so that while it is in your trolly, the item cannot be bought by someone else. Delivery costs are not always included in the trolley, but you can check it later.

5.) [see flow diagram of virtual shopping basket system]

6.) The difference between HTTP authentication and cookie identification is that HTTP authentication is when the user logs in using a username and password, which checks you are who you say are, wheras cookie identification is cookies on your computer for websites to check how much you visit the website, how long you've spent on it etc. You can block cookies, but some websites need these to work.

7.) The advantage that cookies have over HTTP authentication is that it's an automatic way of checking how long the customer is on for etc, even if they don't log in.

8.) Wikipedia says:
HTTP cookies, sometimes known as web cookies or just cookies, are parcels of text sent by a server to a web browser and then sent back unchanged by the browser each time it accesses that server. HTTP cookies are used for authenticating, tracking, and maintaining specific information about users, such as site preferences or the contents of their electronic shopping carts. The term "cookie" is derived from "magic cookie," a well-known concept in UNIX computing which inspired both the idea and the name of HTTP cookies.