Development of an E-commerce web site - Essay Example

?Reflective Writing on the Development of an E-commerce web site. Introduction In this report, the experience of developing the main features contained within my e-commerce web store pages is reflected and based on the skill areas learned in the workshop sessions. The priority area was to develop a shopping website able to store and display simple orders. The creation process is represented in the plan outlined below: Planning Development process Presentation The available learning resources and support are represented in the report, and the interactions are critically analysed. Planning The key to a successful project was good planning. As mentioned earlier, the purpose of the web site is to store and display simple orders. After a research based on the skills learned in the workshop sessions I have decided that the goal of my web site will be the listing, choosing and ordering different types of headsets and head phones, where the customer after the ordering process will be able to print out the ordering details. The site is focused mainly on accessories for audio systems; therefore I have named it Music Delight. After identifying the site’s theme, short-term and long-term objectives, I was ready to start work on web page structure and design. Development Despite the fact that I did enjoy working with the provided software MS Visual Studio in the workshop session, I have chosen Adobe Dreamweaver as my web development application. I have decided to work with Adobe Dreamweaver mainly because I feel more familiar with the software application, using and creating forms, tables, and buttons together with all other Adobe software, for example Photoshop, Flash or Fireworks. The scripting language that I have chosen for this task was PHP. The reason why I have chosen PHP instead of ASP.NET C# was that I am more familiar using PHP coding using the Dreamweaver development application. I also wanted to use MYSQL for the products database, even though the learning curve for PHP and ASP.NET C# are about the same based on what you want to achieve. Another reason why I have chosen PHP was that the chosen hosting provider offers a great tool called PHPMYADMIN where MYSQL databases can be created, imported and exported. After testing on your local machine, for example with the APACHE XAMPP software, I also chose my testing server application. Regarding the design I have used the CSS technology to create a simple but immersive shopping friendly look for the web site. This can be shown below in figure 1 and 2. [Figure 1] [Figure 2] Solving the matter of design has brought me to the coding and scripting process. At the beginning of the development process my coding was aimed for testing the web page on my local machine. Therefore, the PHP scripting was written in a path for accessing the database from my local root folder, as can be seen below. [Figure 3] This code serves to enter the data from MYSQL database called products, created for the web store site containing six items each with five fields: id, name, description, price and an image field. SQL is a standard interactive and programming language for querying and modifying data and managing databases. It is both ANSI and ISO standard. Coding for this specifying database is show below: [Figure 4] A very important part of the development process is testing and evaluation. After linking the database with the web site by coding in my web development application software, it was necessary to test the connectivity and accessibility before uploading it on to the web server. As mentioned earlier, I have chosen the software called APPACHE XAMPP for testing the site on my local machine. The reasons why I have chosen XAMPP as my testing software are that I find it easier to work with, it’s free, it’s provided with quick and simple installation and it includes the PHPMYADMIN tool. This tool allows you to create, import, export save and backup your already existing MYSQL databases. This will save you lots of time when uploading the site on to the server where most of the hosting providers offer PHPMYADMIN tools for administrating or editing your database online. There was only one problem with the XAMPP software -- an error messages saying that the port 80 was already in use. The error was solved by changing the Skype’s settings. After that I was able to run APPACHE and test the site on my local machine. The site worked fine and the database was loaded correctly. At this stage, I was ready to upload the site online. Minding the fact that I have used my personal student webs server space for the module’s comp 2142 assignment, I have chosen ueuo.com as my web-hosting provider. It’s free and it offers a good quality service that organizes the control panel, has lots of space, and enables PHP and MYSQL. Ueuo.com provided me with the necessary documentation to edit my PHP coding so that after uploading the site on their server the database would be loaded correctly. Below you can see the changed coding. [Figure 5] Presentation The site can be found at http://comp2121.ueuo.com and the overall the presentation of the site has fulfilled the goals set for this assignment. The web page is able to offer, store and print out a simple order. I have also included a feature where the future admin of the web e-commerce store would able to add, edit or remove the products from the site without using any special tools but the site itself. This can be seen below: [Figure 6] The looks of the web site are based on research comparing e-commerce web stores offering and selling sound systems. There was a hierarchical structure chosen for these sites and the layout of the web page is simple but functional and easy to operate. Conclusion Within this site you can see an example of my creative work. My long-term goal is to establish myself as a professional web designer. As my experience in this area is still quite limited, I realise that there is a lot to learn. Therefore I found this type of examination very interesting. Read More