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The Evolution of E-Commerce: Then & Now

The origins of e-commerce trace back to the early 1970s, marking a significant transition in how businesses and consumers buy and sell. Electronic commerce, or e-commerce, began with the development of electronic data interchange (EDI) and teleshopping in the late 1970s.

  • A British inventor, Michael Aldrich, played a pivotal role in this early phase. In 1979, Aldrich connected a domestic television to a computer via a telephone line, creating "teleshopping," which allowed transactions from home. This innovation laid the groundwork for online shopping.
  • Electronic Data Interchange (EDI): EDI emerged as a method of electronically sending commercial documents like purchase orders or invoices.traditional mailing and faxing of documents. EDI replaced standardized data transfer between different companies and organizations, enhancing the efficiency of business processes.
  • World Wide Web: Tim Berners-Lee, the Web's inventor, transformed EDI and teleshopping into what we now recognize as e-commerce. The Internet provided a universal and easy-to-use platform for businesses to display their products and services online.

First Online Purchase

The first widely recognized online sale happened on August 11, 1994, when a man sold a CD by the band Sting to his friend through his website, NetMarket, an American retail platform.

  • NetMarkets transactions demonstrated the potential of online selling.  Amazon and eBay. Founded in 1995, it utilized the Internet to sell goods directly to consumers, bypassing traditional retail channels.  This direct-to-consumer model significantly impacted the retail industry, setting the stage for the e-commerce boom.
  • Tools used during the early stages of e-commerce were primitive by today's standards. Web browsers, such as Mosaic, facilitated access to the Internet in the early 1990s. Basic HTML allowed businesses to create simple websites.  The Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) encryption technology ensures safe transactions.

The pioneering efforts of companies like Amazon and eBay leveraged these technologies to transform the retail landscape, setting the foundation for the vast and continuously evolving e-commerce industry we know today.

NetMarket: In Depth

evolution of e-commerce programming

 Modern Online Ordering

Daniel Kohn and a group of recent college graduates, including Roger Lee, Guy Haskin, and Oren Etzioni, contributed to the creation of NetMarket Co., based in Nashua, New Hampshire.  They were instrumental in setting up the platform that allowed for the first online CD transaction.

  • The SSL mechanism leveraged encryption technology to ensure safe payment over the Internet. 
  • Pretty Good Privacy (PGP) provided encryption and was incorporated into the X Mosaic browser. The author of PGP, Phil Zimmermann, called the transaction an essential step towards creating digital cash. [1]
  • NetMarket eventually became part of Trilegiant Corporation, a conglomerate operating in various sectors, including real estate and travel. The transition into such a corporation marked NetMarket's evolution from a pioneer of online shopping into a component of a larger entity's e-commerce strategy.

Daniel Kohn and his partners set the stage for the explosion of e-commerce platforms and technologies that followed.

From Surfing To Purchasing: How Did It Happen?

The journey from the early web browsers to the sophisticated e-commerce platforms we use today involved significant technological innovations and the development of new programming languages and protocols. The first web browsers played a crucial role in making the Internet accessible and navigable for the general public, setting the stage for e-commerce.

  • The WorldWideWeb (Nexus), created by Tim Berners-Lee in 1990, is the first web browser. Berners-Lee developed it at CERN (the European Organization for Nuclear Research). The browser could access web pages and navigate the Web using hyperlinks, but it had a text-based interface and ran exclusively on NeXT computers.
  • Following WorldWideWeb, Mosaic appeared.  A team at the National Center for Supercomputing Applications (NCSA) led by Marc Andreessen created the technology in 1993. It was the first widely used web browser with a graphical interface. Mosaic's ability to display images in line with text on web pages made it user-friendly and helped popularize the Web.
  • Andreessen co-founded Netscape Communications Corporation, which released **Netscape Navigator** in 1994. Netscape Navigator became the dominant web browser in terms of usage share. It introduced many features that improved the user experience and security, including cookies for managing sessions and SSL (Secure Sockets Layer) encryption for secure communications.
  • The transition from basic online browsing to making secure online purchases required the development of secure communication protocols and coding languages. Netscape developed SSL in 1995, and SSL played a pivotal role in providing a secure channel between web browsers and servers. SSL allows the safe transmission of personal and payment information.
  • The early Web primarily relied on HTML (HyperText Markup Language) to structure web pages and URLs (Uniform Resource Locators) to address them.
  • CGI (Common Gateway Interface) scripts, often written in languages like Perl, enabled web forms and server-side processing. This technology was fundamental for e-commerce transactions at the time.
  • Python is a computer language that assists in web development and e-commerce.  Guido van Rossum invented Python in 1991.  It became more prominent with the development of web frameworks, which made it easier to build complex web applications.

This evolution laid the foundation for the dynamic, interactive, and secure online shopping experiences we enjoy today.

Languages Used For E-Commerce:

Today, the landscape of e-commerce is diverse and utilizes multiple programming languages. Each language serves different aspects of e-commerce, from server-side logic to client-side interactivity and database management. The choice of language often depends on the project's specific requirements, including scalability, security, and developer ecosystem. Here are some of the most commonly used languages in e-commerce today:

  • JavaScript: JavaScript is crucial for developing interactive and dynamic web pages. Frameworks like React and Angular create responsive user interfaces, and  Node.js develops the server-side programming component.
  • Python: Increasingly popular for e-commerce due to its simplicity and the powerful frameworks it offers, such as Django and Flask. These frameworks have features that simplify the development of secure and scalable web applications, making Python a go-to for many developers.
  • PHP:  PHP is a widely used language for web development and works with WordPress and WooCommerce. Its ease of use and compatibility with various database systems make it a solid choice for e-commerce sites.
  • Ruby, AKA Ruby on Rails framework, is another favorite among e-commerce developers for its "convention over configuration" philosophy. It's known for its efficiency in building complex websites with minimal coding.
  • Java: Java is famous for its portability, scalability, and robust ecosystem. Due to its performance and reliability, it's used in large-scale e-commerce platforms. Frameworks like Spring Boot facilitate the creation of high-performing, secure web applications.
  • C#: (Pronounced See-Sharp): This language is used with the .NET framework. C# is a choice for e-commerce sites that require integration with Microsoft products and services. It supports the development of robust, secure, and scalable web applications.

These languages uniquely contribute to the e-commerce ecosystem, from front-end user interface design to back-end server management and data handling. The choice of language often aligns with an e-commerce platform's specific goals.

How The E-Commerce Process Works: An Amazon Example

programming language evolution of e-commerce

 Depiction Of Programming Language

Like many large e-commerce platforms, Amazon employs various programming languages and technologies to ensure a seamless, secure, and efficient shopping experience. While the specific details of Amazon's architecture are proprietary, we can outline a general model that large e-commerce systems might follow. This model illustrates how different programming languages and technologies can work together in an e-commerce platform:

  • Browsing the Website:
  • Front-end (User Interface): JavaScript HTML and CSS create dynamic and interactive web pages. Frameworks like React or Angular build responsive and interactive computer user interfaces.
  • Searching for Products:
  • Back-end (Server-side logic): Server-side logic often uses Java or Python to leverage frameworks like Spring Boot (for Java) or Django (for Python). These languages can process search queries, interact with databases to retrieve product information, and send that data back to the user's browser.
  • Search Engines: Specialized search engines like Elasticsearch, often built on Java, index and search through large volumes of data quickly, enabling fast and relevant search results.
  • Adding Items to the Cart:
  • Session Management: PHP or Node.js (JavaScript) are often used to manage user sessions and shopping cart data. These languages ensure that items users add to their cart are remembered during browsing.
  • Managing Cart Items:
  • Database Operations: SQL languages, interacting with databases like MySQL or PostgreSQL, manage the addition, removal, and update of items in the cart.
  • Checkout:
  • Server-side Processing: Ruby (with Ruby on Rails) or Python (with Django) can manage the checkout process. This includes form submissions, validations, and processing user inputs.
  • Payment Processing:
  • Payment Gateway Integration: Secure payment processing might use Java or C#, particularly for platforms needing to integrate with various payment gateways and financial systems.
  • Payment Security:
  • Encryption and Data Protection: Languages like Java and C# are commonly used to implement payment security measures. This includes SSL/TLS for secure communications. Web Application Firewalls (WAFs) and other security solutions protect against common vulnerabilities and attacks.
  • Back-end Data Storage and Management:
  • Database Management: SQL for relational databases (e.g., Oracle, MySQL) and NoSQL for non-relational databases (e.g., MongoDB, DynamoDB) handle data storage and management, which includes storing user data, product information, order history, etc.

This simplified overview demonstrates how different programming languages and technologies contribute to various aspects of an e-commerce platform's operation. The actual architecture and choice of technologies can be much more complex and are tailored to meet specific business requirements.

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Works Cited:

  • "The Everything Store: Jeff Bezos and the Age of Amazon" by Brad Stone:  This book provides an in-depth look at the rise of Amazon and its founder, Jeff Bezos, offering insights into one of the most significant e-commerce platforms.
  • "Digital Gold: Bitcoin and the Inside Story of the Misfits and Millionaires Trying to Reinvent Money" by Nathaniel Popper:  While not solely about e-commerce, this book delves into the digital currency aspect that has become increasingly relevant to online transactions and commerce.
  • The Long Tail: Why the Future of Business is Selling Less of More" by Chris Anderson:  Anderson explores the economic models that e-commerce enables, focusing on how the internet has transformed traditional sales and marketing strategies.
  • "Chaos Monkeys: Obscene Fortune and Random Failure in Silicon Valley" by Antonio García Martínez:  This memoir provides insight into the tech startup culture in Silicon Valley, including aspects related to the development of online advertising and e-commerce platforms.
  • "Click: What Millions of People Are Doing Online and Why it Matters" by Bill Tancer:   An analysis of online behavior and trends, Tancer's book offers valuable insights into consumer habits in the digital age, crucial for understanding e-commerce's growth.
  • "Journal of Electronic Commerce Research" and "Electronic Commerce Research and Applications:"  peer-reviewed articles on the latest research findings and trends in e-commerce.
  •  "How the Web was Born: The Story of the World Wide Web" by James Gillies and Robert Cailliau
  • "Journal of Electronic Commerce Research"
  • Internet Archive (archive.org)
  • (1) Wikipedia