An Introductory Course in an Undergraduate E-commerce Technology Degree Program

Amber Settle1 School of Computer Science, Telecommunications, and Information Systems, DePaul University Chicago, Illinois, 60604, USA

Abstract

Despite great demand, undergraduate degrees in electronic commerce technology are just beginning to emerge. In this paper we describe an introductory course in an e-commerce technology bachelor’s degree program at DePaul University. “Survey of e-commerce technology” (ECT 250) provides undergraduate e-commerce technology students with an overview of their degree program while it prepares them for the client-side Web application development course that follows. To meet these dual purposes, ECT 250 takes a balanced approach between breadth and depth in its subject matter.

Keywords: E-commerce technology, e-commerce, e-business, undergraduate

1. INTRODUCTION here is the first course in a sequence of three courses that teach Web development. The introductory course is The School of Computer Science, Telecommunications, “Survey of e-commerce technology” (ECT 250). It is and Information Systems (CTI) at DePaul University intended to provide students with an overview of their began offering a graduate degree in e-commerce degree program as well as prepare them for the client- technology in the Fall quarter 1999. Interest in the side Web application development course that follows. degree was strong, and the number of students enrolled “Client-side Web application development” (ECT 270) in the program went from 50 in its first quarter to over is an introductory depth course in client-side 650 this year (Knight and Chan 2001). The program technologies, similar to other Web development was based on three curriculum models: IRMA 2000, technology courses (Lim 1998). In it students see a ISCC ’99, and IS ’97 and was designed, developed, and comprehensive study of HTML, Cascading Style Sheets, implemented over a period of only seven months. The and DHTML using JavaScript. Students create their references provide more information on the own Web sites and publish them on a Unix box provided development of this program (Knight and Chan 2001, for their use. The third course in the sequence is 2000). “Server-side Web application development” (ECT 353) in which students learn application development for Interest in e-commerce technology is not limited to e-commerce. This includes the development of small- graduate students. The prerequisite courses in the scale e-commerce transaction applications, which Masters level e-commerce technology degree are open students learn by designing and building a retail Web to all students, and these courses were in great demand site that accesses a database for online order processing. with undergraduates. In response, the CTI faculty The emphasis, as the title suggests, is on server-side developed an undergraduate e-commerce technology technologies, with ASP and VBScript as the choice for degree based on the graduate degree. Students earning a the academic year 2000-2001 (DePaul CTI 2001). bachelors of science in e-commerce technology learn programming, user-centered interface design, As the first course that e-commerce technology students e-commerce system design skills, and the technology of take, ECT 250 has vital role in orienting the students databases, networking, and middleware (Knight 2001). within their major. ECT 250 is also taken by students This degree was first offered in the Fall quarter 2000. outside the School of Computer Science, Telecommunications, and Information Systems, A discussion of the entire undergraduate e-commerce including students in the Schools of Commerce and curriculum is beyond the scope of this paper. Of interest Liberal Arts and Sciences. This unique course benefits

1 [email protected] both e-commerce majors and non-majors by providing the area. Finding an appropriate balance between them with an introduction to an important and rapidly breadth and depth can be challenging, although not changing subject. In this paper we discuss ECT 250, impossible (Reed 2001). The balance between breadth giving the purpose of the course, outlining the topics and depth in ECT 250 is achieved by using a Web that it covers, and reflecting on its first year and its development tool, namely FrontPage. Whereas teaching future in the curriculum at CTI. the students to create Web pages by producing HTML would require multiple weeks, students familiar with 2. THE INTRODUCTORY E-COMMERCE Microsoft office products and the Windows operating COURSE system can learn FrontPage in two or three lectures. In a relatively short period of time they can gain hands-on As mentioned previously, the purpose of ECT 250 experience creating and publishing Web pages, leaving within the undergraduate curriculum is twofold. First, it ample time for the survey topics of the course. provides students with a general survey of the topics important to the study of e-commerce technology. This 3. THE COURSE provides e-commerce technology students with a survey of the topics they will cover in greater detail in their ECT 250 is taught in one (10 week) quarter, meeting for degree program, and it exposes non-majors to an area three hours a week. The sections discussed in this paper that is increasingly important both to their personal and took place in the Fall 2000, Winter 2001, and Spring professional lives. The topics of the course range from a 2001 quarters and met twice a week for 1 ½ hours a history of the Internet to legal issues surrounding lecture. In the Fall 2000 quarter, 71 students enrolled in e-commerce. A list of topics is given in Table 1, and two sections, with 50 of those being CTI students, 5 more details can be found in the next section. This type Commerce students, and 16 from Liberal Arts and of breadth-first approach to an introductory course is Sciences. In Winter 2001, 76 students were in the two common in CS and IS undergraduate curricula (Bagert, day sections, with 42 in CTI, 28 in Commerce, and 6 in Marcy, and Calloni 1995; King and Barr 1997; McFall Liberal Arts and Sciences. (Another instructor taught an and Stegink 1997). evening section). In the Spring 2001 quarter, there were 73 students enrolled in the two day sections, with 39 in Introduction to e-commerce CTI, 33 in Commerce, and 1 in Liberal Arts and The Internet and the WWW Sciences. (Two evening sections were taught by two E-commerce software other instructors). A graphical representation of the E-commerce hardware enrollment figures is given below. Security Electronic payment systems Marketing, sales, and promotion 60 50 CTI Purchasing, logistics, and support activities 40 International, ethical, and legal issues 30 Com m erce 20 LA&S Table 1: Survey topics 10 0 Fall Winter Spring The second purpose of the course is to prepare students 2000 2001 2001 for the client-side Web application development course that follows it within the e-commerce technology degree. This preparation entails learning how to create There are no formal prerequisites for ECT 250, and the Web pages using FrontPage 2000 and how to publish only assumption made about the background of the Web pages on a Unix system. The depth topics covered students is that they had browsed the Web before and in ECT 250 are discussed further in the next section. were familiar with e-mail. Although intended as a The goal in giving some topics more coverage is to course for freshman or sophomores, a large number of expose students to a deeper knowledge of topics than a juniors and seniors took the course in the 2000-2001 survey can provide. Again, this is a common approach academic year. In the Fall 2000 quarter of the 71 taken in introductory courses, with technical topics students registered, 13 were freshman, 18 sophomores, ranging from Web design (Mercuri, Herrmann, and 19 juniors, 16 seniors, and 5 were graduate students. In Popyack 1998) to spreadsheets (Herrmann and Popyack Winter 2001, of the 76 students registered, 18 were 1994; Kolesar and Allan 1995). freshman, 19 sophomores, 24 juniors, and 15 seniors. In The goal in combining breadth topics and depth topics the Spring 2001 quarter, 73 students registered with 18 into a single course is to allow students both to gain a freshman, 22 sophomores, 21 juniors, and 12 seniors. broad perspective, providing a framework within which Below is a graph showing these numbers. to place any additional courses they take, and to have sufficient experience to understand the significance of disadvantages of e-commerce 30 The Internet Components of data communications 25 Freshman and the systems. Analog and digital signals, 20 Sophomore WWW piggybacking technology, modems, 15 Juniors modem speeds. Types of 10 Seniors communication links (wire pairs, 5 0 coaxial cables, fiber optics, microwave Fall 2000 Winter Spring transmission, satellite transmission). 2001 2001 Internet connection terminology (POTS, cable connections, T1, T3, ATM). Comparison of connections. This spread of class levels is due in part to the newness Types of networks (LAN, MAN, of the e-commerce technology program in the School of WAN). Protocols. Intranets, extranets CTI and the e-commerce program in the School of (public network, private network, Commerce, introduced in the Fall quarter 2000 and the virtual private network). Definition of Winter quarter 2001 respectively. A number of CTI and the Internet. History of the Internet. Commerce students in their junior and senior years Internet applications (E-mail, FTP, opted to choose one of the new majors, boosting the Telnet, newsgroups). Control of and upper class enrollment in the course. In a few years the commercialization of the Internet. spread of class levels should favor lower level students. Prehistory and birth of the Web. It should be noted that some of the spread is due to Factors behind Internet growth. students outside of CTI and Commerce taking the course Internet2. Netiquette. Circuit as an elective, a situation that is expected to continue. switching and packet switching. Open architecture. Internet protocols The textbook for the course is Electronic Commerce by (TCP/IP, HTTP, SMTP, POP, IMAP, Schneider and Perry (2001), and the coverage of topics FTP). Network layers and TCP/IP. in that text strongly influenced the choice of survey Client/server model. IP addresses, topics in the course. (Prior to the Winter quarter 2001, URL. Internet utility programs an older version of the text (Schneider and Perry 2000) (finger, ping, talk). Searching the was used). Electronic Commerce was the only required Internet (searching tips, advanced textbook for the course. It does not cover the material search options, limitations). necessary for the depth topics, and this information was E-commerce Web server software (Apache, IIS, taken from various sources including some software NES). Determining factors in supplementary texts (Andersen 2000; Buyens 1999). platform solutions (budget, target The supplementary material was provided to the audience, hosting). E-commerce students in the lecture notes made available on the requirements (catalog display, course Web site. shopping carts, transaction processing, product tools). Web-hosting services In the remainder of the paper we detail the topics (services provided, advantages, covered and assignments given in the course. For more marketing, B2B issues). Levels of information, including lecture notes and sample packages (basic, middle-tier, assignments, see the ECT 250 course page at enterprise-class). Basic packages http://facweb.cs.depaul.edu/asettle/research/ect250/ (services, banner advertising, mall- style hosting, examples). Mid-range Survey Topics packages (features, examples). In this section we discuss the survey topics covered in Enterprise solutions (features, ECT 250. A detailed summary of the topics covered is examples). given in Table 2. The topics in Table 2 are given in the E-commerce Web servers (factors to consider, the order in which they appear in the course. hardware role of a Web server, third-party hosting, factors in performance, Topic Details benchmarking). Web server features Introduction Definitions of e-commerce, e-business, (core capabilities, site management, to EFT, EDI, traditional commerce. application construction, dynamic e-commerce Views of commerce (buyer’s, seller’s), content, electronic commerce). business processes. What characteristics make a business process well suited or badly suited to e-commerce? Advantages and Security Terminology (physical, logical, threat, intermediary, costs, examples). countermeasure). Risk analysis. Business models (selling goods and Secrecy, integrity, necessity threats. services, selling information or digital History of computer security. E- content, advertising supported, commerce threats (client, advertising-subscription mixed, fee- communication channel, server). for-transaction, examples). Copyright and intellectual property Purchasing, Purchasing (activities, procurement, threats. Protecting copyrights and IP. logistics, and specialized Web sites, MRO supplies). Steganography, digital watermarks. support Logistics (objectives, activities). Client threats (active content, Trojan activities Support activities (finance and horse programs, cookies, Java and administration, human resources, Java sandbox, JavaScript, ActiveX, technology development, training, graphics, plug-ins, e-mail examples). Forms of economic attachments). Protecting client organization (markets, hierarchies, computers (digital certificates, security networks, changes in recent years). in IE and Netscape Navigator). EDI (definition, early efforts, broader Communication channel threats standards, international standards, (secrecy vs. privacy, sniffer programs, paper vs. EDI, direct connection, information leaks, anonymous indirect connection, VAN, open EDI, browsing, integrity threats, necessity financial EDI, perceived risk, hybrid threats). Encryption (terminology, solutions). Supply chain management history, modern systems, type of (definitions, levels in the supply chain, systems). Private-key cryptography value creation, impact of technology, (communication, key distribution, advantages, example). DES). Public-key cryptography International, Barriers to international e-commerce (communication, authentication, RSA, legal, and (language, culture, infrastructure). PGP, key agreement protocols, digital ethical issues Language (issues, common languages, envelopes, key management). Secure translating sites, localization, handling protocols (SSL, S-HTTP). SSL requests). Culture (issues, labeling, (basics, types of communication, key ways of doing business, Internet length, limitation). Message digests, access, the law). Infrastructure. digital signatures. Server threats (Web Ethical issues (defamation, privacy server, databases, CGI, other utility rights). Borders and jurisdiction programs). Securing the server (power, effects, legitimacy, notice). (access control, firewalls). Jurisdiction on the Internet (sufficient, Electronic Electronic cash (micropayments, subject-matter, personal, long-arm payment concerns, storage, advantages, statutes, international issues). systems disadvantages, obtaining and spending Taxation and e-commerce (nexus, e-cash, security, success, examples). types of taxes, federal income tax, Electronic wallets (advantages, state/local income tax, sales tax). examples, W3C and ECIG Contracting (written contracts, architecture, ECML standard). Smart signatures, warranties). Web site cards (definitions, Mondex). Credit content (trademark infringement, and charge cards (definitions, payment deceptive trade practices, regulation of processing, closed vs. open loop advertising claims, defamation). systems, online systems, SET protocol). Table 2: Detailed description of survey topics Marketing, Building a Web presence (definitions, sales, and goals, elements, purposes, difficulties, The more technical topics are covered early in the promotion strategies, examples, usability). course, including the survey of the Internet and the Finding and reaching customers WWW, e-commerce hardware and software, and (approaches, types of interactions, the security. This prepares the students for the depth topics Web, effectiveness, micromarketing, and also gives them sufficient technical knowledge to comparisons, technology and understand the broader topics that come later, such as marketing). Branding (differentiation, marketing and promotion strategies and international relevance, perceived value, emotional and legal issues. vs. rational branding, leveraging, affiliate marketing, serving as an The Internet and the WWW and security are given more introduction to the Internet and the WWW and the emphasis than the other topics. The survey of the discussion of e-commerce hardware. Internet and the WWW provides perspective on the development of e-commerce, introducing themes that recur throughout the course. These themes include the importance of standard protocols in e-commerce development and the rapidly changing nature of e-commerce technology. The strong emphasis on Topic Details security reflects its importance in e-commerce as a FrontPage What is FrontPage? Titles, headings, whole. lists, backgrounds, paragraph formatting, hyperlinks, bookmarks, images, tables. Overall the survey topics deal more with business-to- Graphic GIF, JPG, PNG. Lossy and lossless consumer issues than business-to-business e-commerce formats compression. Bitmapping. and only brush the surface of consumer-to-consumer, Publishing FTP, Telnet, Unix (directory structures, peer-to-peer, and mobile e-commerce. In part this Web pages file permissions, commands). Relative reflects the focus of the textbook for the course. In paths for files. Unix commands (ls, ls –l, some sense it is a reasonable choice for an introductory cd, mkdir, rm, rmdir, mv, chmod, man). survey course. It is the framework students are most Access permissions (types of access, familiar with entering the course, as many have been types of permissions, values associated consumers themselves. An attempt is made throughout with types, various ways to use the the quarter to emphasize that business-to-business chmod command). Text editing on the activities represent a larger portion of e-commerce than students.depaul.edu machine (more, business-to-consumer transactions (Schneider and Perry pico, moving and deleting files, the 2001). image and anchor tags). Markup SGML, HTML, XML. HTML Depth Topics languages terminology (opening, closing, one-sided In preparation for ECT 270, ECT 250 students need to tags, document tags, text structure tags, know how to access a Unix system using FTP and style tags, image tag, anchor tag, meta Telnet, how to execute basic Unix commands to both tag). History of HTML. History of move up and down directory structures and to create, SGML, advantages and disadvantages of delete, and move files on the system. In addition, they SGML. XML (purpose, benefits). must understand and be able to manipulate the Frames What are frames? Problems with frames. permissions of files in order to make them viewable by a Benefits of frames. Alternatives to browser. Believing that 10 weeks did not provide frames. sufficient time to teach undergraduates basic Unix, Information Elements of information architecture. Telnet, and FTP in addition to the other topics required architecture Organization systems (schemes and in ECT 270, basic Unix, Telnet, and FTP were moved to structure). Organization schemes (exact, ECT 250. ambiguous, hybrid). Organization structures (hierarchy, hypertext, To motivate the depth topics, it is necessary for the ECT database). Navigation systems 250 students to create Web pages. To leave as little (purposes, built-in browser features, overlap as possible between the two courses and to make types of systems, types of elements, efficient use of time, ECT 250 students create Web building a navigation system). Labeling pages using an HTML editor, specifically FrontPage systems (navigation, indexing, link, 2000. (Originally FrontPage Express was used, but the heading, iconic). Searching systems tool was changed when FrontPage 2000 became widely (kinds of searches, when to implement a available in the DePaul University labs). The students search system). Skills needed for Web also learn about graphic formats, the benefits and design. Organizational challenges disadvantages of frames, the basics of various markup (different perspectives, ambiguity, languages, and the fundamentals of information politics). Web problems (poor architecture. In more advanced courses, the students organization, poor graphic design and implement frames (ECT 270), learn more about XML layout, gratuitous bells and whistles, lack (ECT 270), and discuss the design and usability of Web of attention to detail, under construction, pages in greater depth (ECT 270 and HCI 310 inappropriate tone, designer- “Introduction to human-computer interaction”). centeredness). Rules of thumb for good Web pages. A detailed summary of the depth topics covered is given in Table 3. The depth topics are covered between the Table 3: A detailed description of the depth topics are five sections of ECT 250 offered in the Fall quarter 2001. During the same period the number of sections of Assignments and Exams CSC 200 has remained flat. A total of eight assignments are given throughout the quarter. Four of the assignments deal with the depth The course has been a valuable addition to the topics and four are related to the survey topics. curriculum. Changes made to the undergraduate curriculum this year added ECT 250 to the information Assignments 1, 3, 4, and 5 all involves the use of their systems bachelor’s degree. Beginning in the Fall quarter Unix accounts and/or the creation of Web pages. The 2001, ECT 250 will be a required course in three of the first assignment asks them to answer questions about six undergraduate degrees offered in CTI (e-commerce their background and expectations for the course and technology, information systems, and network mail their responses from the student Unix box. This technologies). The quality of the client-side Web ensures that each student can access his or her student application development course has improved now that account. Assignments 3, 4, and 5 ask them to create undergraduates are required to take ECT 250 as a Web pages of increasing complexity. The first is a prerequisite to the course. Instructors have been able to simple home page from which the other two pages were add more material to ECT 270, such as more thorough linked. The other two are a shrine page for a favorite coverage of XML and Web design. person and an essay on a subject of their choice. The students are expected to provide significant content and It would be interesting to conduct a formal study of the to pay attention to the design of their Web pages for differences in outcomes between ECT 250 and CSC these assignments. 200. Some of the material covered in ECT 250, such as the development of basic Web pages, is also taught in Assignments 2, 6, 7, and 8 deal with survey topics. CSC 200. CSC 200 students, however, do not learn as Assignment 2 discusses e-commerce terminology and much as the Internet or Web design, and e-commerce is Internet basics. Assignment 6 asks the students to not on the syllabus at all. It is possible that more investigate Web hosting options for a fictional knowledge about the Internet and e-commerce would employer. The next assignment instructs students to motivate students in learning Web page development, investigate the topic of computer forensics, and the final enabling them to better retain the concepts. We hope to assignment requires students to learn about the Vigenere investigate this hypothesis in the near future. cipher and encrypt a short message using the cipher. As expected, the Internet and the WWW and security are 5. ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS strongly represented in the homework. Students found the Web hosting assignment to be the most difficult, I would like to thank Rosalee Wolfe for encouraging me although many understood that it was the most natural to write about my experiences with ECT 250. Linda exercise of the quarter. Knight and Terry Steinbach provided invaluable assistance in writing the article. I am indebted to Sophie There were two comprehensive exams during the Laplante and Curt White for their comments on earlier quarter, a midterm after five weeks, and a final exam drafts of this paper. during the eleventh week. These exams were both cumulative. The type of questions ranged from 6. REFERENCES matching and true/false to short essay questions. As expected, FrontPage, Unix commands, the Internet and Andersen, Paul K., 2000, Just Enough Unix, Third the WWW, and security were heavily emphasized. Edition. McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc.

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