Planning for Integration with Existing Systems
During the planning process, you need to assess your existing systems and data to determine the most effective methods to either integrate them with Commerce Server 2002 components or convert them to formats that can be imported into Commerce Server databases. In addition, you will need to plan the integration of your e-commerce business subsystems.
The following table lists some of the questions that you need to answer in planning for integration.
| Planning question | Recommendation |
|---|---|
| Will you integrate existing databases and database servers that contain such data as catalogs and user profiles or customers? | If you will maintain separate data sources for your offline and online businesses, you must establish a system for synchronizing the data. Consider integrating Microsoft Host Integration Server 2000 and Microsoft Application Center 2000 into your overall system design. |
| Will you integrate your existing order processing, payment transaction, inventory management, and order fulfillment systems with Commerce Server? | If you plan to integrate these systems, develop Component Object Model (COM) components to connect them to Commerce Server. Consider incorporating Microsoft BizTalk Server 2000 in your overall system design. |
| Do you need to integrate Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) systems with suppliers and trading partners? | If you plan to integrate ERP systems, you should incorporate BizTalk Server into your overall system design. |
| What are your requirements for converting data? | Establish a system for transforming data from its existing format to a format you can use in Commerce Server. For example, you will need to convert existing catalog data in a tab-delimited format to Extensible Markup Language (XML) before importing it into the Product Catalog System. |
| What are your requirements for custom development? | Although Commerce Server is a full-featured product, it has been designed so that you can customize many features to suit your business requirements. Examine the features list in Commerce Server Features at a Glance carefully and read Commerce Server 2002 Help before you plan for custom development. |
| Will you complete the custom development in-house or work with a software vendor? | Review the information about Microsoft partners at https://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=6772. |
See Also
Integrating with BizTalk Server
Integrating a Third-Party Product Catalog
Adding a Non-Commerce Application to a Site
Adding a Non-Commerce Web Server to an Application
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