Shopping Cart
Systems
Shopping carts in storefronts are provided
for the customer's convenience. A customer picks up a shopping cart from the
row of carts in the parking lot or at the storefront entrance. The customer
pushes the cart around the store's floor during the shopping session, filling
it as she goes, until she is ready to check out. The customer then (sometimes)
returns the cart to the store when she has finished transferring her purchases
to her vehicle. Similarly, when a customer visits an electronic retail
storefront, the shopping cart's purpose is to make shopping easy for the
customer. To understand the technologies that govern an electronic shopping
cart, you need to understand how the technology works.
Scope and Lifetime of an Electronic Shopping Cart
When a customer first enters an electronic
retail storefront, the shopping cart application provides him with a virtual
shopping cart. It remains with the customer until he places an order and exits
the storefront's Web site. Once the order is placed, the virtual shopping
cart's contents are cleared and the resources used by the virtual shopping cart
are freed. In essence, without further need, the virtual shopping cart is
destroyed by the shopping cart application.
Collecting, Analyzing, and Comparing Selected Components
As with a conventional shopping cart, another
important aspect of an electronic shopping cart is that the customer can select
items after analyzing them thoroughly�including comparing different brands�and
place them in the cart. The ability to hold items and carry them along
electronically saves shopping time. Otherwise, the customer would have to pay
for each item immediately upon selection and then continue with his shopping. Also,
at any time during the shopping process, the customer can view the selected
items and compare them with other items.
Keeping Track of the Total Cost
One advantage that an electronic shopping cart has over a
conventional shopping cart is that is displays the running total of the items
as they're added to the shopping cart. In this way, the customer can keep track
of the cost of his selections and compare it to his budget.
Change
of Mind
A customer often changes her mind after deciding to buy an
item. If the customer notices a better or cheaper item than the one being
carried, she can replace the previous selection with the new one. If she
overshoots her budget, she may decide not to buy some items or reduce the
quantities of the items selected. Electronic shopping carts allow the customer
to change the quantities and remove items previously selected.
Processing
the Purchase
The electronic shopping cart also helps the merchant do the
final billing at the checkout counter. By carrying the total cost of the
selected items, the shopping cart saves the checkout system the trouble of
adding up the costs. The system simply applies any taxes and surcharges and
generates the final bill. Payment is accepted against this final bill.
Hence the shopping cart application forms the heart of the
electronic storefront. The shopping cart application binds the customer, the
catalog, the inventory system, and the payment system closely. Certain
electronic shopping cart systems provide the customer with product
recommendations and price comparisons with equivalent products on the fly. Most
shopping cart systems are implemented with server-side code. When maintaining
shopping cart instances on the server side, some applications allow the user to
resume shopping where she left off, if for some reason the shopping session is
terminated abruptly. Incidentally, if shopping cart applications aren't
implemented with server-side code, they become candidates for electronic
shoplifting!
with the product catalog and how a customer can keep track of selections during
the shopping session.
with product catalog
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