ABSTRACT
I am now ready to embark on what is currently referred to as the killer application for the Web — electronic commerce (e-commerce). What is e-commerce? Simply stated, e-commerce is all about conducting commerce on the Web. It is about conducting transactions on the Web that involve buying and selling products. Earlier in this book, I mentioned that e-commerce on the Web could be as simple as putting up a Web page or as complicated as merging two corporations. We also have heard the term e-business, which is much broader than e-commerce and means conducting any business on the Web. Therefore, e-commerce has come to be known as conducting transactions on the Web, and tasks such as putting up Web pages and other activities are known as e-business. Figure 6.1 illustrates how one does a normal transaction (that is, a non-Web transaction), and Figure 6.2 illustrates how one carries out a business transaction on the Web.
