RWT Webmaster Tools Blog

[...] Operational Issues Confronting e-Business Today: Business through the internet has expanded by leaps and bounds and continues to do so. With opening up of the world economies e-business has become truly global for buyers and sellers alike. Also keeping pace are the associated problems that are both technical and non-technical in nature. The prime concern for any e-business is secure and efficient handling of run away transaction volumes at acceptable response levels. Congested networks are causing delays, even outages. Slow downloading time is one of the main reasons potential on-line customers switch web sites. Long waiting times can prove disastrous. The web site load pattern varies from hour to hour. For example, lunch time and after hours load on an on-line super-store will be more than it is during working hours, as that is when people like to do their purchases. Unacceptable response times could result in on-line customers abandoning the cart midway and switching to competition. The varying internet networks’ bandwidths and load patterns mean response times could vary widely from place to place even for the same traffic volumes. The web sites would like to know in real time where the bottlenecks are on a regular basis. Constant monitoring is therefore a must to enable web sites identify problems and initiate remedial steps without loss of time or on-line customers. There are other problems as well. These relate to web site’s accessibility, availability, security, data integrity and dangers from the hackers. Invariably, even the best managed web sites do not know what the exact problem is and where! Until informed by a frustrated customer. Clearly, web site owners would prefer to concentrate on challenges posed by their business rather than spending time on these extraneous issues. For every web site in e-business, therefore, there is an urgent need for constant 24×7 monitoring that keeps constant vigil and reports response time delays and any availability or accessibility problem; also regularly monitoring consistency of content and protected areas for any violation. [...]