Description

After completing this self-contained course on server-based Internet applications software, students who start with only the knowledge of how to write and debug a computer program will have learned how to build web-based applications on the scale of Amazon.com. Unlike the desktop applications that most students have already learned to build, server-based applications have multiple simultaneous users. This fact, coupled with the unreliability of networks, gives rise to the problems of concurrency and transactions, which students learn to manage by using the relational database system.

After working their way to the end of the book, students will have the skills to take vague and ambitious specifications and turn them into a system design that can be built and launched in a few months. They will be able to test prototypes with end-users and refine the application design. They will understand how to meet the challenge of extreme business requirements with automatic code generation and the use of open-source toolkits where appropriate. Students will understand HTTP, HTML, SQL, mobile browsers, VoiceXML, data modeling, page flow and interaction design, server-side scripting, and usability analysis.

The book, which originated as the text for an MIT course, is suitable for classroom use and will be a useful reference for software professionals developing multi-user Internet applications. It will also help managers evaluate such commercial software as Microsoft Sharepoint of Microsoft Content Management Server.

 

Table of Contents

 Preface  vii
 
 Acknowledgments ix
 
1 Introduction 1
 
2 Basics 9
 
3 Planning 47
 
4 Software Structure 63
 
5 User Registration and Management 75
 
6 Content Management 97
 
7 Software Modularity 141
 
8 Discussion 161
 
9 Adding Mobile Users to Your Community 183
 
10 Voice (VoiceXML) 199
 
11 Scaling Gracefully 213
 
12 Search 241
 
13 Planning Redux 261
 
14 Distributed Computing with HTTP, XML, SOAP, and WSDL 269
 
15 Metadata (and Automatic Code Generation) 281
 
16 User Activity Analysis 303
 
17 Writeup 313
 
 Reference Chapters 
 
A HTML 329
 
B Engagement Management by Cesar Brea 351
 
C Grading Standards (for MIT Students) 359
 
 Glossary 363
 
 To the Instructor  375
 
 Sample Contract (between Student Team and Client) 391
 
 About the Authors  393
 
 Index  395