Overview

EzTrade Server provides companies, both large and small, with the ability to implement a flexible forms based XML e-commerce solution quickly and cost effectively. EzTrade is a component based out-of-the-box solution. That means that once you install the EzTrade Server software you are ready to begin trading. There is no requirement for systems integrators, costly business systems interfaces or custom solutions. Everything you need is in the box. With EzTrade, your time to implementation is significantly shorter and can be measured in hours, not weeks. Ultimately EzTrade provides you with a solution that is flexible, cost effective and customizable to your specific needs.

How EzTrade Works: EzTrade Server consists of 4 Server based components that together provide you with all the functionality that you need to define, send, receive and manage your e-transactions as well as integrate EzTrade with your existing business system or databases. These components are:

• EzTrade E-Commerce Provider.
• EzTrade EzForms Designer and Mapping Wizards.
• EzTrade Management Service.
• EzTrade IntraNet.

The EzTrade E-Commerce Provider is the primary workhorse. This component requires Microsoft's Internet Information Server in order to function properly. Once you install the EzTrade E-Commerce Provider on your existing or new web site you can send and receive XML based e-commerce transactions with your trading partners. There is no costly configuration or systems integration required. Simply install the software and the EzTrade E-Commerce Provider will automatically handle authentication, sending and receiving of documents and transactions.

The EzTrade EzForms Designer and Mapping Wizards visually guide you through creating your e-commerce transaction forms. You can use your own existing XML templates or design new forms, all without writing one line of computer code. As your needs change the EzForms Designer assists in modifying your existing transactions and ensures backward compatibility with your earlier form sets. Form tracking and version control are built in. The EzForms Designer guides you visually step by step through customizing your transactions. Easily turn your existing paper based forms into electronic masterpieces simply by pointing and clicking. In addition you can make your e-forms smart. This means that you can define data and integrity checks within the forms themselves, thereby preventing your trading partners from sending you bad or incomplete data. In addition, utilizing the built-in Mapping Wizards, you point and click your way to defining the relationship between the data that will be contained on the form and your business system or database. Historically this required 3rd party integrators and customized solutions. Not anymore. EzTrade builds the integration rules set for you, guaranteeing that your data ends up where it belongs. The Mapping Wizards create a high level scripting and interface protocol that can, if required, be edited and modified by an experienced programmer at the lowest level. Usually this is not required. In rare cases when unusual tasks or extremely complex operations must be performed on the transactions or their data, then these scripts can be manually edited and modified. Extended operations can include the launching of other software packages COM and DCOM objects, low level data conversion and more.

The EzTrade Management Service is the transaction watchdog. As transactions are sent between you and your trading partners, the management service monitors data integrity and performs imports, exports as well as processing tasks. Overall, the management service guarantees that your transactions are processed correctly, according to your instructions. In addition to the tasks defined using the EzForms Designer and Mapping Wizards, The EzTrade Management Service can perform additional automation tasks as required. This includes the ability to create and manage outgoing transactions as well.

The EzTrade IntraNet is your primary point of contact with the EzTrade Server system and allows you to perform all of your management and communications related tasks. From here you can define who you want to trade with, monitor trading activity, search for, review, print, archive and reprocess historical transactions and more. In addition you can define who in your organization is authorized to perform e-commerce related tasks including both management and transaction functions. Transaction functions include sending, receiving and monitoring transactions and their status. Once authorized, users can visually review historical transactions that have been sent or received. Users can even create new transactions and send them to your trading partners manually using the visual forms.