The platform Architecture

Developed from scratch in .NET 4.0, the Enyo Commerce framework is addressing all the functionality needed to build a powerful B2B e-commerce application. Its architecture is constructed first and foremost with flexibility and extensibility in mind. It is very easy to extend and plug in to, and from a developers point of view, you can make massive customizations with just a few lines of code.

So how does it work? What we essentially do is to provide an engine that understands the data model and inner workings of each supported ERP system. On top of that we provide the ability to mirror the ERP data to a hosted environment, exposing only the data needed to run the E-commerce application.

The Enyo Commerce framework has initially been designed to be consumed by an ASP.NET Web Application (Forms or MVC), but can also be consumed by other application types, such as a WCF service host or any windows application or service.

Software Architecture, Enyo Commerce

Every component of the application is built on the Provider Model, supplemented with one central Provider Factory that specifies the providers for each specific area of functionality. The graphic below shows a simplified version of the layers of abstraction through the Provider implementation, to the right an example of the Tax Functionality implementation.

You can compare the “Functional API” most times a static facade class named xxxManager, to e.g. the SiteMap, Membership or Roles class in the System.Web namespace for managing ASP.NET features. The Provider Base is the abstract minimal requirement contract (almost like an interface) for providing this type of functionality

Providers for the most generic functionality has been implemented in generic versions, the rest is supplied in various ERP system specific providers, however you can inherit from all of them, overriding and customizing just about any feature of the e-commerce you can imagine.

You can furthermore plug in at any level, either implementing all functionality to your own liking or just making changes to the implementation provided by Enyosoft.

The ERP specific layers provided by Enyosoft will support a standard, non-customized version of each ERP system. It might work with certain customizations, but functionality coded inside the ERP system itself, has to be replicated into customizations to the ERP provider layers themselves. The Enyo Commerce model however, is easy to plug-in to, and has been designed with customizations in mind.

The UI / Web Application

When you install the Enyo Commerce SDK, it will provide a Visual Studio 2010 (.NET 4.0) project template for ASP.NET forms 4.0, ASP.NET MVC 2, as well as a preconfigured WCF Service library. For the web applications, it is in fact fully functional, but delivered with a default Shop Design, than can easily be changed through changing the Theme.

For ASP.NET Forms, a complete set of DataSourceControls are provided as well, for ease of development, as well as a complete set of User Controls providing the most common implementations of the different areas of functionality.

For MVC, it is a tad simpler example of an implementation, but it is provided in 2 flavors for different target business types.

Environment

The Web application will run on a standard IIS 6.0 and later with the .NET 4.0 framework installed, Windows Server 2008 with IIS 7 is recommended.

For database it requires as minimum a SqlServer Express 2005 or SqlServer 2000, SqlServer 2008 is recommended.

For maximum scalability and flexibility, it is also an option to run the application on the Microsoft Windows Azure platform. For more info on Azure look here, or contact us.

Support and Documentation

With the SDK, a full documentation of the framework is provided. Also the documentation will be available online along with our wiki. All framework elements and ERP plug-ins do also contain full inline documentation.

Additionally development support will be available for partners and customers.

Do you need onsite support or is interested in a introduction course for your developers, please contact us for more information.

Technologies

Enyo Commerce and the underlying technologies are developed purely in C# and .NET 4.0.

We have strived to use as much of the built-in functionality from the .NET framework as possible allowing you to reuse as much of your existing .NET knowledge and code as possible, both in the UI of your application and on lower levels.

We rely on the Membership and Roles functionality provided with the .NET framework, making it possible for you to plug in and reuse existing membership provider implementations.

CMS system integration

Enyo Commerce is not bound to a specific CMS system and we will as such not provide a CMS system with the package, all VS project templates are implemented using a simple Xml SiteMap and static localizable content. It is very easy to use the Enyo Commerce functionality with a ASP.NET based CMS System since all the functionality is provided in ready-to-go User Controls. However we can recommend systems such as:

• SiteFinity (by Telerik)
• SiteCore
• EPiServer CMS
• DotNetNuke (DNN – Open Source)
• SharePoint
• Any CMS system capable of handling ASP.NET User Controls.