Mercantec: Technology (Part 6 of 8)
Technology
Mercantec possesses several unique technological advantages: first and
foremost is the speed and efficiency with which a merchant using the
company's SoftCart product can set up an online store. According to
Mercantec, the basic product can be installed in less than three minutes.
This is possible because the system is database agnostic - SoftCart does
not require any particular DBMS to be present or loaded. Mercantec has
created this product with its own small-store optimized data management
system that is operating system independent.
This is both a bane and a benefit. The benefit is the ease of loading
and system independence. A slight bane is the upper limit on the size
of store that can be handled (around 7,000 unique items). If the store
is larger than this, Mercantec incorporates DBMS-specific SQL queries
into the catalogue interface. Because the preponderance of SoftCart
users sell less than 500 items in their shops, running into the upper
bounds of the system is not a common occurrence.
Part 7 - Risks
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