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More Business Stuff

Unfortunately, this area is still incomplete, please bear with me.

Those @#$%! Buzzwords:

| ASP | ISP | CSP | NSP | WAP | Vortal | More Stuff |

ASP

You should NOT confuse the Business term ASP with the Technical term ASP. In technical terms, ASP means Active Server Pages and has to do with WEB programming (simplistically put) and is usually deployed on Web Servers running on a Microsoft platform.

In the Business community, ASP means Application Service Provider. The ASP Industry Consortium defines an Application Service Provider as the organisation that manages and delivers application capabilities to multiple entities (companies) from a data centre across a wide area network.

This is a mouthful. All it really means is that instead of purchasing own software at great expense, such as HR-, Payroll-, Accounting Systems etc, companies "rent" and share usage of these systems from ASP's. This allow even small and medium sized enterprises to afford potentially expensive systems and be able to compete with traditionally large organisations (on a global scale too).

More information about ASP's are here and here.

ISP

ISP is the common term used to refer to the company that provides your Internet connectivity. Therefore ISP means Internet Service Provider. Internet Service Providers provide the infrastructure on which ASP's deploy applications for use by companies and individual users. In some instances, an ISP and ASP can be the same organisation (providing both services itself). Typically, ISP's provide "public network infrastructures" (also see NSP below).

CSP

CSP is the term used for Commerce Service Providers. CSP's are the organisations that provide you with an infrastructure that enables you to trade electronically with customers/consumers and trading partners. Ariba and Commerce One are examples of such organisations. Instead of purchasing and deploying these applications, companies can opt to use such applications and infrastructures as provided by CSP's. Typically, a CSP will charge a fixed monthly connection fee and a per transaction fee. In a way, a CSP is also an ASP as they provide the application that enables e-commerce. Again, here too an ISP can be the CSP at the same time.

NSP

NSP is the term used for Network Service Providers. NSP's are the organisations that provide your corporate network infrastructure (WAN - Wide Area Network, on an outsourced basis) and are also referred to as "private network infrastructures" (as opposed to "public network infrastructures"). Therefore, by definition, NSP's exclude Internet infrastructures. Network Service Providers usually deploy Quality of Service networks, in other words, guaranteed speed, reliability, throughput, redundancy etc. This can be done because NSP's provide the complete (total) network solution, end-to-end, as opposed to ISP's which provide only a portion of the Internet or "public network". NSP's can also act as "private" or closed ASP's and CSP's. For example, a motor manufacturer can opt to use an NSP for it's network infrastructure, connecting all its trading partners to this network. The NSP can deploy the applications and commerce infrastructure for this community, therefore creating a closed user community, providing trade and e-business without ever needing the Internet.

WAP

This is the latest buzzword in the computer industry. The Wireless Application Protocol (WAP) is the de-facto world standard for the presentation and delivery of wireless information and telephony services on mobile phones and other wireless terminals. The purpose of WAP is to process and display Internet-type information in a similar format to what you see on the Internet with your favourite browser.