Welcome to the Developer’s Guide for the Microsoft® Reference Architecture for Commerce, version 2.0. The Microsoft Reference Architecture for Commerce consists of engineered code components that allow developers to build retail Web sites using the Microsoft® Windows® 2000 Server operating system and Microsoft® .NET Enterprise Servers, such as Commerce Server 2000 and SQL Server™ 2000. This guide is designed to aid your understanding of the design and implementation decisions made by the developers of the Microsoft Reference Architecture application, and to help you create great e-commerce solutions using Microsoft tools and technologies.

The Microsoft Reference Architecture for Commerce, Version 2.0 consists of code and documentation designed to accelerate the development of e-commerce solutions for medium to large businesses. This volume includes an e-commerce application, which contains reusable and customizable components and was designed to address many of the general business requirements that are common to e-commerce solutions.

It also provides complete documentation, including a thorough explanation of the application components and the decisions behind the code design and development process. Also: instructions for using, modifying, and testing the code, and procedures for setting up the development environment and installing the application.