Online Merchant was an application that combined a desktop database-driven product catalog application with a set of automatically generated CGI scripts that it would upload to a standard web hosting environment. Using the desktop software to maintain the catalog, and the CGI scripts to run the shopping cart, merchants could quickly and easily sell their wares on the Internet. Later versions included integration with the BuyItOnline.com system, and with credit card handlers such as CyberCash, Open Market, and Authorize.Net.

My role was to create and refine the Perl-based CGI scripts that would be installed by the product onto the user’s web server to actually operate the online catalog and shopping cart aspects. In addition to writing effective code, this required research about different hosting environments and the locations of their available resources, because once the product CD was sent to mastering, we would have very little opportunity to provide updates to the users.