Maestro Internet Reservations

Northwind offers Web-based Internet reservation modules that can be fully integrated with our Maestro Property Management applications. Using our system, you'll be able to offer your customers:

• On-line, Internet reservations with immediate confirmation.
• A Double Booking-Proof solution. No need to maintain separate in-house and on-line inventories.
• Complete control over on-line offerings, including pricing and availability. Web site visitors are not linked to a generic, external site.
• Cutting edge technology for fast, secure, cost-effective, and low maintenance service.

Confirmed Web Reservation

On some Web sites, you find a button or a link called “Reservations”. When invoked, you see a “form“ you may fill in and return to request information. This is handled just like a fax request: a clerk checks the availability, and contacts you via phone, e-mail, fax, or mail, to let you know if your request has been confirmed, if any alternatives are available, or if no rooms are available. In all of these cases, confirmation or denial of your reservation request is not returned to you immediately.

Internet technology now offers the alternative of interactive, immediate response. Within seconds after you submit your request you receive an on-line response that tells you if your reservation has been confirmed. If it has not, you can try another date, another accommodation type, or, if none are available, you can immediately check on another date or simply make other arrangements.

Benefits of Confirmed Web Reservations

The benefits to the hotel guest are many, including convenience (refer to the above paragraph). The most important benefit to the hotel operator is global availability and automatic booking, 24 hours a day, 7 days a week without the need of a human operator.

Architecture of Internet Reservation Applications

The applications are made up of some or all of the following components:

• Application Server: A custom program that resides on a Web Server computer. This computer may be located at your office or hosted remotely. For efficient communication with Web Clients (see below), we recommend a high speed Internet connection.
• Data Server: A repository of persistent data, capable of serving data to the Application Server via SQL, ODBC or object technology (ActiveX or DataServer objects, directly or through a network). This component communicates only with the Application Server, never directly with the Clients.
• Web Client: A user, located anywhere, who accesses the Application Server through a standard Web browser on the public Internet. This client is usually not trusted with sensitive data.

Trusted Web Client: An authorized user, located anywhere, who accesses the Application Server via a trusted Internet protocol, for example PPTP (Point to Point Tunneling Protocol). This access is implemented via a custom program that is not available for download via the Internet; users must obtain it and install it manually on their PC.

• Secure Client: An authorized user connected to the Application Server via a private, secure network (or deployed on the Application Server computer itself).
• E-mail Client: A user, located anywhere, communicating with the Application Server through e-mail.

Platform Supported

The Internet Reservation components described above are currently supported on the following platforms:

• Application Server: Windows NT
• Data Server: NT, Unix, Novell, or any other platform that can communicate with the Application Server through standard protocol.
• Web Client: Any platform with HTML 2 compatible Web browser. Client-side Java applets or ActiveX objects are not used unless they are required for functionality.
• Trusted Web Client: Windows NT, 95 and 98.
• Secure Client: Windows NT, 95 and 98.
• E-mail Client: Any platform with SMTP/POP3 compatible e-mail program.

Security

Security is probably the most difficult issue facing Web application development. The architecture itself is guided by security considerations. At the functional level, Northwind implements the ”AAA“ of access control (Authentication, Authorization and Accounting/logging), and any sensitive data, down to the field level, can be encrypted.