Re: FN-FORUM: How does moneysupermarket and other similar sites work?

date posted 15th June 2007 17:08

Just to add to what everyone has already mentioned..

Some of the things I have worked on, involved some regular data
exchange, as well as data exchange at run time.

Basically, there are two parts to it - Static data and runtime/availability data

e.g. If we were to take holidays example:
Static data includes things like,: which partner has holidays in which
cities etc. The Id of the holidays in the system where the original
inventory is held, images, textual description etc,.

And runtime data includes things like prices of hoilidays etc.

So, when somebody does a search on travelsupermarket - e.g. for
Chamonix, the system will first check, for suppliers that have
holidays in Chamonix, and then there will be a runtime call to that
supplier to fetch the latest prices.

Some parties may want to supply the prices as well as a daily feed, in
which case there is no runtime call.
This in my opinion is very rare, as the same holiday company might
want to sell inventory through multiple channels, and so the inventory
has to exist at *one* place only, unless there is a
dedicated-inventory sharing mechainism in place.

Hope it helps,
cheers.



On 14 Jun 2007 12:02:34 -0000, Craig [EMAIL REMOVED] wrote:
>
> Hi Duncan,
>
> I'm currently involved with one of my travel clients in their project with
> TravelSuperMarket (same people as MoneySuperMarket). Every night they FTP a
> flat file up to TSM with prices and dates and then TSM also run a web
> service I developed to get the brochure details. They combine these every
> night for use by their site the next day. Oh, and by the way, they ain't
> cheap!
>
> Hope this helps.
>
> Craig
>
>
> -----Original Message-----
>
> Good Morning,
>
> Right, I thought I would ask if anyone new how moneysupermarket and
> other sites actually work?
> In essence they are a comparison tool for a specific service (or
> product) and presents the customer with an impartial listing of all
> the providers and their best price.
> Does it do this by fetching the data off each of the providers, or do
> they have to regularly update moneysupermarket with their info?
>
> I would be interested to understand the system behind it, if anyone
> can shed any light on that?
>
> Thanks,
>
> Duncan
>
> --
>
>
> --
> Freelancers, contractors earn more with Prosperity4
> Call 0870 870 4414 or visit www.prosperity4.com
> and benefit from Inland Revenue approved expenses today.
>
> To advertise here: http://www.freelancers.net/advertising.html
>
>