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Microsoft Site Server, released in 1996 was a successor technology to Microsoft Merchant Server, Microsoft's first effort at providing a solution to the growing business of Internet-based commerce (or e-commerce). During the course of its evolution (culminating with Site Server 3.0), Site Server expanded on Merchant Server's functionality by annexing content management tools; which would typically be involved, it was thought, in facilitating the management of Web-facing content. Consequently, Site Server became not only a solution for businesses wanting to sell products online, but companies who had corporate intranet servers hosting documents.

Although Site Server went through several iterations, the most widely-discussed and perhaps widely-adopted version was the last, Site Server 3.0, released in 1998. The primary areas of Site Server 3.0 functionality included:

• Indexing and Search
• Content Management
• Product Management
• Order Processing
• Site Personalization
• Ad Server

Product Legacy

For its time Site Server offered one very credible among a select few alternatives for such functionality - particularly on the Windows platform. At its release it generally came out to very positive reviews in technical journals, although compared to later products its management tools were on the arcane side. The content management functionality was adequate, but not particularly competitive with dedicated document management systems that were available at the time. On this front, Site Server's main advantage was its low cost. Another feature that might have been a source of confusion was the taxonomy management system. The tools used to maintain item metadata were very basic and required a degree of technical familiarity foreign to most business users. On the plus side, once configured, Site Server got very high ratings for management of conducting e-commerce. Management of products and orders was fairly sophisticated - a strength that would be extended in the technology that succeeded it: Microsoft Commerce Server  

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