# The GoDaddy Poynt Architecture

In some environments, developers are forced to integrate with proprietary systems and outdated technologies that bring limited capabilities, and also restrict their reach to a small number of merchants using that specific technology.

With PoyntOS, you can bring the capabilities of large merchants down to the small business countertops. These solutions can range from loyalty and CRM, to inventory and employee management (See image below.)

Depending on your application's use case, you might need to integrate with one or several components. Below are some of the main components in our architecture and their corresponding functionality.

# Development Environment

Unlike a traditional payment terminal which requires the merchant or the ISV to build a payment application, Poynt comes with its own payment application called Poynt Services. Poynt Services eliminates a lot of low-level details required to communicate with the card reader and provide a higher level interface which default applications like Terminal and Register can use to process transactions.

Additionally, Poynt Services brings a payment UI also known as payment fragment that provides the status and result of transaction processing. This architecture allows applications running on GoDaddy Poynt to be outside of the PA-DSS scope and enables rapid integration.

# Card Reader Service

We know that providing access to low-level card reader interfaces can create numerous security problems. To address this, GoDaddy Poynt implemented a series of functional APIs that can process card data based on the application's needs.

All of this data is also encrypted within the card reader services, avoiding the exposure of sensitive information to the applications.

# Commerce Services & Payment Experience

In the GoDaddy Poynt environment, these services support various commerce-related functionalities such as business, order, transaction, customer, catalog, and product management. Commerce services also represent the core integration point for all applications running on the terminal to interoperate, serving multiple aspects of the commerce activity.

In terms of the payment experience, GoDaddy Poynt provides a standardized experience for all payment methods and removes the unnecessary burden of repeated payment certifications for every integration.

# Capability Management Service

This service delivers a detailed directory of capabilities installed on the platform and the ability to connect and utilize them. These capabilities include transaction processing, receipt printing, loyalty, discounts, customer management, etc. It also plays an essential role in the interoperability across applications running on the smart terminal.

# Cloud Services

Cloud services provide the necessary interfaces to extend the services on the smart terminal beyond the device itself. These services provide access to the same features and, more importantly, access to the same commerce data via the cloud, enabling effortless access to applications running on the cloud. They also provide configuration management for various components like card readers and security key management.