Extract Transaction's Customer Info to be written to a file?

I would like to "intercept" a transaction's customer details, in order to write it to a text file.

I know that this is possible (because customer information is in the database, accessible by Zen Cart's PHP scripts, and displayable accordingly), but I don't know what is the correct approach to implement it?

Should I hack an existing PHP file to pipe this information to the text file?

Or is there already a "hook" somewhere in Zen Cart that allows me to do that more cleanly and/or elegantly?

Thanks,
Daniel

I would like to tap/hook into the PHP page that sends order confirmation email, so that I can retrieve customer information from there and write it to a temporary file.

Where do I do that?

Thanks,
Daniel

You can look in includes/modules/checkout_process.php about line 75

Code:

---

//send email notifications
$order->send_order_email($insert_id, 2);
$zco_notifier->notify('NOTIFY_CHECKOUT_PROCESS_AFTER_SEND_ORDER_EMAIL');

---

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by kobra

You can look in includes/modules/checkout_process.php about line 75

Code:

---

//send email notifications
$order->send_order_email($insert_id, 2);
$zco_notifier->notify('NOTIFY_CHECKOUT_PROCESS_AFTER_SEND_ORDER_EMAIL');

---

---

Thank you! I was mistakenly looking for it under /includes/modules/pages/checkout_process and I really needed this tip to know where to start. At least now I can start to see the light at the end of the tunnel.

I understand that I now need to create a handler (observer class) for the NOTIFY_CHECKOUT_PROCESS_AFTER_SEND_ORDER_EMAIL event, right?

I think that the following tutorial can be helpful:

http://www.zen-cart.com/wiki/index.p..._API_Tutorials

Any other tips you can recommend?

Perhaps there already is a handler/observer/hook in the contrib section that can save me the time of development and testing?

Thanks,
Daniel

You should be on the correct track with that and the correct file to start with

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by kobra

You should be on the correct track with that and the correct file to start with

---

Thank you. After some learning, I managed to create an auto_loader config file in includes/auto_loader/ (first step required).

Then, the file containing the actual intelligence of my mod, needs to be created. It's an observer class file in includes/classes/observers/ in which the main trick, IMHO, is to find the right object to attach. After some learning and research (with the help of DrByte, thank you!) I concluded that that object should be 'orders' (please correct if I am wrong). Thus, the resulting observer.writecustinfo.php looks like:

PHP Code:

---

<?php
/**
 * Observer class to write customer info to a temp file.
 */
class writecustinfo extends base {

 /**  constructor method !
   *  Attaches our class to the $orders class and watches for 1 notifier event.
   */
  function writecustinfo() {
    $orders->attach($this, array('NOTIFY_CHECKOUT_PROCESS_AFTER_SEND_ORDER_EMAIL'));
  }

 /**   Actual Method to write data to file
   *  Called by observed class when any of our notifiable events occur
   *
   * @param object $class
   * @param string $eventID
   */
  function writetofile(&$class, $eventID) {
    /**
    * Write the following fields to a file
    */

    orders->fields[orders_id];
    orders->fields[customers_id];
    orders->fields[customers_name];
    orders->fields[customers_company];
    orders->fields[customers_street_address];
    orders->fields[customers_suburb];
    orders->fields[customers_city];
    orders->fields[customers_postcode];
    orders->fields[customers_state];
    orders->fields[customers_country];
    orders->fields[customers_telephone];
    orders->fields[customers_email_address];
    orders->fields[customers_address_format_id];
    orders->fields[delivery_name];
    orders->fields[delivery_company];
    orders->fields[delivery_street_address];
    orders->fields[delivery_suburb];
    orders->fields[delivery_city];
    orders->fields[delivery_postcode];
    orders->fields[delivery_state];
    orders->fields[delivery_country];
    orders->fields[delivery_address_format_id];
    orders->fields[billing_name];
    orders->fields[billing_company];
    orders->fields[billing_street_address];
    orders->fields[billing_suburb];
    orders->fields[billing_city];
    orders->fields[billing_postcode];
    orders->fields[billing_state];
    orders->fields[billing_country];
  }
}
?>

---

Does the above make sense at all?

Do you identify fundamental flaws in the code or in my understanding of the process?

(for simplicty, I didn't include the actual file writing code, I will start working on it shortly).

Thanks,
Daniel

That is the concept, yes

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by DrByte

That is the concept, yes

---

Concepts are great but when it comes to real life... :smile:

When I tried to implement the above using $orders->attach(), the entire store blanked! This puzzled me for a moment since the 'freeProduct' example in the Developers API Tutorial works on my system without any problem (or modification).

At first, I tried changing the $autoLoadConfig offset (aka 'action point'), in the config file, from 90 to 210, thinking that perhaps this has to do with the fact that $orders is not instantiated until offset 180. That didn't help (same exact white blank page).

So, after some research I came across this excellent thread: Use Of Notifiers - How To.

I then realized that, despite having different symptoms, I probably have the same exact problem: attempting to use a class ($orders) instead of the 'stub' notifier class, $zco_notifier. It is also the class that actually sends the notification. That solved the blanking problem! :clap:

So, I can now start working on the actual functionality of this observer.

OK, I got the update() method of the observer class to act upon email confirmation and to write something to a test text file. :smile:

The only problem now is that... all $orders->fields[] elements seem to be empty. :huh:

Using SuperGlobals Plus I can see at the successful checkout page that the $orders->fields[] elements are there and contain valid and correct values. So it seems that by the time my observer class receives the NOTIFY_CHECKOUT_PROCESS_AFTER_SEND_ORDER_EMAIL notification, the $orders->fields[] array has gone??? :blink:

I will try tying my observer class to NOTIFY_HEADER_START_CHECKOUT_SUCCESS to see if I can intercept that $orders->fields ...

Thanks again Kobra & DrByte for all your help and guidance. It's fun to program in such great environment.

Daniel

Isn't the object named $order, not $orders ?