Using more than one database

[Pete Denly]

Is it possible to use more than one database on a single site as I am building a site with some items for sale and some for information only and I would like to keep them in separate databases.

[DrByte]

I'm not sure I fully understand what you're envisioning. Why are you wanting to "keep them in separate databases"?

Are you wanting 2 different stores?
Or do you just want 1 store but the ability to present certain products *one way* and other products *another way*?

[Pete Denly]

I'm not sure I fully understand what you're envisioning. Why are you wanting to "keep them in separate databases"?

Are you wanting 2 different stores?
Or do you just want 1 store but the ability to present certain products *one way* and other products *another way*?

I want to present certain products without prices as reference material and other products for sale which are much the same as the reference material.
There are perhaps over 4000 items for the reference with about 1000 for sale.
I thought to manage the database effectively then the 'for sale items' could be held separately as these will be changing but the reference database will only be added too.

[DrByte]

If you wanted to stick with just the Zen Cart system itself, the simplest way would be to create your reference material as "Document-General" products instead of regular products. When creating a product, there is a pulldown beside the New Product button, which lets you choose the type of item you're creating.

The documents will show in a separate category sidebox, and when displaying those items, there will be no pricing or add-to-cart facility for them.

[kuroi]

It's probably that the effort involved in changing and maintaining Zen Cart's core code to support this would far outweight any possible database efficiencies.

Could you tell us something more abiout the nature of the reference products and what information you want to display about them. There may be other solutions available if we know what we're dealing with.

(Wow I must be typing slow today. The good Doc beat me by a whole five mins!)

[Pete Denly]

Yes it is going to be a stamp cover catalogue with items also for sale.

I did look at the document options today and I think that this may well serve my purpose. Thanks

But better solutions are always welcome!

Thanks again

Pete

[DrByte]

You can also add lots of pages using the EZ-Pages feature ... which can even be used to group linked pages into chapters with a clickable index/table-of-contents etc.