not using a database for products

[plains_man]

The website discussed here is set up as a static website. It does not have a database. Nor will it if I can find a way to add items within the various pages to a shopping cart.

The website has both individual data pages and group gallery pages on the subject(s) of flora and fauna native to the location of the actual site being documented on the virtual site. Both types of pages contain photographs. Many of these images are suitable for framing; they are the product, if you will. Rather than directing users to "products" pages, I would like that they can simply click on an add to cart icon (not a button) in order to add an image to a cart.

As well, I want a streamlined shopping cart which blends in with the site. Hence, Zen Cart's template wrapped in the site's template which displays the site's navigation. Although I will add mention (and logo) of Zen Cart.

Samples are shown in the screen shots.

I do not know whether this is the appropriate forum category and hope that someone will direct me to the proper one if it is not.

[stevesh]

While it might be possible to do that with some custom coding, you'll run into sessions problems moving from Zencart to non-Zencart pages and back.

Zencart is meant (and was designed) to be a complete shopping cart program, not a back-end cart script, and it won't even install without setting up the database.

You might take a look at this (I haven't used it, though):

http://www.zen-cart.com/index.php?ma...roducts_id=990

[plains_man]

Thanks for the response stevesh.

Another approach to this would be to have the + icon under the image link to the corresponding image in a database. From there the user could add it to the shopping cart. Would this be possible?

And would it be possible to have the cart icon link to the shopping cart page?

I checked out the link you added to your post but the links on the page don't go anywhere or do anything; perhaps I have to have Zen Cart installed.

[dmfelder]

My company sells funny shirts. I built www.gafy.com with the same hopes as you. I didn't want to get into a DB like zencart because of all the different permutations of shirt, color, size, etc., and I wanted it to have a very unique look and feel (as opposed to our direct to garment printing business at www.greatapparelforyou.com).

Click on any of the funny tshirt images at gafy.com to reveal the "product assembly page" then...if you're ready...view the source code. It is a mess and it is all maintained OUTSIDE of zencart. When the customer clicks "add to cart" they are ported INTO the shopping cart feature of zencart and I pass the product id. When they click out, they are ported OUT of zencart and into the base website.

In two words: it sucks. Maintaining data like this was not worth the trade-off of maintenance time versus benefit. But, of course, hindsight is 20/20.

Since I began this endeavor, we expanded to custom shirts, screen printing, and dtg (direct to garment) printing - www.greatapparelforyou.com. Because of all of our offerings, I created a quote page. Of course this page, do to it's complexity, was built in PHP. So...I became familiar with the language.

Now, two years later, I am on this forum again because I have hit a wall and need to rebuild gafy.com with a "FULL" implementation of zencart.

I will say this (if you're not tired of my story), Zen-Cart is awesome. I know it pretty well these days. It can and will manage "custom" pages as well as the transaction piece. So, my advice to you is throw out the idea of using your own front-end and feeding it to a cart.

If that doesn't convince you enough, take one more look at that source code I spoke about above!

Good luck!

[plains_man]

I appreciate the response dmfelder.

But, my website is not nearly as complicated nor are there as many variables. In fact it is not set up as a shopping site. It is set up as an information / gallery site. The images are the product and subtlety is essential to the addition of any *shopping* function.

At present I am contributing to the client needs list for a javascript cart that is being developed by the Wojo Group (thewojogroup.com/2008/10/simplecartjs-paypal-e-commerce-in-minutes/).
You can see my test implementation of their script at: silverplains.ca/test/simple_cart/sc_images_forbs.htm

If zen cart could be adapted to produce something like this then I will gladly use it.

[dmfelder]

First, it took me 30 minutes to stop viewing the videos linked to the wojogroup website. Mesmerizing stuff.

I took a look at what you're doing, and I can see why you don't want to integrate completely into zencart. For me, I ended up doing it out of necessity because I was dealing with 1200 unique funny shirt "SKUs" per design at www.gafy.com. In your case, it's much different.

I think (and this is coming from someone on this board who really did link in from a front end) for your case, it CAN be done with zencart.

I won't give you a tutorial here, but I learned everything from this discussion board.

1) Create the products you currently have in zencart and allow the cart to automatically assign product IDs.

2) Extract the products_id number from the database. (This can EASILY be exported from the products table in PHPMyAdmin.)

3) Copy the code (right click copy target) from the "Add to cart" buttons on the zencart product page...that in your case you will never actually see after deployment.

4) Extract what you need from the code, and based on the image selected, concatenate the products_id from your export file above.

5) Modify the header file to change the "base" url location.

And if you're still following me, just do some basic searches in the forum for help. It's amazing how quickly people come to your aid, and nearly everything in the cart is configurable in the admin utility. (Tables, banners, images, buttons on/off, etc.) As for the layout, it is all controlled by a single CSS file.)

Good luck!

Now, if you know anyone who likes funny tshirts, send them to www.gafy.com (or www.greatapparelforyou.com for custom printed shirts or embroidery) LOL!

[plains_man]

I follow a little from what you've said, although I have not set up zen cart so I am taking some of it on faith, as it were.

It seems to me that you are saying I should set up a cart database and page with the various images and copy the code associated with each image then paste it where the user would click -- to add an item to the shopping cart -- on my static web page. Instead of taking the user to the items page, this will simply add the item to the corresponding php page which will be retrieved when the user goes to the shopping cart. I could live with that, especially if I can simulate the mini shopping cart down in the right hand corner of my static web page.

Assuming what you are saying is possible, and I believe you that it is, the question then is whether I can place the shopping cart page inside the navigation for my website which appears around all four edges of the browser window? Essentially, can I adapt zen cart to my site rather than, what seems to be the norm, build the site around zen cart?

[dmfelder]

To answer the first part, I think you totally get it. Create the products so you can extract the unique product IDs. (The product ID is a primary key that is assigned by the database. They can be easily extracted from the DB through PHPMyAdmin.)

If you actually set up the images and product info in the cart as well, you will get proper thumbnails and descriptions in the cart summary.

Now, as for the question about cart information on your website:

There is definitely a sidebox shopping cart summary that can be turned on/off. In your case, you need to find the php page (probably something like shopping_cart.php located in the sideboxes folder), and pull out the necessary code. Note that the code may require some look-up info from the header.

My guess is that it would work, especially if the cart is installed in the same root domain.

My suggestion: install a sample cart with a few items. See how the "add to cart" button works, how the thumbnails appear in the cart, and how the cart sidebox functions. Then, see if you can view or extract the product IDs straight from the DB.

This will definitely take some work, but there really is a lot of information here. And after a few years working in ZenCart (me), I think you'll be hard-pressed to find a more versatile, free cart, with such amazing support.

[plains_man]

Okay dmfelder, assuming that I embark on your suggested complicated journey into zen cart land, please allow me to demonstrate my lack of knowledge: what and where is the *header* from which I am supposed to look-up info? And having looked it up what would I do with it?

You are also saying *see if you can view or extract the product IDs straight from the DB*. Does this mean you are only guessing that I can do this?

I also don't want to turn you away (your enthusiasm has me considering trying zen cart) but from what I read about the ############## design solution, posted in the link by stevesh in the first response to my enquiry here, it is no simple task to wrap zen cart in one's overall site design. Especially if one does not know PHP. I am still struggling at the novice level with javascript. PHP looks to me a little like learning Chinese.

[dmfelder]

The header information I refer to is really just "where" you would find the search box code. All you really need to do is view the source code and inspect the form and submit button. That way, you could get the same result as if you were inside of zencart.

As for extracting the product ids, that will be simple. Open the zen_products table in PHPMyAdmin, go to "browse" and hit export. You can export in txt or xls files.

The other piece was adding to a cart. Go to any standard product page and view the source code. Like I mentioned above, you can copy the form submit section and simulate the "add to cart" button. Once you know the product id, drop it right in, and it will be added to the cart.

The only think left is to redirect any "exit" from the cart. In other words, if there is a "continue shopping" button, you simply need to overwrite the URL.

I'm not trying to oversimplify here. I think once you set up a basic cart with 2 or 3 items, you can easily inspect the PHP-generated source code. Then, if you REALLY need to make PHP changes, you can use the "Developers Tool Kit" under "Tools" in the admin module.

Zen Cart is so CSS based that you can change the entire look just by changing the stylesheet.css file.

In any case, it should take you an hour or two to set up a basic test site. Ignore the sideboxes, and look at the real meat of your code.

Good luck.