Question about checkout_process.php and $_SESSION['order_number_created']

[xianFF0000]

I have a question about the creation of customer orders. It seems that checkout_process.php calls $order->create(); to create the order. My question is: Is the order created solely through checkout_process.php or is it ever created through a payment module or another module?

I'm asking because I see no other way of capturing the order_id other than using an observer and listening for NOTIFY_CHECKOUT_PROCESS_AFTER_ORDER_CREATE_ADD_PRODUCTS then using $_SESSION['order_number_created'] which is only supplied in checkout_process.php.

[DrByte]

My question is: Is the order created solely through checkout_process.php or is it ever created through a payment module or another module?

In v1.3.x, some payment modules such as "PayPal IPN" and "NoChex APC" do insert order records on their own independent from checkout_process.php.

I'm asking because I see no other way of capturing the order_id ...

For what purpose are you trying to capture the order_id?

[bunyip]

An order can be created without going through the checkout_process module - this can happen in some circumstances such as delayed response from Paypal IPN, when the cart will create the order as a result of the IPN data post. However, the notifier NOTIFY_ORDER_AFTER_ORDER_CREATE_ADD_PRODUCTS is still issued, directly by the function create_add_products in the orders.php class file.
Although not generally used at the moment, the notify function does have the capability to include a parameter array in the notification.
You could modify the notify event in the function create_add_products to include the order number as a parameter, and use that in your observer function. To do that , change this line in includes/classes/order.php:

    $zco_notifier->notify('NOTIFY_ORDER_AFTER_ORDER_CREATE_ADD_PRODUCTS'); 

to this:

    $zco_notifier->notify('NOTIFY_ORDER_AFTER_ORDER_CREATE_ADD_PRODUCTS', $zf_insert_id); 

[xianFF0000]

Thank you both.

What I'm using it for:
I have an order_total module that uses an API to calculate the fee. That API has 2 methods, getQuote, getConfirmation.... so the order_total module "process()" uses the API getQuote to calculate the fee.

I was struggling with a way to call the API getConfirmation after a completed order. The API creates a tracking number for the customer that appears on the invoice but you need to call getConfirmation so the 3rd party system knows the fee was successfully processed.

So yeah this is helpful stuff, thanks again.