Things every New Zenner needs to know

[Kim]

Did you look in the forum designated for Mac setup?

[KEMentor]

I am considering writing a "Getting Started" style document that focuses on templates, overrides, colors, text, images and the like. Perhaps a reasonable title will be "Top 10 Questions asked by New Zenners" or "10 things every New Zenner should know but doesn't know where to find."

I would like to hear from New Zenners about this project. What did you have the most trouble with? What documents did you feel were lacking? What were the top problems and questions you had? -- Things like that.

Please consider including a section on changing the font color on the EZ Pages TOC navigation bar for those of us who use a dark background here. I figured out how to change the side-boxes, etc., but have been unable to get navEZPagesTOC to remain white through link, active & visited like my navMain primary navigation menu does.

I'll be posting a query about this shortly, when I find the correct venue for it.

I also spent a great deal of time yesterday searching the FAQ & forum for instructions for "centering" a block of text. Something so simple (I'm sure) but so frustrating not to find it.

I did, however, find tons of great info to take me a step beyond the user manual (which is great as far as it goes). Thanks to all who have posted here, and who are so patient with us Zen newbies!

[clydejones]

Please consider including a section on changing the font color on the EZ Pages TOC navigation bar for those of us who use a dark background here. I figured out how to change the side-boxes, etc., but have been unable to get navEZPagesTOC to remain white through link, active & visited like my navMain primary navigation menu does.

Open you stylesheet.css and find the following declaration and add the highlighted portion to suit your needs.

#navEZPagesTOC ul li a {
padding: 0em 0.5em;
margin: 0;
color: #ffffff;
}

[KEMentor]

Open you stylesheet.css and find the following declaration and add the highlighted portion to suit your needs.

#navEZPagesTOC ul li a {
padding: 0em 0.5em;
margin: 0;
color: #ffffff;
}

re: www.craftkorner.com/zencart


Thanks Clyde, that gets me one step closer. Now the link is white (ffffff) when clicked. However the unvisited and visited states still show up in dark blue, which is not visible on my dark red background.

I even tried going back to my "Classic" stylesheet.css & picking up the original code to over-write anything I flubbed. Then I lost the white when link clicked. I'll include my code below, showing prior changes. I went back to this when the restoration did not work.

Any further suggestions? And thanks again.

Here's the code:

/*Lines 22 - 53 had already been edited to this before my original post:*/

a:link, #navEZPagesTOC ul li a {
color: #ffffff;
text-decoration: none;
}

a:link, #navMain ul li a:link, #navSupp ul li a:link, #navCatTabs ul li a:link {
color: #3300FF;
text-decoration: none;
}

a:visited #navEZPagesTOC ul li a {
color: #ffffff;
text-decoration: none;
}

a:visited #navMain ul li a:hover, #navSupp ul li a:hover, #navCatTabs ul li a:hover {
color: #3300FF;
text-decoration: none;
}

a:hover, #navEZPagesTOC ul li a:hover, #navMain ul li a:hover, #navSupp ul li a:hover, #navCatTabs ul li a:hover {
color: #FF0000;
}

a:active, #navEZPagesTOC ul li a {
color: #ffffff;
}

a:active #navMain ul li a:active, #navSupp ul li a:active, #navCatTabs ul li a:active {
color: #0000FF;
}

/*Per your directions I edited lines 326 - 330 as follows:*/

#navEZPagesTOC ul li a {
padding: 0em 0.5em;
margin: 0;
color: #ffffff
}

[mikemcc]

Being new to zen cart, the biggest problem I have is English. A lot of us that just started with an ecommerce site, don't understand the language of what people or the instructions tell us. We don't know how to get to the areas to modify the strings. Example, how do we know where:
includes/templates/template_default/images/logo.gif
is and how to modify it.

I just bought my site from Turnkey nation and I have other sites from the same and different companies, but they use os commerce and the why they have the admin set up, it is very easy to modify items once you start playing with it. I have a lot of things I need and want to change on my new site, but can't figure out how to do it.

For instance:
How do I add a COST column to my products list?

How do I change the shipping pricing to charge a flat rate for the first item and then an additional amount for each item after?

How do I make the template wider to fill the site width?

How do I set up my site to accept data feeds from my vendors to keep inventory and itmes up to date?


I could go on but you get the point..... I am lost...

[clydejones]

re: www.craftkorner.com/zencart


Thanks Clyde, that gets me one step closer. Now the link is white (ffffff) when clicked. However the unvisited and visited states still show up in dark blue, which is not visible on my dark red background.

I even tried going back to my "Classic" stylesheet.css & picking up the original code to over-write anything I flubbed. Then I lost the white when link clicked. I'll include my code below, showing prior changes. I went back to this when the

Just make the following changes: change the color to what you need.

#navEZPagesTOC ul li a {
padding: 0em 0.5em;
margin: 0;
color: #ffffff;
}
#navEZPagesTOC ul li a:active {
padding: 0em 0.5em;
margin: 0;
color: #ffffff;
}
#navEZPagesTOC ul li a:visited {
padding: 0em 0.5em;
margin: 0;
color: #ffffff;
}
#navEZPagesTOC ul li a:hover {
padding: 0em 0.5em;
margin: 0;
color: #ffffff;
}

[clydejones]

Being new to zen cart, the biggest problem I have is English. A lot of us that just started with an ecommerce site, don't understand the language of what people or the instructions tell us. We don't know how to get to the areas to modify the strings. Example, how do we know where:
includes/templates/template_default/images/logo.gif
is and how to modify it.

I just bought my site from Turnkey nation and I have other sites from the same and different companies, but they use os commerce and the why they have the admin set up, it is very easy to modify items once you start playing with it. I have a lot of things I need and want to change on my new site, but can't figure out how to do it.

For instance:
How do I add a COST column to my products list?

How do I change the shipping pricing to charge a flat rate for the first item and then an additional amount for each item after?

How do I make the template wider to fill the site width?

How do I set up my site to accept data feeds from my vendors to keep inventory and itmes up to date?


I could go on but you get the point..... I am lost...

The Tutorial/FAQ section is a great place to start

[kevinmc3]

The eStart Your Web Store with Zen Cart book is ok,a good start. But, as a non programmer it lacked quite a bit particularly with the template system. And the section on over-rides seems to be missing some important pieces as I followed it verbatim but then when I employed the new template (copied from the old) it didn't work. A new , MUCH expanded edition would be great.

[WHAnderson]

PRE-EMPTIVE EDIT:

A lot of documentation has been added to the Knowledgebase:
https://www.zen-cart.com/tutorials/i...hp?category=16

Further, you will find great value in the eStart Your Web Store with Zen Cart users manual, which walks you through setting up your Zen Cart site from start to finish, along with many day-to-day tasks.
You can get your copy of the book here: http://www.lulu.com/content/466605


----------------------------------------------
Original discussion:
New Zen Cart users get easily frustrated. They often do not know how to find answers to their questions and if they stumble onto the right answer they don't realize it's the right answer. The recent 'reboot' for the forum so closely on the heels of the upgrade to 1.3 seems to have made things worse.

I am considering writing a "Getting Started" style document that focuses on templates, overrides, colors, text, images and the like. Perhaps a reasonable title will be "Top 10 Questions asked by New Zenners" or "10 things every New Zenner should know but doesn't know where to find."

I would like to hear from New Zenners about this project. What did you have the most trouble with? What documents did you feel were lacking? What were the top problems and questions you had? -- Things like that.

Part of the rationale for this project is that as users can perform more tasks without having to post a thread like "I am such a newb and have no idea what I am doing" it will free the Devs for more time in core upgrades. Hopefully, users that are more successful at the beginning will press on and have a viable online business and donate back to Zen Cart.

I will be away from the forum for a few days (niece's wedding) this weekend. Further, I don't plan to reply to every post. This is a place to collect feedback from new users.

If more experienced users post, perhaps you could list the mistakes you most often see.

The final location for the project is uncertain. In many ways, it will be a duplicate of material in the FAQ and Wiki. However, much of that material needs to be updated and New Zenners seem to not read it or not understand it. I will continue to try to coordinate this with the Devs so that it benefits the most in the community.

Please presume a successful install of ZenCart 1.3+. I would like to focus on customizations issues that every new users is likely to experience.

Feel free to PM with info you would rather not be in the forum.

A few comments on what I experience, and cause frustration, as a new user to ZenCart:

1. A Directory/Folder tree.
a. Shows a listing of all of the files in ZenCart.
b. Can be expanded and modified over time to include:

1) Highlighting the user accessible files for modification.
2) Allow a Copy and Paste function of the specific file location. Right now, questions get answered with directions like, and I quote; "Open you stylesheet.css and find the following declaration and add the highlighted portion to suit your needs." (That is a copy and paste of a real answer, including the mis-spelling, of an actual reply to a request for help.) There are four files named 'stylesheet.css' in different folders.

Which one of these four files is the person being told to change? Do they have to change all four files? And, there are 30 'index.html' files in ZenCart. Answers need to be more specific about the file location of the files which need to be modified. Otherwise, it is just plain frustration for the new person.

3)Highlight, color, or put into Italics those files which can NOT be modified without destroying ZenCart.

2. Some reviews and updated hot links for new people to go to and learn basics about HTML, Javascript, CSS, and PHP. A lot of us have never tried to do this before and do not know where to begin to find competent help. Or, even how to effectively search for that help.

3. Expand the ZenCart Forum Search Function to allow 'Exact Match' or 'Exact Phrase' searches which include the "three" (3) letter acronyms ( 'Zen' 'PHP' 'CSS' 'SEO' '2CO' 'QBI' 'IPN' 'lib' and the list goes on) which everyone likes to throw around but there is no way to actually search for them.

Try a search for 'EZ Pages TOC', which has become a popular item, and you get 299 results found for the word "pages" only. It looks like the search engine has a maximum of 299 results.

4. How about some, really basic, instructions on how to actually use the website search engine. Most new people only know two ways to search; Google or Yahoo. Searching with wild card characters - are they allowed? If so, which ones are not allowed?

5. What you can actually use the Admin Control Panel to do and, really important for new people, what can you NOT do using the Admin Control Panel?

[RayNAustin]

Hello All,

I'm probably the best to chime in on this topic because I probably know the least, as in...relatively nothing.

First, I'm not a programmer, and have little to no knowledge of HTML, PHP. I do have some familiarity with programs like Corel Draw, so my thoughts were that a WYSIWYG approach (Dream Weaver) to building a site would be the logical choice.

The problem is, I haven't found a good explanation of the relationships between Zen Cart (proper) and it's customizable template, versus a Zen Cart template that can be purchased, and whether you actually can use Dream Weaver to re-format/customize either of them.

I'm assuming that Dream Weaver is ostensibly a visual editor that converts WYSIWYG into the appropriate HTML/PHP/FLASH code, while the Zen Cart tutorials are manual editing instructions that require at least some understanding of HTML/PHP coding?

My biggest question starting out is: would the best approach be for a novice to select a pre-designed Zen Cart template (100's of them available for under $150) that has the desired look and feel, which would only require slight modifications like Logos and category naming, etc.....and can a program like Dream Weaver be used to make those modifications?

Or do I understand even less than I thought I did about all of this?

Thanks