Using just cart only or redesign website?

Hello,

which is do people think is easier to implement:

1, coding to replace the current PayPal Shopping Cart, or
2, redesign the website pages?

Monarchy Catering

I would really like the option to run just the shopping cart, what would I need to do, and how tricky is it?

I want to use ZenCart as we have a complicated shipping cost by weight calculations, multi-currencies and multi-languages.

Thanks,

Mark.

I'm not entirely sure what you are after but Zencart is a WHOLISTIC e-commerce solution. It cannot be split into "bits", so if you want to use the excellent functionality of ZC's shopping cart process, then you'll have to use everything else too. With a little bit of effort, it can be made into a very attractive website.

PayPal integrates very well with ZC, and takes just a few minutes to configure if you have a PayPal Premier or Business account.

Thanks for the prompt reply...

I have spent the last few days looking at SC solutions and really can't figure out why so few SC's can be used stand alone? The bells and whistles are great to fall back on if needed.

My product pages are generated from XML files, and so are updated by the client. Therefore, don't require any other facilities. Each item has an auto-code-generated "Add to Cart" button and all that's required. Elsewhere is the "View Cart" which displays the list of selected items. Simple.

Sorry to be a pain, but I'm just hitting the rails at the moment. Any alternative suggestions on SC's greatfully received....

Thanks,

Mark.

The site design is simple and clean, and would be easy enough to replicate in Zen Cart.
You have only four pages of content, and they could easily be put into ZC define pages and ez-pages.
The "anti-robot" function can be done with an available ZC mod.

All the rest of the product content can be entered straight into ZC.
I don't know about "feeding" xml content into products, but all of the product details (options, pricing, discounts) need to be within the ZC system in order for it to handle the backend functions.

OK, you do have products already entered. Because your menu depends entirely on javascript with no alternate functionality, anyone browsing with javascript off will never know that you have products to sell on your site.

"can't figure out why so few SC's can be used stand alone?"

From a developer's point of view, who would want to spend their time making something robust and full-featured in the back end without a full front end? Making such a back end that can seamlessly integrate with everybody else's front end would be much more difficult, and unless it were sold for a fixed price I don't imagine it would have the visibility to generate donations sufficient to support development.

I beg to differ from others (but only slightly) as ZC can be used in bits, to a degree.

If you need to, you can build just a store or you can build a store with integrated CMS using EZ or define pages.

Take a look at my portfolio to see that ZC really is as versatile as your imagination.

You can possibly even, with a bit of effort, integrate ZC into a phpBB (forum) or even wordpress/ joomla.

Yes, there have been threads posted, and even a mod or two I think, that will allow some of this to be done. The whole hog "backend only" will have to be tailored to each situation and I don't think can be done without considerable programming skill.

Thanks to both of you for replying.

I have been a developer for almost 20 years, mainly using 3rd and 4th generation languages. Design through tiers and object orientation were at the fore-front of the development stages. From that view point, there should really be some form of abstraction between each attribute of a total solution. You never want to create a monolithic solution.

I have searched for the last week through SC's and think that ZenCart is the best by far with the language and currencies support.

Regards,

Mark.

A little background info - Zen Cart was created from a base of osCommerce code, and there is still a lot of that code in various parts of ZC. The devs have steadily been working to make the code more modular, to current coding standards, and easy to add modifications without hacking core code. It is obviously a work in progress, and will continue to improve.

No criticism of ZenCart intended. For a totally free complete ecommerce solution it is the best. I started looking at ZenCart, due to it's name, not fully understanding the other built-in aspects.

I am planning more websites and will be using ZenCart in the future.

Thanks,

Mark.

I am surprised noone mentioned that you can charge by weight for items ordered. This can be done in the shipping modules by adding a price based on an items weight. you can customize this however you'd like. The only thing I am not sure of if you can modify the charges by size and weight.

I am sure that a little playing (changing) with code in the modules>shipping directory you can modify code to provide the functionality your looking for. Given the existing template someone could create this for you at a low cost if you are unable to do so yourself.

I have built a few stores usign the ZC program and given the customization available and knowing/learning what the code does makes for some fun for those that hack the code beyond what the admin area allows. Clients happily pay for the customizations that they want for the store. And given that the main template is free, it costs a significantly less amount of money and time to do the mods for design and layout changes.

I really like this program and have "stripped" alot from it manually, testing on a server before using it for any live sites. I can attest that this is a great software with unlimited possibilities. The only thing that was a problem for me was the amount of duplication within the directories. An example to this is the stylesheet.css that was in the templates>classic>css and templates>template default>css folders. Combining both of these files made modifying appearance much easier and less of a headache. Unless I missed something there was no need to have 2 different .css files.

Another functionality that is available is the admin access rights mod. You can control the access a client gets to the site. I use this for interns to add products to my site. This will enable you to allow clients access to add products quickly and easily without alot of headaches of creating pages, putting cart buttons and linking the pages. You can simply add the product.

Doesn't hurt to install ZC somewhere and play with the functionality, design, and modifications some.