Need to make attributes forced and Questionnaire style

Have searched forums and tutorials for about a week, but not finding enough information to be helpful.

I have a product (actually a service) that requires extensive information from the customer in the form of a completed QUESTIONNAIRE. Some questions are lengthy and Zen Cart does not accomodate long text option names or values; also some answers are in form of check boxes, some are radio buttons and some are text or textarea. But ALL are required to provide a complete scenario.

I chose Zen Cart because someone told me it was easier than OS Commerce to set up...but maybe it doesn't fit what I need to do.

Can Zen Cart be "easily" modified to accomodate lengthy questions (or add the questions in the form of text added direclty to a template file for the specific product, near each attribute/option name thingy?). If so, can someone offer some guidance please?

Also, I need the questionnaire fields to be REQUIRED before the "add to cart" button will work. If there is not an easy way for Zen Cart to force these fields to be filled, then can a javascript be added to not allow the "add to cart" button to work until all fields are completed? if so, what file(s) should I be looking in to add the javascript?

I hope this makes sense, I am new to Zen Cart, just installed last week the newest version on Linux with current php, mysql versions (using Hostgator), and no add-ons installed.

Thank you TO ALL for the wonderful support you provide to each other and the general community of would-be self-employed business owners (that would mean "me").

I look forward to some advice. If it won't work, I'd rather find out now than struggle for several more weeks and THEN have to start all over again.

thank you!!!!! :blush:

Zen Cart is easier than osCommerce to set up, but your requirement is quite specific. The need for a pre-purchase questionnaire is quite common, but each situation seems to have its own quirks.

This is the first time that I have heard of somebody trying to use attributes to satisfy this requirement. It's an ingenious approach, but also tries to twist attributes to do something slightly beyond what they were designed for.

A more common approach is use Zen Cart's open source nature, to add fields to the checkout process and there are a number of threads that discuss how this can be done. This approach allows the visitor to add the product to the cart, but not checkout with it until the required information has been submitted.

Thanks very much, Kuroi,

See....I just know nothing about Zen Cart. The information you offered was extremely helpful, and perhaps will provide a much better solution for me. I will start looking around for threads regarding this feature.

If you happen to know of some good ones, I wouldn't mind a bit if you were to direct me to them (the search function of this forum is a bit difficult to use, or...alternatively....I'm just stupid).

:wacko: