Can I do this in Zen Cart? If not, what should I use?

Please look at this site for Machine Screws:

http://www.mcmaster.com/#machine-screw-fasteners/=c9ftsl

Is there any way in Zen Cart to do something like this? My client has a need to "build-a-screw" using many of the variables seen here (Head, Material, Drive, Measurement, etc.). Ultimately, if you drill down on the McMaster-Carr site, you will get to a data sheet. This is something that my client needs.

I tried using attributes, but it's just too clunky for the client. Here is a rough attempt:

http://www.apexfasteners.com/fasteners/threaded-products/screws/machine-screws/apex-fasteners-machine-screw

From here, can I make it show a hyperlinked part number that they click on to see a data sheet?

If this cannot be done in Zen Cart, please offer any suggestions that might get to what is shown on McMaster-Carr. I would be happy to build that separately and try to integrate or simply link to this.

Thanks in advance for any and all help!

Zen Cart's attribute structure is appropriate for this, but the general purpose maintenance and display code fitted around it would be overly complex.

The normal way to handle this is to write custom maintenance and display routines simplified down to your specific requirements.

As open source software, Zen Cart is ideally suited to this. I very much doubt that you'll find anything that supports your specific requirement without custom coding.

Another site that does something similar using .asp is http://www.instockfasteners.com/PRODUCTS/machinescrews.asp

They aren't as smooth as McMaster-Carr, but they do allow some amount of customizing variables/attributes after you choose some factors.

Kuroi,

I appreciate the quick response. ZenCart definitely works for the rest of the site: http://www.apexfasteners.com/fasteners/

I am very happy with the way ZenCart works, and I've used it for a number of ecommerce sites as well as showroom type sites.

I agree that the custom coding would be overly complex. That's why I wonder if there's some type of software already out there that I could use to integrate into this site for this one purpose: build-a-screw.

In a spreadsheet for example, I can have a list of all of the possible machine screws. By filtering certain fields (Head, Material, Drive, Measurement, etc.), I can drill down to the screw I'm looking for. Is there something like that already out there - a spreadsheet and filter built for the web?

Thanks!

Actually I'm saying the opposite of that which you attribute to me. I doubt you'll find a simple solution out there already because the requirement is complex.

You make it manageable by custom coding to remove the complexity that you don't need from Zen Cart's generic attribute facilities.