I have some questions about how Zen Cart works

I'm just starting to build an online store and was wondering if Zen Cart will do what I need.

1. Pages that are not within the Zen Cart system (my own html pages) at https://www.site.com.
2. The cart setup at https://www.site.com/cart

The items need to be listed on my own html pages outside of the Zen Cart system. By using an added html code or something. When they click the "Add to cart" button on any of the items, they will be forwarded to https://www.site.com/cart and the item will be added to the cart. Then they would either proceed with checkout or press continue shopping and it would take them back to https://www.site.com. So basically be able to add items to the cart from an html code on a page that isn't in the same php system/thing as Zen Cart.

There is an example of this done here: http://www.rosettastone.com/en/individuals/languages/german/level-1?_session_id= *** &commit=More+Information
They are using an added html code to add the item to the shopping cart.

Can this be done with Zen Cart? Thank you for helping me out with this one!

Zen Cart is not designed to be operated in that manner.

Ok thank you. Can you point me to something that is?

While it would be some work to transfer all of your html pages to Zen Cart, in the long run you would be much better off. Zen Cart is built on the fly using the information from the database and that means much less maintenance to add/change/move products around.

Kim:

While it would be some work to transfer all of your html pages to Zen Cart, in the long run you would be much better off. Zen Cart is built on the fly using the information from the database and that means much less maintenance to add/change/move products around.I understand that. But I feel limited in what I can do using the php template system. I'm now looking at other cart solutions because of this. It seems like a very easy thing compared to what Zen Cart does. So I'd think they would have a strip down option to allow you to do this.

immersive,
what cant be done in the zc templates?

you are only limited by your imagination,

and if you have more than a few products updating html each time there is a product change is gonna suck

A similar sort of question was asked recently in

http://www.zen-cart.com/forum/showthread.php?t=50109

I wonder if this would make a good FAQ question, because it does seem to come up periodically.

Immersive, my understanding was that GoDaddy's shopping cart product worked this way, but I just looked at a write up

http://www.ecommerce-guide.com/solutions/building/article.php/3497841

that seemed to suggest that it is a complete system as well. Perhaps if you were to shop
around and look for ISPs that offered add-on cart functionality that would yield some results.
Here's something else:

http://www.quickcart.com

Remember though that with solutions like this, you're going to have to pay some sort of monthly fee based on the size of your catalog. You might be better off in the long run just converting to Zen Cart even though it means abandoning your current site design.

Good luck,
Scott

swguy:

A similar sort of question was asked recently in

http://www.zen-cart.com/forum/showthread.php?t=50109

I wonder if this would make a good FAQ question, because it does seem to come up periodically.

Immersive, my understanding was that GoDaddy's shopping cart product worked this way, but I just looked at a write up

http://www.ecommerce-guide.com/solutions/building/article.php/3497841

that seemed to suggest that it is a complete system as well. Perhaps if you were to shop
around and look for ISPs that offered add-on cart functionality that would yield some results.
Here's something else:

http://www.quickcart.com

Remember though that with solutions like this, you're going to have to pay some sort of monthly fee based on the size of your catalog. You might be better off in the long run just converting to Zen Cart even though it means abandoning your current site design.

Good luck,
ScottYeah I think you're right. I probably will just go with Zen Cart. I was hoping to not have to learn and figure out the template system lol. But once I do, I will have a much better site.

But once I do, I will have a much better site

:yes: :yes: :yes: exactly! Welcome to Zen!