Things every new zenner shouldn't have to know

Ok. I am not exactly an idiot, but I have never seen such a mess. Got zc installed no problem with the demo stuff and I have my usual look around.

First, I thought the demo items would make things easier to understand. Just the opposite. Why 125 items?? Why not just a few? How can a new user keep track of what is going on? The store is a mess out of the box. So I thought it would be easier to just get rid of the sample stuff and just start adding my own products and see how things flow

So I browse around the forums and the FAQs, learn out to get that Congrats! message out of there, add a category and a product. Simple, yes? Well, not really. I create a category with a description, looks ok. I then create a product with a description and an image -- Basic online store stuff. What do I see? The category description is missing and in its place is the product description.

OK, so I tell myself I am missing some basic knowledge of the store logic. I read some more. The more I read the more disgusted I feel about what I thought would be a great product.

I shouldn't have to read volumes of posts, FAQS and articles to get basic info that should be somewhat deducible by the admin layout. I should be able to bang out some categories and products, even change basic store layout such as 2 col or 3 col without much reading and effort.

Are there any add-ons that make it easier to build the darn store without having to know every feature of zc and how those features co-exist? Sheesh:censored:

Ah, I found a wiki for this thing, let's see......

Uhm, there are many carts out there, no one forces you to use ZC. And you did not have to pay the ones who code ZC, nor the ones who write all the FAQ/wiki, nor the ones who coded add-on module, not even a single cent.

What gives you the right to be angry?

If you actually look carefully through the demo products, you will see that most of them have descriptions of how some particular feature works. Some of them are there just to show how larger quantities of products are handled in certain situations.

TechOnADesk:

I shouldn't have to read volumes of posts, FAQS and articles to get basic info that should be somewhat deducible by the admin layout. I should be able to bang out some categories and products, even change basic store layout such as 2 col or 3 col without much reading and effort.

Zen Cart provides a balance between ease of use and configurability. Some systems are easier to skin and datafill, but provide very limited opportunities for customization in other areas. Still other systems are highly customizable on both the front and back end, but are expensive and require extensive study before you can become productive using them.

Many many many other e-commerce options exist. Explore them. But understand there's always a trade-off between cost, complexity, customizability and ease of use. To say that a novice "should" be able to do a,b and c, and an experienced person should be able to do x, y and z may be incompatible objectives. Quite often systems that are easy to get started with provide hours of frustration and grief six months down the road when you realize the customization you require will not be possible. Just last week I read a thread of angry ranting about why it takes Shopify forever to make changes to their software. With Zen Cart, you can DIY or hire it done.

Start your search at shopping-cart-reviews DOT com

Good luck,
Scott

You only have to know enough to do what you want to do with Zen Cart. There's no reason to > know every feature of zc and how those features co-exist.

If you looked at the demo products and the various notices on all the screens in the demo shop, you'd know how to do pretty much all of what you need to do because it TELLS you how.

its funny really its always the long term zenners who seem to think its easy to sort problems out. Maybe they were born as great Zenners but to them i say have patience as we all werent. I was lead to beliebve by a number of zenners that zencart is great for newbies - well i think not. When you do search and sift through post after post you dont always find the answer and if you do its often written by well experienced zenners who think everyone understands the spaghetti of obscure words so before anyone suggests to a newbie - please search for the answer tell yourself that they probably have and thats why they have posted the call for help.

Yes, ZC can be confusing to someone who has never used a system quite like it.

There is a "manual" (e-Start Your Web Store With Zen Cart) that you can buy (links for it in the header of the ZC site here and all over) that is very helpful to many newbies. It walks you through the basics, learning the admin switches, etc. Then there are other tutorials out there for things like customizing the template, both free here on the site and for sale by others (disclaimer -- including myself LOL).

I remember when I first started using ZC, it didn't make much sense to me. The biggest thing is try not to be on a rushed deadline. Take your time and explore it. The more you explore, the more you'll understand it and the easier it will be to learn.

HTH,

ZC is hard to understand, I TOTALLY agree with you (but it's the same for most other softwares tho). You gotta have patience. I have spent a great deal of time with it to really understand how it work.

But there are some tricks and tools to find a way around the problems, I think I will find time and write a mini tutorial in the near future.

oakwoodevents:

its funny really its always the long term zenners who seem to think its easy to sort problems out. Maybe they were born as great Zenners but to them i say have patience as we all werent. I was lead to beliebve by a number of zenners that zencart is great for newbies - well i think not. When you do search and sift through post after post you dont always find the answer and if you do its often written by well experienced zenners who think everyone understands the spaghetti of obscure words so before anyone suggests to a newbie - please search for the answer tell yourself that they probably have and thats why they have posted the call for help.

No, they probably HAVEN'T searched for it. Take a look at the forums and see how many times the same questions are asked and asked and asked by people who all swear they searched for it first and insist that no one ever asked it before. :huh:

Someone swore up and down that he/she had searched the tutorials/FAQ and did not find an answer to the question. I searched, found it in a few seconds and posted the link to him/her. I highly doubt the person spent any time searching for the answer. It's much easier to post the question and sit back waiting for someone to hand you the answer.

[/end rant]

Yellow is absolutely correct. There is a learning curve with Zen Cart that exists with anything new that you set out to learn. If someone expects Zen Cart (or anything else) to do exactly what he/she wants just by installing it, he/she is in for a rude awakening and a rough time setting up a cart.

I tried several other carts before settling on Zen Cart because I got better results faster and with less effort than with other similar carts. As Lesli pointed out, you really need to play around with it and not expect to get it done on a short deadline.

I remember the first time I used Excel ... not only did I have to pay for the software ... I later had to pay for the classes to get a clue on how to use it ...

And that was just to learn how to manipulate the spreadsheet and learn a few basic things ...

Then there was the time I wanted to use Word ... dang if I didn't have to read up on how to do a whole load of things ...

You'd think you could just poke at a menu and find the answer ... but oh no, the dumb program does so many things you actually have to dig into the menus or read the help or FAQs or take a class or what ever ...

Never could get help on a forum for those packages ...

I mean I could have ... but I couldn't afford their fees ... :cry:

I think a lot of newbies also assume, "Oh, I can create a website, so it must be a wysiwyg like FrontPage/Dreamweaver."

It's not.

I always tell people first go through ALL the Admin switches. Set up a test store and do nothing BUT play with the Admin switches to figure out what they do. (Many questions asked in the forums are easily-found admin switches if someone had actually played around with them.)

I share Mary Ellen's rant that someone will post a question (How do I get rid of the Congratulations message? I can't find that ANYWHERE...) that has been answered not just in the FAQs, but ad naseum in the forums, simply because they want a "fast" answer and/or are lazy. If someone is that lost, they need to shell out the money to buy the e-Start book.

Linda brings up an excellent point -- many software packages not only require you buy them, but pay for support as well. ZC has an excellent VOLUNTEER support forum. (And btw, if you haven't donated to the ZC project, you have no room to complain because the software is FREE.)

I also tried several packages before settling on ZC, including a built-in GoDaddy webstore package that did not meet my needs.

I love that there are extensions for ZC to do what you need, and if you need custom work you can do it yourself or pay someone to do it (or request it and band together with others to bring it to fruition).

I don't have a huge business. I do enough volume to allow me to stay at home with my son (fortunately my dh works). But if someone has a huge business, they can make use of ZC. ZC is fully flexible and configurable.

NO e-commerce software package out there (unless it's thousands of dollars) will come ready "out of the box" to set up and start you selling in five minutes. I started using ZC in late 2005, and it wasn't until last year that I really started digging deep into the template to make my own from scratch. (I could have done it sooner except that I didn't have time.)

If ZC frustrates you, get a book on CSS, a book on PHP, and the e-Start book for ZC. That right there will help you a lot. But you need to be willing to put the time and effort (sweat equity) into learning it.

[/rant off]

NO e-commerce software package out there (unless it's thousands of dollars) will come ready "out of the box" to set up and start you selling in five minutes.

Corollary: any package which purports to allow you to do setup in minutes is so feature-poor that you'll wind up ditching it and starting again after six months.

TANSTAAFL.

Its such a joke - all that ranting and yet no offer of a solution to my problem and by the way i pay Servage for the Zencart. You might disagree and probably will but thats their offer and thats what i pay for - like it or not.
i have the zencart manual and my problem isnt answered in there.
I went for Servage on the suggestion of another forum and was told its great for beginners - not in my case.
When i get to the grand status of many on here i dont think i will write volumes on - please search before you post. No doubt many high flyers on Zencart have forgotten what its like to be a newbie - but why rant about our asking for help ? Do us newbies a favour and bypass us as you just add to our frustration. THANK GOD THERE ARE SOME GREAT ZENNERS WHO DO OFFER SUGGESTIONS AND HELP to those i say a BIG thank you

5 minutes ? strange that as i was told it would be a few days - 2 weeks later i have a problem that no search through posts can answer, but i wont be doing any more postings as it seems to me the only postings many like is those that spout off about newbies asking for help which is a true indication of the world we live in.

oakwoodevents:

5 minutes ? strange that as i was told it would be a few days - 2 weeks later i have a problem that no search through posts can answer, but i wont be doing any more postings as it seems to me the only postings many like is those that spout off about newbies asking for help which is a true indication of the world we live in.

I have to say, that I am a newbie myself, but can sort quite a few things out using the search function here.
I thought I might try and help you and have looked at your 20 posts.

Your first problem was solved expertly in this thread: http://www.zen-cart.com/forum/showthread.php?t=84050

Your second problem here: http://www.zen-cart.com/forum/showthread.php?t=84203 Well, it seems that people have tried to help you as much as they can but with all due respect, you don't appear to read the posts very well. Perhaps you are just skimming over them?
Barco57 clearly said to you (after trying to help already) "at this point to really see what is going on I would need to have access." But you ignored him.

If somebody offered to go that far in helping me, I would be 'over the moon'. The guy has offered to log-in to your C-panel and sort out your permissions problem on your images folder. Why don't you let him?

It's no good spouting off that nobody helps you if you ignore the advice you've clearly been offered.

Sheesh! :blink:

with respect you only see what you see

oakwoodevents:

with respect you only see what you see

Very well said. And, with respect, clearly it goes both ways.

Let me tell you, 2 weeks ago was the first time I have EVER installed and used a shopping cart software.
My company has an online shop, but we are growing and we figured it was time to upgrade the site. My manager said I had unlimited time and resources to develop a new store.
So I started developing my own store for a couple days. I then stopped and thought, this must have been done a million times before, why am I developing it from scratch?
I then remembered someone talking about zen cart a few years back for PHP and how it was free and easily customizable.
So I downloaded zen cart, installed it, downloaded a couple different templates on this site, and tried them out.
I looked at how the templates made the look of the cart extremely different. Most of it is just with the CSS, but some more advanced features you need to code with PHP.

So 1 day later, I had a fully functional cart up, with all our products added. I shown it to my boss and he said wow how did you get that all done in 3 days.
We then reviewed it, he had a bunch of different tweaks that he wanted done. Most were easy, some were more difficult, but all of them (except a couple) were answered in the forums, or were available for download.

The only thing I had to figure out on my own was how to add custom sorting to the featured products (I just added in another field into the database and added another textbox to featured products)
The other big issue was wanting the users be able to checkout without an account. I found a mod on here that did exactly that and it saved me so much time.
In ONE week I went from not ever using, installing and configuring a shopping cart, to having a fully functional ecommerce website. We are meeting with the head boss tomorrow to get final approval, but my manager is really excited.

Starting off with a template or two, and seeing how they did it really sped up the learning process.
I guess I am a developer, so it may be easier for me to configure it how I need to, since I can understand some of the code. But using SEARCH in the forums, and looking through the faqs was definitely how I figured out how to do most things.
Also, for general layout purposes I highly recommend installing Firefox, and firebug, because you can play around with the css and INSTANTLY see how it affects the layout.

So to all the newbies out there(and I was (and still am) one) do not be discouraged. Don't expect to build a fully functional cart in a day. Play around with the demo store, check the FAQs and search the forums for your questions (trust me, if they are basic questions, then it is most definitely answered). PLay around with templates by downloading a couple off this site, and installing them, and see if you like the look of them. Thats what I did, I had a template that was kinda close to what I wanted mine to look like, I then modified CSS and the code to eventually get the look of what I wanted.

I still have tons to learn, and I might buy the book to see what sort of things I missed.
The ONLY thing that isn't very user friendly, is trying to find exactly where options are in the admin panel.
I definitely think the admin panel needs a huge overhaul, because quite a few things are not where you expect them to be.

Anyways hope this helps

Our rant isn't with newbies who ask questions. It's with newbies who ask questions that are 1) clearly answered in the FAQ or wiki (meaning they didn't take the time to read them), 2) when we take the time to answer the newbie's question they either don't respond, don't read the response given, or fail to provide the additional information asked to try to help them suss out the problem.

I well remember how clueless I was when I started, and I had a pretty fair amount of knowledge. I'm not a programmer -- I know enough to be dangerous.

But when someone asks, "I've searched EVERYWHERE... How do I get rid of the 'Congratulations...' message," it means they did NOT search, because as of this posting it's listed as #4 in the "All time questions" section of the FAQ. Easy to find -- not hidden at all. Had they read through it, they would have found the answer.

Not to mention the software is FREE (as in purchase price). Yes, you have to put some sweat equity in. But when there are easily tens of thousands of people (and that's a low-ball estimate) successfully using Zen Cart as their online store, it begs the question of whether or not it's the software or the user.

I also think it's ironic that many people who complain about Zen Cart never bother to contribute to the software project, either in money or helping other members on the forums.

The software is proven. You do not have to be a programmer to learn it. (I'm proof of that!) Advice is readily available on the forums, in the FAQ and Wiki (if one chooses to spend more than ten seconds and one poorly-formed or misspelled search).

I think it's more a case of sour grapes because someone is having trouble with the software, wants "free" software without paying money for it, and is upset they might have to go with a different package (or pay for assistance).