how do i create an home page for my cart?

Hi there,
I want to create customize home page for my cart in stead of having the Zen cart has home page. Can somebody please tell me a proper and easy way to do it? Thank you for any help in advance

You can create a html page for the homepage. Just name it index.html and it will load before the php file.

If you decide to use a php program for the homepage, then you'll need to put zen cart in a separate folder, to avoid any like named files taking over the zen cart files.

Hi there,
Thank you for reply, if I do create an index.html has I have already done, will it considerate from the search engine as the other pages on my shop, or I have to put some particular code on it? I’m sorry if this is a stupid question! But I’m new in all web staff thank you for helping
Fracy
https://www.funkyfreak.co.uk

Do you definitely want to have a home page that is not connected to your Zen Cart?

Or do you just want a home page that doesn't look like the regular cart pages? (See my site for an example.) If this is the case, you can do all the HTML and PHP coding you want in define_main_page.php (in your admin > Tools > Define Pages Editor), and turn off the display of as much as you want by setting flags in /includes/templates/your_template/common/tpl_main_page.php. There are directions in the comments at the top of the file.

Thank you for reply, yes I want to have a home page that is not connected to your Zen Cart, the reason for this is that I haven’t got experience in coding and I thought that building a simple page by using Microsoft publisher was for me the easiest option…just I don’t know if by doing this I will have problems with search engine or any other kind of problem. I’m reading a lot and “hopefully” soon I will be able to create a page like you have done in your site (look very good), anyway any advice to bring me there will be gratefully appreciated…..

PS: Sorry for mistake but I’m Italian and sometime my English let me down
Thank you
francy

Francy,

I'm American and sometimes my English is bad. ok, most of the time. ha. My Italian is much worse.

What I think you should do is download the fckeditor from the download section of this web site.

Then read the instructions on installing it. I can help you if you need it.

Using fckeditor, and the Define pages tool in the tool's section of admin will allow you to create a much better home page than you will get out of Microsoft publisher. Besides, Microsoft publisher will probably not work well as a homepage. Even though they say it will work it will probably fall appart once you try using it on the web.

how about giving the fckeditor a try first. It will save you allot of time and heartache.

Hi there thank you for your support! Hope I will improve my writing soon, I have download and installed the editor, now how can I make it work, how should I use it? If I take out the entire box from my home page will I end up with a blank page were I can build my own design by using this editor? Well this will be very nice but only if I will find out the way to use it properly! Also I have forgot to mention that actually my Zen cart is in a folder called Shop rather than public.html directory as it should be, so I do assume that I have to move it to public.html or I will end up with the only option to build a customize index.html or index.php just in order to make my shop start from https://www.funkyfreak.co.uk rather than https://www.funkyfreak.co.uk/shop . Is this correct? Thank you
francy

In the admin menu,

Configuration ~ MyStore

Near the bottom change the HTML editor to FCKEditor.

Now when you go to the menu Tools ~ Define pages fckeditor will be the preferred editor.

The page you want to edit is the "Define_main_page".

Good luck.

To get your shop accessible from the root domain name, you will need to either do a redirect to /shop/ or move the installation from /shop/ to the root (/public_html/).

Many people do their development work in a subdomain like /shop/ so the unfinished site is not out for all the workd to see, and move it to the root when finished. This is not a complicated job; after moving all the files & folders, you just have to eliminate "shop/" from a dozen places in two files. There is a tutorial that gives full instructions.

Define_main_page.php controls the center column of the home page. To turn off the rest, you will need to edit /includes/templates/your_template/common/tpl_main_page.php. There are instructions at the top - essentially, you would add

if ($this_is_home_page) {
$flag_disable_header = true;
$flag_disable_footer = true;
$flag_disable_left = true;
$flag_disable_right = true;
}
```though you might want to leave at least part of the footer.

You can copy parts of the tpl_header.php code into your custom home page, like the logo and some links, and put them where you want them.

Thank for this accurate post! It really helps me understand more the situations, well the conclusion is…. that I got a lot to learn! :smartalec: But I will get to the point (eventually) can you please tell me if the shop not being in the root directory will cause me problems or if this could be an advantage? Why should I move it? I do understand the procedure needed to moving and edit the 2 file, and it seams quite straightforward, I just want to be sure that moving everything to the root dir is the best…..
Thank you for your time
francy