Use zen cart w/ existing product db and pages?

We have an existing website with a product database and product pages. We just want to layer a shopping cart on top of it. With zen cart can we put an "add to cart" button on the existing page and have it add items to the shopping cart? Basically, we want the cart and the checkout process, but we do not want to use Zen Cart's product database, categories or template?

Is this possible?

Thank you!

Not really. Zen Cart is a whole site solution, not just something you can tack on to an existing site.

OK. If that's the case...are the page templates 100% customizable? If I migrate my product db into zen cart, will I be able to EXACTLY reproduce my existing product pages or will I be forced to use their stock 2-3 column templates?

Thank you

I don't know about 100%, but take a look here to see some other folks' handiwork:

http://(sorry, site offline)/

I'd go further and say yes 100% customizable and offer this variant of the above link, (sorry, site offline)/hoff.php, to back it. Though some of these sites are quite old now - it's actually gotten easier to customize since many of them were built.

Why isn't my client's site in the HOF?
(the one in my sig)

:smile:

Hmmmm....most of these sites (even the "Hall of Fame" ones) seem to still be in 2-3 column layouts.

Here is our prototype category page:
http://jkc.kimronemusdesign.com/listing.html

Here is our prototype product page:
http://jkc.kimronemusdesign.com/product.html

We need to mouse-over actions on the category page and we need to css category image horizontal slider at the bottom of the product page. Unless there is a template system where we can code 100% of our own html and just drop in Zen Cart variables where we need them then I don't think it's going to work.

Comments?

I'm trying to post links to our prototype pages, but my responses do not show up on the board when i do that. Basically, our design is heavy js/css. I would need to code 100% raw html and drop in ZC vars where I need them. Is this possible? I can't do the standard 2 columns w/ banner up top.

Thanks

Comments?

Certainly.

1. Don't get fixated on the columns. You can simply turn them off at Admin > Configuration > Layout Settings and you have a single column site.

2. Let go of you current ideas about how you want to do this. What you actually want to do is not difficult to for somebody with the technical skills that you're demonstrating, but to do it the way you say you want to would be much more difficult.

Basically once you have turned off the side columns most of what you want to do would be simply to re-arrange the resulting Zen Cart page templates. There would be some things that need to be added in, but you would have to do that anyway if you were writing from scratch and then trying to insert "Zen Cart variables".

I'd say that if you turned off the columns and amended some of the CSS styling, you'd have a site that was 75% of the way and recognizable very quickly, and the 25% of new development would be a fraction of what you would otherwise have had to do. This is just a case of getting your head around how Zen Cart is structured and works.

Thank you. That is helpful information.
When you say custom development - do you have to modify the source code or are you able to code php and/or html chunks like in a CMS? The navigation is all graphic in nature, so in addition to the js/css page components, I need to "display image A if current category=A"

Thanks again!

When you say custom development - do you have to modify the source code or are you able to code php and/or html chunks like in a CMS?
Basically, YES - A combination of rearranging currect php page code and insertion of your specific html/css stuff.

It is not done, for the most part, from an admin interface - while there are some basic editing features admin side much of the "custom" work is through altering/adding to the php files. Where you create within the Zen Cart structure your "custom" page look versus you creating your own pages and trying to only add cart functionality to them.

If you are not familiar with SSI scripting, I think that you will be pleased at the work reduction it provides - especially when you look at maintaining 10-100's of pages

Suggest that you install Zen Cart, read the tutorials/FAQ's in the top nav bar for basic items and post back for more indepth questions