question about shopping carts

[dipita]

Haven't designed a shopping cart before and will be doing a first. A few questions - a software such as zencart will take care of some of the front end and the code that talks to the server with the payment details right? WHat happens after this - I know there's supposed to be a payment gateway or something like that that takes care of the actual fund transfer, but what software(s) take care of this - does zencart deal with this as well or do you have to hook into another software to do this?
Basically, I was wondering if someone can tell me the steps of setting up a shopping cart site?
THanks!

 

[imstillatwork]

zencart will take care of EVERYTHING.

need USPS estimates? plug it in. Need UPS or FedEx esimates? Plug it in.

Authorize.net? Paypal? plug it in.

now...downside is horrible code to work with. extremelt bad coding practices in both php and html.

otherwise, to get the job done, it has a LOT of features. some which I wonder WHY? but a lot of good features too.

If you aren't afraid of (overly) complicated includes and architecture, and tables inside of tables inside of tables inside of... you get it....

if you have time, build your own.

if you need to get it up, customized, and done, use zencart.

 

[Foamcow]

I agree about the ZenCArt coding. But it's not that bad when you get your head around the fact there are multiple files with the same names in different locations that all contribute to the same output!

I've been developing a template for someone recently and at first it was a nightmare, but once I realised a few things it became ALOT easier.

Just learn to use the over-ride system properly and you should be able to achieve most anything.

Foamcow Heavy Industries - Web design and ranting
Toccoa Games - Day of Defeat gaming community
Target Marketing Communications - Advertising, Direct Marketing and Public Relations
"I'm making time

 

[imstillatwork]

Once you play around with it, It does make sense, but I believe it could have been made much simpler, having the same functionality.

The override system is nice to be able to use also.

 

[dipita]

Typical costs for a standard website with shopping cart - what are the average rates for such a site?

 

[imstillatwork]

depending on the zencart cusomizations, I would probably start around $1000 for zencart with a 3rd party template applied, and MINOR modification. you could have it finished in a matter of days or hours if you are familiar with zencart.

Custom solution? I would start around $2500-3500 for a basic no frills cart / catalog / backend. You should be able to have it finished within a matter of 2-3 weeks depending on the design complexity (reusing your logic for the cart, of course. no need to re-invent every time you get a new client.)

I know of a few large corporate shopping sites that cost in the $100,000+ range, and take 6 months to finish with 5 guys working on them.

 

[aaphandana]

Hi, I just started using open source products, I start with ZenCart.
I found that it is very hard to understand what it is doing by reading the codes.

Is Zencart a special "hard to understand and modify" product compared to other open source products such as drupal, PHP-NUKE, etc?
Or every open source product is just as hard?

Should I be discourage with my situation right now or everybody faces the same?

I really appreciate it if any one experienced can ansr this.

 

[Foamcow]

They are complex, but that's because they are doing a complex job.

Granted some of the coding in ZenCart is a bit clunky but you will find a similar level of complexity with most products of this ilk.
The manual for ZenCart is work in progress so it's not that easy to work with sometimes.

Don't be discouraged though! Take your time, keep notes and keep a backup.. and back that up too!


Foamcow Heavy Industries - Web design and ranting
Toccoa Games - Day of Defeat gaming community
Target Marketing Communications - Advertising, Direct Marketing and Public Relations
"I'm making time

 

[aaphandana]

So when we want to develop a website, let's say something with the features of a zencart. Do we need to make it that complex? (exclude customizeability)

My understanding is that they (zencart developers) did such complex job since they wanna make it so custumizeable, while in the case of creating a website need not to be so complex since we won't need it to be as customizeable. Is that correct?

 

[Foamcow]

I'd say that is a fair thing to say, yes.

It's easier to hard code something. But then again, it's not a bad thing to use a "black box" methodology and build an Object Orientated system. Especially when you want to update the site or reuse the code somewhere else.

Take into account also that ZenCart does have some coding foibles and the lack of thorough documentation doesn't help.

Foamcow Heavy Industries - Web design and ranting
Toccoa Games - Day of Defeat gaming community
Target Marketing Communications - Advertising, Direct Marketing and Public Relations
"I'm making time