Shopping cart

[dreammaker888]

If I already have a website up and running that I wrote with php and mysql and I am currently using PayPal shopping cart for payment, how do I implement a more sophisticated shopping cart without having to rewrite what I've already got.

I would like the have the following features in the shopping cart:

1. Process Credit Card thru my existing merchant account (I don't mind changing merchant account if have to).

2. Set up discount structure for quantity purchase for merchandise total as well as shipping total.

3. Accept coupon redemption.

4. Preferrable accepting Paypal or Google checkout.

5. eMail notification and batch download.

It is a very small operation and probably has 100 transaction a month. We don't want to spend thousands of dollars to purchase a shopping cart.

Can someone shed some light in this subject and point me to the right direction?

Thanks.

Alex

 

[jpadie]

have you looked at Zen Cart?

 

[dreammaker888]

I think I am still in a very early stage of learning "shopping cart".

Most of the establishments I found in Google want to sell me the entire package that includes templates and hosting. Right now, I've got my website up and running now and I am using PayPal standard checkout. All I want is to have a more robust checkout that does the things I mentioned above.

I found a company by the name of "eCommercetemplate". They claim that I can use only the shopping cart only. But the package seems to involve the whole 9 yard. The cost is $160 which is not a lot. I like some of the design of their templates too. The good thing is, they let you download the user manual before you make your purchase in pdf file. I did that and I've print it out and put it in a folder.

I am going to invest a week going thru that 250 pages. I am sure, by then, I will be more knowledgeable in deciding what course of action I am going to take.

At the meantime, any comments and suggestions will be greatly appreciated.

Thanks.

Alex

 

[jpadie]

zen cart is open source

http://sourceforge.net/projects/zencart/

 

[dreammaker888]

Yes, I look at Zen Cart too.

They are "free", but the manual sells for $150.

At this point, I am not knowledgeable enough to plunge down any $$ yet. The eCommercetemplate free manual download is eaier for me.

Again, I was hoping to gain more knowledge at this point.

Alex

 

[jpadie]

you don't the need the manual. unless you want to customise it to a large degree.

alternatively shopping carts are trivially easy to write and there are also hundreds of "hot scripts" out there.

in pear (pear.php.net) there are a number of middle-ware pieces of code that will hook up a shopping cart with a payment provider. some classes support multiple providers out of the box.

 

[jpadie]

there is also the wiki, of course, with a huge amount of information in it.

http://www.zen-cart.com/wiki/index.php/Main_Page