[pilgrim_fgau]

Right guys, Im looking into setting up a trial eCommerce site for a friend, that could very well go live but I have a few queries that I cant find straightforward answers to, so if you can help it could be much appreciated.

So currently I am looking at using opencart or zen cart.

But lets use opencart as an example.

I had a look on their demo page, http://www.opencart....n/demonstration,

is this like a template you are given to style yourself? or do you have to create the page from scratch?

Also is there anyway you can use the likes of opencart without setting up a hosting and a domain name, say just for playing around with first and then possibly uploading to a hosting account when you are happy and want it to go live?

Sorry for being such a noob, but im new to this.

Appreciate any comments

Thanks

[CSN-UK]

pilgrim_fgau, on 07 November 2011 - 03:45 PM, said:

Right guys, Im looking into setting up a trial eCommerce site for a friend, that could very well go live but I have a few queries that I cant find straightforward answers to, so if you can help it could be much appreciated.

So currently I am looking at using opencart or zen cart.

But lets use opencart as an example.

I had a look on their demo page, http://www.opencart....n/demonstration,

is this like a template you are given to style yourself? or do you have to create the page from scratch?

Also is there anyway you can use the likes of opencart without setting up a hosting and a domain name, say just for playing around with first and then possibly uploading to a hosting account when you are happy and want it to go live?

Sorry for being such a noob, but im new to this.

Appreciate any comments

Thanks

Hi Pilgrim ,

We've all got to start somewhere; at least you're not afraid to ask which is the sign of a "noob" in my opinion.

As for your questions, the templates provided with both open cart and zen cart are reasonably easy to modify if you have a handle on html and css, you can also find something appropriate on one of the many template sites and use that as a start point however.

Here is a link to the zen cart wiki which covers the first few steps, I would recommend you create a new template as it suggests and work on this rather than the default.
http://www.zen-cart....s_-_Customizing

As for working on it offline, this is perfectly possible through a virtual server, there are many popular LAMP installs however personally I use WAMP (http://www.wampserve...en/download.php) which suits the needs of most.

To use Wamp, select the version appropriate to you and install, once complete launch WampServer you will have an icon in your task bar (windows) which should turn green, left clicking on this icon will give you access to all of the server settings, for now open localhost and then again open phpmyadmin.

To create your database:

• Go to the phpmyadmin webpage
  
• Databases tab (top left)
  
• Then type in a name and press create
  
• Once complete click "check privileges" next to the database you created
  
• Click "Add a new User" (bottom of this page)
  
• Enter a username, and password (save the password and username at this point)
  
• Scroll down to "global privileges" and click "check all"
  
• Once complete press "go" bottom right of the page and your user will be created/added to your database.

Setting up Zen Cart

• Once again click the Wamp icon in your task bar and select "www directory"
  
• Windows should open a folder, inside this create a new folder for example "my site"
  
• Click inside this folder and extract the zen cart zip here.
  
• Refresh the localhost page and under "your projects" you will see your folder, click this.
  
• Follow the onscreen instructions from zen cart using the database details you setup earlier

Possibly a bit overkill, but should point you in the right direction

This post has been edited by CSN-UK: 08 November 2011 - 10:10 AM

[pilgrim_fgau]

CSN-UK, on 08 November 2011 - 09:54 AM, said:

Hi Pilgrim ,

We've all got to start somewhere; at least you're not afraid to ask which is the sign of a "noob" in my opinion.

As for your questions, the templates provided with both open cart and zen cart are reasonably easy to modify if you have a handle on html and css, you can also find something appropriate on one of the many template sites and use that as a start point however.

Here is a link to the zen cart wiki which covers the first few steps, I would recommend you create a new template as it suggests and work on this rather than the default.
http://www.zen-cart....s_-_Customizing

As for working on it offline, this is perfectly possible through a virtual server, there are many popular LAMP installs however personally I use WAMP (http://www.wampserve...en/download.php) which suits the needs of most.

To use Wamp, select the version appropriate to you and install, once complete launch WampServer you will have an icon in your task bar (windows) which should turn green, left clicking on this icon will give you access to all of the server settings, for now open localhost and then again open phpmyadmin.

To create your database:

• Go to the phpmyadmin webpage
  
• Databases tab (top left)
  
• Then type in a name and press create
  
• Once complete click "check privileges" next to the database you created
  
• Click "Add a new User" (bottom of this page)
  
• Enter a username, and password (save the password and username at this point)
  
• Scroll down to "global privileges" and click "check all"
  
• Once complete press "go" bottom right of the page and your user will be created/added to your database.

Setting up Zen Cart

• Once again click the Wamp icon in your task bar and select "www directory"
  
• Windows should open a folder, inside this create a new folder for example "my site"
  
• Click inside this folder and extract the zen cart zip here.
  
• Refresh the localhost page and under "your projects" you will see your folder, click this.
  
• Follow the onscreen instructions from zen cart using the database details you setup earlier

Possibly a bit overkill, but should point you in the right direction

Not overkill at all

I really appreciate the depth of that, makes certain things a lot clearer now!

Thanks!

rep added

[pilgrim_fgau]

That helped alot, i managed to get xampp installed and zen cart installed on the xampp server, now just to learn some php and get to grips with styling the shop front, which at the minute i am completely baffled.

One more question... i have always been used to html and css, no problem there, but is there no html file in zen cart. I can see a index.php but i always thought that php was the server side scripting and there would always need to be a html for the client side?

[sash_oo7]

see how the default templates are made if u have installed zencart the two templates are there by default

\zencart\includes\templates

check in this path

also just curious have u renamed ur admin folder ?

This post has been edited by sash_oo7: 10 November 2011 - 10:57 AM

[pilgrim_fgau]

sash_oo7, on 10 November 2011 - 10:49 AM, said:

also just curious have u renamed ur admin folder ?

yup

[CSN-UK]

As sash has pointed out the template folder, hopefully I can explain the PHP/HTML question.

PHP is as you have said a server side language, however before any HTML files/data are sent to the client (browser) the file must pass through the php compiler and execute before it will output as html.

Take for example:

hello-world.php

<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Transitional//EN" "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-transitional.dtd">
<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml">
<head>
<meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=utf-8" />
<title>Untitled Document</title>
</head>

<body>
<?php $mymsg = "Hello world";?>


<h1<?php echo $mymsg;?>></h1>
</body>
</html>

Notice how the PHP code is contained within the <?php ?> tags and as such will be interpreted by the PHP compiler, as for the reason to use .php files this is just another means of telling the compiler that "this file will contain code that will need to be compiled" .. you can use php within .html files also if the server is setup to check html files as well as .php

This post has been edited by CSN-UK: 10 November 2011 - 04:12 PM

[rallport]

pilgrim_fgau, on 07 November 2011 - 03:45 PM, said:

Right guys, Im looking into setting up a trial eCommerce site for a friend, that could very well go live but I have a few queries that I cant find straightforward answers to, so if you can help it could be much appreciated.

So currently I am looking at using opencart or zen cart.

But lets use opencart as an example.

I had a look on their demo page, http://www.opencart....n/demonstration,

is this like a template you are given to style yourself? or do you have to create the page from scratch?

Also is there anyway you can use the likes of opencart without setting up a hosting and a domain name, say just for playing around with first and then possibly uploading to a hosting account when you are happy and want it to go live?

Sorry for being such a noob, but im new to this.

Appreciate any comments

Thanks

I use OpenCart as a an example, as I've used that quite a few times now.

Setting up a basic template using your design, with the basic shoppi9ng cart functions is pretty easy of you follow the Opencart docs.

However, if you client ever wants bespoke functionality you'll need an understanding of Opencart works E.g. through it;s own MVC structure. It's something to note when using a 3rd party system - as you'll have to support it.

[Renaissance-Design]

Rob - I'm looking for a good lightweight system to fill the gap between Shopify and Magento. How's Opencart's architecture - is it fairly well constructed?

I also have a thing against templating languages like Smarty - I prefer to work in plain php/html Views.

[rallport]

Renaissance-Design, on 11 November 2011 - 02:34 PM, said:

Rob - I'm looking for a good lightweight system to fill the gap between Shopify and Magento. How's Opencart's architecture - is it fairly well constructed?

I also have a thing against templating languages like Smarty - I prefer to work in plain php/html Views.

Yer, that's essentialy what it is. Definately nothing like the old and bloated Smarty - just HTML/PHP.

As you seem to be pretty big on Magento, you'll pick Opencart up very quickly as it uses it's own MVC as is nowhere as near as complicated

I personally think it's very well made and easy to update/extend. If you've ver used a PHP framework (which again, you probably have and do) workign with Opencart will be pretty easy.

In fact, it's fairly easy to go through the system folder and see exactly how it works.

I also think the admin area is much more useable to a normal user when compared to the beast that is Magento E.g. not a web developer

The caching is a little rough too imo, but you could easily upgrade it yourself to use something like apc. However, I can understand the reason behind the opencart developers sticking the file based caching by default.