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osCommerce

The e-commerce.

What do you expect?


fixion

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Hi guys,

 

First off, I want to say that the reason I even bother posting this - is that you have a KILLER shop - seriously. A whole lot of options, and it's very well tied together into making a shop that can deliver worldwide.

 

I don't want to start a flame-war, I'm just interested in hearing why you guys seemingly want to reinvent the wheel.

 

I've been using Postnuke and PostKart for quite some time and it has some features that you sorely need. mainly it's the permissions, the abilty to (re)move the blocks around and themes - without having to manually edit sourcecode.

 

IMHO you should stick to what you're obviously good at - The SHOP - and leave the rest to a CMS such as PostNuke. Many people have failed trying to accomplish it all - and many people have succeeded when keeping their focus.

 

My suggestion would be to do what Gallery.menalto.com has done. It is built so that it works as standalone, and in a CMS.

 

if you f.ex. choose to support the pnAPI (PostNuke thing) OSC would work in Envolution, PostNuke, Xaraya and PHPNuke (and perhaps still Xoops?).

 

In one swoop. Then people can use the CMS for what it's good at - text pages and layout stuff - and get the killer shop possibilities that OSCommerce has to offer.

 

If you're interested, I'd gladly assist (with whatever knowledge and time I can) and also I would think that talking to f.ex. the Gallery guys (and viewing their source code) would get you a long way.

 

This is just a topic for discussion, and I'd be very glad if you were open to a dialogue about this. If no one in your user community is interested in it then peace be with you :)

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Also - your simple-urls don't work that well - and in several of the CMS's I mentioned it is implemented and work well.

 

Also, it couldn't hurt to let your users have access to all the modules(features) that exists for the CMS's. Postnuke f.ex. has a ton of options - and a cool feature called hooks.

 

This hook idea, works so that if the module author (or someone who wants to add it) decides to support hooks (which is very simple - he just enters one or two lines of php) - then they can hook into any module that has hooks (OSCommerce would be a good example) - and in the case of OSCommerce, this would mean that if I want to be able to sell any service from any of my CMS (Postnuke in this case) modules, I can just enable the hook and create the comodity in OSCommerce, and when the CMS module is opened, the hook (which actually amounts to some html - like "put in cart" image) is displayed and the user can purchase the item/service.

 

IMHO that's cool, but different people like different things :)

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Ohh - and also people in all the mentioned CMS'es are SCREAMING for SHOPS - and I am willing to bet, that if you announce your intention to make OSC work as Gallery does (standalone and with pnAPI) a lot of devs and users of those CMS'es will want to help out quickly and you will most certainly get new devs willing to work on this and contributions from people who wants this project as fast as possible :)

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osCommerce is a standalone full blown e-commerce solution - not a module for other software / CMS solutions.

 

Mattice

"Politics is the art of preventing people from taking part in affairs which properly concern them"

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So you really want to reimplement theme, block rearranging (instead of the manual commenting stuff you have now), permissions and all that?

 

Ok. Thats entirely up to you. I just think the way the Gallery guys have done it (both standalone - and CMS module) is good for everyone - also for increasing the userbase for both products. Many who use PostNuke and other CMS's can't use OSCommerce (I think) because they can't (or don't have the time) to make manual design and implement that. Afterall PostNuke alone, has 300+ designs that you can use.

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So you really want to reimplement theme, block rearranging (instead of the manual commenting stuff you have now), permissions and all that?

 

Exactly ;)

"Politics is the art of preventing people from taking part in affairs which properly concern them"

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I realize I misphrased this sentence:

 

I've been using Postnuke and PostKart for quite some time and it has some features that you sorely need.

 

I ofcourse meant, that it was PostNuke that had some features that you could use - PostKart is (unfortunately) not even close to all the IMHO GREAT features OSCommerce has - which ofcourse also is why I even bother to post this message - as I am very sure, that did you open up the possibility for someone to work on the OSCommerce so it worked as a module in PostNuke (and others - and still as stand-alone too) it would be very well received and I guarantee you that min. 95% of the sites running a compatible CMS and a Shop - would be running OSCommerce.

 

This is why I was hoping you would be open to such a suggestion - so the great work you guys have put in the Shopping system can benefit as many as possible.

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Since there isn't any Poll option in here, I'd appreciate it, if you would let your voice be heard by replying to this post (just a one-liner telling you position). Thanks.

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If you want to discuss PostCart / *Nuke stuff this really isn't the place.

Like I said before - we're developing a full blown e-commerce solution, not a CMS or CMS plugin.

If you do not like that we're sorry - look at Jan's signature, it might make you feel better ;)

 

Mattice

"Politics is the art of preventing people from taking part in affairs which properly concern them"

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man-o-man!! I do agree, os-commerce as a pnmod would kick major butt!!! SO, if it's still openscource perhaps I'll crack it open and have a look around, it' s definatly a worthwhile project and it provides much better security to the admin panel than osc does now.., OSc is hands down the best shop on the net, I've currently recommended it to one of my clients whos having me build a on-line store, BUT heres the deal, my client is running a PN site that has an ssl for selling a service, he would like to add related products, but PostKart cant hack it and + it's now abandon-ware, SO OSc is the best choice, BUT it requires a separate site license($$) and my time ($$$) to create a complementary theme. PN (or anyother CMS for that matter) would be awsome for handling all the mundane tasks such as templates and all. Just my 2 cents worth :D

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I think the reason osC is such a great cart is because the developers are focusing on making a good cart, period. They have a lot of things to work on as it is without having to worry about CMS stuff. Just my opinion though.

If every member of this board donated $1 to the dev team, that would be over $11,000.00. Don't you think this cart is worth at least a $1????

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osCommerce is a standalone full blown e-commerce solution - not a module for other software / CMS solutions.

 

And that is it's main strength and its weakness. If all you want to implement is a standalone shop, then it is the perfect solution. If you want to integrate it into an existing CMS solution, then forget it. OSC simply doesn't provide the architecture to join it to any other products.

 

When OSC gets templates implemented, I'm sure things will change. Once an admin can hook into OSC under-the-bonnet (aka hood), so to speak, then you will see it bolted onto many other systems and it's usage will explode.

 

-- Jason

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So you really want to reimplement theme' date=' block rearranging...quote']

Exactly ;)

 

Open Source should not have brick walls built around it. I think if that is the official line, then it is a shame.

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Open Source should not have brick walls built around it. I think if that is the official line, then it is a shame.

 

There's nothing stopping you from taking the existing code and doing whatever you want with it. Have fun. Let us know when you have something worth looking at. :wink:

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Open Source should not have brick walls built around it. I think if that is the official line, then it is a shame.

 

Then you obviously need to re-read the GPL licence.

It's not about brick walls - it's about freedom.

Freedom to do with osCommerce as you desire - within the limits of the licence.

 

So if you want to build it into a *Nuke module by all means be my guest - just don't expect us to do it.

We're osCommerce developers, not *Nuke Addon devs.

 

In short - forgive me if this sounds harsh - stop whining and go code it :D

 

Mattice

"Politics is the art of preventing people from taking part in affairs which properly concern them"

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Zaq beat me to it - but I think you get the point.

"Politics is the art of preventing people from taking part in affairs which properly concern them"

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First.. sorry about my english...

 

I ?m using OSC to develop an ecommerce site and I?m not using the template for the front side.

We have designed a new template and layouts for the client and we found that OSC is much more flexible than we thought. :D !!!!

 

We think that the goal is implement OSC in full customized layouts. It?s very easy.

 

And it?s also easy to integrate other modules like News, Documents, etc,etc in the BO....

All you have to do is investigate the code.... and modify it for your needs...

 

I think that this discussion goes nowhere.... OSC arquitecture is good enough and we have a lot of experience in PostNuke and PHPNuke and I have to confess that we don?t like them....

 

OSC has to improve many things, specially in the BO: x.e we are very surprised that the BO has not a level authentication users by default.... but I think that the team is in the good path.

 

Mattice is right.

OSC should be a full e-commece solution not an addon... and also could have a future in the B2B model....

By!

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There's nothing stopping you from taking the existing code and doing whatever you want with it. Have fun. Let us know when you have something worth looking at. :wink:

 

Yes, I'm sure I will. I've customised OSC for my own use to the extent that I'm now very familiar with it's code. I also appreciate how much effort has been put into getting it just right - there are so many little features that people just don't notice that make it such a slick app. Reinventing that lot from scratch would take a long time.

 

BUT since customising OSC to do anything other than the stock layout and the stock functionality involves changing so much core code, then a customised OSC site becomes an effective fork. Perhaps I'm just being fussy, but that's what Open Source allows for ;) SO, if I'm going to fork anyway, then I may as well go the whole journey and strip out the cart on its own and integrate it into an existing CMS. After all, the existing CMS will provide for 80% of what OSC does (users, sessions, layout, templates, navigation, articles, catalog, backup, security, etc.), so there's only 20% to port. That sort of makes sense.

 

I am one of those who believe the cart of OSC is the best around, and the best bit of the whole project. If the project is now leaning towards being a complete CMS, then believe me - the cart will be dwarfed by the overall project. I think there is the potential to lose a very good thing by watering it down.

 

IMO the project should be tightly focused on what it does really well, and that is not by entering a saturated CMS market. If you want to go that route, then why not just create a CMS. On its own. Then strip OSC down to its bare cart and integrate it into the CMS as a module. Once you take that approach, you may begin to question why you want to create a CMS in the first place.

 

That's my take on the situation anyway. We may disagree on the direction the project should take, but we do agree that OS is great and the work put in by all so far has been tremendous, and really appreciated across the community. I'm not trying to knock the project at all.

 

-- Jason :-)

 

PS. I think I can sum it up concisely: I'm here for the cart.

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Then you obviously need to re-read the GPL licence.

It's not about brick walls - it's about freedom.

Freedom to do with osCommerce as you desire - within the limits of the licence.

 

I wasn't trying to quote the GPL licence nor make any points about how you are applying it. I fully understand how that works, and wasn't suggesting you were violating it in any way.

 

My point was the statement along the lines of "we are not going to support our product being subordinate to any other product" went against the spirit that I personally attribute to the GPL. But you are free to do that. The community will judge whether that is the approach that works or not.

 

:)

 

-- Jason

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But you are free to do that

Like you are free to make it a whateverNuke module.

Just don't expect us to do your coding / support - that is all I am saying :D

"Politics is the art of preventing people from taking part in affairs which properly concern them"

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Like you are free to make it a whateverNuke module.

Just don't expect us to do your coding / support - that is all I am saying :D

 

Fair dos. No-one expects OSC team to program for any other CMS. Why should you?

 

What I am hinting at, is that you are missing out on a good trick. If the cart were separated more from the content and layout, through a well-defined API, then you wouldn't have to worry about that side. I believe OSC would be integrated into other CMSs almost overnight.

 

I wouldn't suggest anything that I didn't think would be a benefit to the OSC project.

 

-- Jason

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My point was the statement along the lines of "we are not going to support our product being subordinate to any other product" went against the spirit that I personally attribute to the GPL.
I think that you are misquoting him. What he was saying was more along the lines of "We are not going to subordinate our project to another project."

 

I think that you would get more developer support if you started talking about how to link in other theme managers in *general*, rather than trying to talk them into dropping 80% of their codebase in favor of someone else's with which they're not familiar.

 

I don't think that they should do anything like that, any more than KDE should drop Konqueror and build Phoenix/Firebird/whatever into their WM. Or that Linux should build KDE into the kernel. Or to enhance performance, Linux could custom code the kernel in AMD specific machine code only. Or so on and so forth. A great deal of the idea behind open source is choice. By contrast, while your proposal would make *your* choice easier, it would then preclude a lot of others from making their own choices.

 

--Matt

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Fair dos. No-one expects OSC team to program for any other CMS. Why should you?

That was the initial suggestion in this thread I'm afraid.

 

What I am hinting at, is that you are missing out on a good trick.

I'll hint you back: http://www.oscommerce.com/community/workboard :D

 

Regards,

Mattice

"Politics is the art of preventing people from taking part in affairs which properly concern them"

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