On Tue, 04 May 2004 13:12:47 -0500
"Ben Bargabus" <ben_b at ppdonline.com> wrote:

> Based on some of the initial feedback I've taken a quick look at
> x-cart as well and it seems to be a good product for a decent price.
>  I'd like
> to hear some more feedback from other x-cart users out there too.

I marked this Off Topic as it's not really Linux related...

I've used x-cart for about 6 different storefronts with different degrees of success.  The nice thing is that if you want to buy another license I think the price goes down to about $85.00.  They sell a lot of optional modules and extra crap that you probably don't need and can usually get by with their x-cart gold package.  Their website is pretty good about what each product they sell supports.

First off, don't buy anything more than the license, if you ask them questions chances are they will sell you customization services but for really high rates.  If that becomes an issue, talk to me and I'll do it for 1/2.  :)  

It's a PhP / MySQL only app, no support for other dbms's.  Generally installation is pretty easy, create a mysql database and user, run the install wizard over the web.

Most customization is done through an administrative interface.  The brunt of the work is in figuring out their templating system.  It's not too hard, but it does take a few tries to get used to.  There is a master CSS file for global color/font settings and then a ton of template files for pieces of the interface.  They have a "Webmaster Mode" which allows you to see each template file as you hover your mouse over sections of the page.  Then you can find the template in a popup window, click on it and get brought to an edit interface.  If you understand HTML you should be just fine.

You do get the source when you buy the license, and you can modify it to your liking.  I had to do this on one of the sites that required adding additional mysql tables to support the amount of data my client had on each product and I had to complete rip out x-carts search interface and write my own because of this.  It wasn't horrible, but it certainly wasn't enjoyable.

Adding products is pretty simple, you can add one at a time or in batch if the data is in a text file or something.

The vendor releases patches, but never sends you an email when they are released which is annoying so you have to frequently check for patches.  Patching the software to the latest version is easy as long as you haven't made many customizations, it's also web based.

That's enough for now, if you have more questions, feel free to contact me.  I'm not sure, but I might be able to get you a lower price through a reseller program.

Here are a couple sample sites I've done (keep in mind these are not my designs, so if you want to puke, don't blame me!)

http://www.lbow.com/store/
http://www.isaksenpromotions.com/medallion/store/
http://www.isaksenpromotions.com/stthomas/store/
http://www.inkjetdepotusa.com/store/

Josh

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