Posted: Mon Mar 14, 2011 12:51 pm Post subject: Zen-Cart
Zen Cart is crazy. While on one hand it is one of the better opensource/free shop apps out there, it is designed as though the members of the Mad Hatters tea party group are the developers.
while the admin controls give very good control over the things they address, there is NO, none zilch zero consideration to customization. They refer users to edit css pages directly. That is pretty comparable to insane.
While a great many of those folks installing and setting it up will be tech folks who have some understanding or ability to pick up editing these types of files (at least, they should if that's the field they're in), another very large group of users implementing such an app are people whose "first life" is that of a small business owner who is donning several new hats to get things up and running.
Their grasp of editing css files, etc.. is slim to none and expecting them to devote the time and mental energy into doing so very much defeats the purpose of having an "easy to use" enterprise shop app.
Zen Cart has a LOT going for it in terms of usability and internal customization such as setting tax, adding product categories, prices, etc...
Trying to follow the FAQ's, Wiki articles and user forum is like trying to get help from the Looney Tunes gang at Warner Bros.
I can search for "customization" on the zen cart site and get dozens of completely un-related results and several results claiming to be the solution I am looking for and yet only one of them works. It's like looking for a needle in a haystack in the twilight zone.
They need to get some folks on the team who can translate from nerd to normal language, STAT! They answer questions about simplifying How To's with yet more complex instructions. and a lot would be made simpler if they included customization features in the admin area from the get go. It's not like it's that hard to do. If Wordpress and mediawiki, SMF and others can include customization controls, there is no good reason Zen Cart can't also. They simply have chosen not to.
People ask me a lot, "Bear, what's one of the best enterprise apps out there?" and I reply "Zen Cart". They ask me then what is one of the worst and I reply "Zen Cart".
So, If you are having problems customizing Zen Cart and can't figure out which direction you are swimming (kind of like a scuba diver getting lost in the deep ocean "which way is up"), ask your questions here and we'll do our best to give direct, specific answers regarding Zen Cart.
If at all possible.
In the meantime, a good way to get started on the insanity is to use one of a handful of good pages from their wiki, namely ;
Posted: Sun Mar 27, 2011 3:45 am Post subject: Zen Cart Upgrades
Oh ho friends and neighbors.
Just when you thought it was safe to go back in the water.
Zen cart will send you a nice note telling you about a new version just released, they advise you strongly to upgrade to it.
Now, just what does "upgrade" mean to ZenCart? basically, it means re-install it.
I'm not kidding you. They tell you with a straight face in their docs for upgrade that you need to install a new version in a "demo" dir, then backup the old dir. Then run an app to compare old files to your modified ones. Make sure to take notes on all the differences found.. Make changes to customized files and copy/paste new files into directories.
After all that, make a new database and basically, start over.
Now, the nerds who live and breathe for this kind of activity to make them feel special will tell you that you can't expect a "free" app that is just so special and versatile and highly functional to also have a automated upgrade tool.
I call BS on the Nerd crew this time. there are several very versatile and powerful interactive apps out there that have pretty much mastered the automatic update.
Wordpress and phpbb being just a couple of them.
It's called lazy folks.
"We want to be called a free, for anyone to use app and crow about how easy it is, but make you spend a week hunting through forum and help pages to learn to nitpick through various and sundry .css files for an upgrade.
Here's Big Bear's advice. Just set up a whole new install on the major releases. don't mess with the minor releases, not worth the time and effort you will spend.
keep the old version up and public while you basically rebuild the new site. It actually takes less time to set up the new site than it does to screw around with the upgrade instructions.
These nerd whackjobs do not understand the words "practical" and "productivity" for the small business. They assume everyone is going to have an IT department with a few certified nerds on hand who live to breathe code. Forget the small business person who needs to focus on what the business is selling/providing in the first place.
For the sake of punishing myself for ranting so hard on this, Iam going to test my theory of being able to run the new install with the old database.
If the devs are half as good as they think they are, 90$ of the changes are code changes and very few, if any will affect the database relationship. Meaning, backup the old database, set it up as a new database for the new install and walla! you won't have to re-enter all your products and info.
you might have to copy a couple directories over to the new one with images and custom modules you need, etc.. I guarantee you, there will be a couple issues in the general setup complaining about where to find the new locations of files (or just point everything back to the old dir and let that be that)
You know what? at heart I am just a network tech. All the way down to my bones I utterly despise web crap.
I find myself a victim of having to learn and know web crap as a consequence of being an effective IT admin.
Doesn't change the fact that it still sucks though. You can make me do it, but you can't make me like it.
Why am I so vehement about web crap? Precisely because of apps like zen cart. Here's how I personally upgrade crap like zen cart. when they lack a common sense tool.
1) keep a version of the whole dang thing running on a local "play" server.
2) install new version into existing directory on "play" server.
3) run through everything on the play server till it all works as it should. All the while, "old" version is still 'live' on hosted or web facing server.
4)when I am satisfied kinks are worked out on 'play' server' I ftp the whole damn thing to a directory with a different name on the web facing server.
5) rename live directory to something else.
6) rename new directory to old live directory name (this preserves file locations, etc..)
7) check web facing link, all should be well.
this works when like I said earlier, there are few to non changes to the database. Otherwise, you might as well be starting from scratch.
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