Considering Presta Shop

[Lindsayanng]

Hi there,
I am a web developer who has been using OSCommerce for the past three years and I am fed up. The core seems to be at a dead halt and there's nothing moving forward aside from a few hack developers trying to make addons for the existing crap code.

One of the things that OScommerce seems to have over Presta is addons.. Although 90% of them are garbage, there is a good amount of addons that do some of the heavy lifting I need in a store. I had a look through the Presta Shop addons list, but I am left a little confused.

1. are the addons (even the paid ones) open source? Once I purchase an addon, can I get into the code and edit it?
2. Attributes AS products. In my store, the actual product isn't what the custom buys, but the attribute. I need a product page with a list of attributes and a QTY/ TEXT box next to it so the customer can say "I want 10 red, 5 blue, and 6 Green of Product X"
3. Whats the inventory control like on this install?
4. Is there a bridal registry where a customer can sign up, get a unique ID and give that ID out to their wedding guests so the guests can either put money into their account OR purchase items?

Thanks in advance for any help you are able to give me.

[wildchief]

Hello,

I also used OScommerce and decided to abandon it because for varying reasons, some of which you list.

A lot of the modules that you needed for OS commerce were simply to get it to a usable level , for example metatags, pretty urls or a simple "accept terms and condition" box. A lot of the simple stuff was not present in a base OSC install is in a prestashop install. So you might find (as I did) that a lot of OSC custom modules just aren't required. And a good thing to - the less 3rd party modules my stores have the better as it makes the upgrade path much easier.

1. The question of add ons is a difficult one as the modules can be found all over the place not just on the prestashop store, and I don't know the terms and conditions of each one however, in my experience if you want to modify a module that you have obtained legally then I don't see why you could not modify it to your own custom needs. It is al writte in php so no "compiliing" or reverse engineering required.

2. I don't think it does this out of the box but I am not 100%

3. No problems with it yet but I look after smallish businesses

4. Like a wish list kind of thing? I don't think it does that out of the box.

On the plus side building modules is not so hard as it was for OSc as prestashop is desinged to be extended add on modules. I think that is getting even better in v 1.4 to

Hi there,
I am a web developer who has been using OSCommerce for the past three years and I am fed up. The core seems to be at a dead halt and there's nothing moving forward aside from a few hack developers trying to make addons for the existing crap code.

One of the things that OScommerce seems to have over Presta is addons.. Although 90% of them are garbage, there is a good amount of addons that do some of the heavy lifting I need in a store. I had a look through the Presta Shop addons list, but I am left a little confused.

1. are the addons (even the paid ones) open source? Once I purchase an addon, can I get into the code and edit it?
2. Attributes AS products. In my store, the actual product isn't what the custom buys, but the attribute. I need a product page with a list of attributes and a QTY/ TEXT box next to it so the customer can say "I want 10 red, 5 blue, and 6 Green of Product X"
3. Whats the inventory control like on this install?
4. Is there a bridal registry where a customer can sign up, get a unique ID and give that ID out to their wedding guests so the guests can either put money into their account OR purchase items?

Thanks in advance for any help you are able to give me.

[Kelvin Koh]

Hi there,
I am a web developer who has been using OSCommerce for the past three years and I am fed up. The core seems to be at a dead halt and there's nothing moving forward aside from a few hack developers trying to make addons for the existing crap code.

One of the things that OScommerce seems to have over Presta is addons.. Although 90% of them are garbage, there is a good amount of addons that do some of the heavy lifting I need in a store. I had a look through the Presta Shop addons list, but I am left a little confused.

1. are the addons (even the paid ones) open source? Once I purchase an addon, can I get into the code and edit it?
2. Attributes AS products. In my store, the actual product isn't what the custom buys, but the attribute. I need a product page with a list of attributes and a QTY/ TEXT box next to it so the customer can say "I want 10 red, 5 blue, and 6 Green of Product X"
3. Whats the inventory control like on this install?
4. Is there a bridal registry where a customer can sign up, get a unique ID and give that ID out to their wedding guests so the guests can either put money into their account OR purchase items?

Thanks in advance for any help you are able to give me.

1. I'm not fully sure whether the paid addons/modules are open source but the free ones are. All addons and modules are actually PHP and TPL files which you can download and save. These addons are open for modifications and sharing among the community. As for the paid addons, you can modify or customise to your specific requirements by requesting the module's developer to do so or hire another developer for the project.

2. Yes, Prestashop definitely can do that - either list the product with attributes or without. The customer can choose the quantity of the attributes and add them to cart. You can even add custom text boxes and file/image upload features for the customers to input texts and files.

3. Inventory control is very easy. You can freely add, subtract and monitor your inventory. You can execute stock adjustments from the products editing tab in the Back Office (admin panel) and gather stock movement/sales from the catalog and stats tabs.

4. There isn't a bridal registry feature or module in Prestashop out of the box, but there is a paid module where registered customers can buy gift vouchers/cards and send them to friends/guests.

To better understand and experience what Prestashop can offer, I suggest you install Prestashop and give it a try. Or you can go to the showcase and demo where there are many types of online stores and check out the variety of features.

[Lindsayanng]

Sorry it took me a while to reply. Thank you so much for the well thought out replies. I have to say that one of the few things that has me worried is that PrestaShop is primarily built for French users correct??? How is the support for US based payment gateways and shippers?

Also this forum, while has been helpful thus far, is it active and friendly to newbies??

I am going to get to installing it on my dev. server and see where I land.. Is the mode much like wordpress where there are hooks and pre-built functions that you can use?? or is it more like osc where the core and addon code are intermixed?

I still am not sure that out of the box it does that I want it to as far as attributes. This is what I need

Widget Product
[ ] 8x10 - $15.00
[ ] 5x7 - $10.00
[ ] Wallets - $8.00
[ ] low res. digital file - $5.00
[ ] Gallery Wrap - - $50.00


Where the customer puts the number of products in the boxes, even those those attributes are essentially the same across the site, the name of the product is different.. I do not want them to select an attribute for a drop down. This is called "Attribute QTY" addon for oscommerce.

Wishlist will probably be the only thing that it doesn't do out of the box.. I am hoping that my team member can help me develop our own and most likely anything we develop I will push as a free addon if i really get into this cart. I am a big fan of open source communities.

[wildchief]

I am UK based and I haven't found the french origins of prestashop to be a problem for me yet - but I can't be sure how it is from a US users point of view. As for hooks, overrides and functions then prestashop is light years ahead of oscommerce. Both for extending the functionailty and for theming. It uses drop/plug in modules and drop/plug in themes for extending and customisation of the basic cart.

Sorry it took me a while to reply. Thank you so much for the well thought out replies. I have to say that one of the few things that has me worried is that PrestaShop is primarily built for French users correct??? How is the support for US based payment gateways and shippers?

Also this forum, while has been helpful thus far, is it active and friendly to newbies??

I am going to get to installing it on my dev. server and see where I land.. Is the mode much like wordpress where there are hooks and pre-built functions that you can use?? or is it more like osc where the core and addon code are intermixed?

I still am not sure that out of the box it does that I want it to as far as attributes. This is what I need

Widget Product
[ ] 8x10 - $15.00
[ ] 5x7 - $10.00
[ ] Wallets - $8.00
[ ] low res. digital file - $5.00
[ ] Gallery Wrap - - $50.00


Where the customer puts the number of products in the boxes, even those those attributes are essentially the same across the site, the name of the product is different.. I do not want them to select an attribute for a drop down. This is called "Attribute QTY" addon for oscommerce.

Wishlist will probably be the only thing that it doesn't do out of the box.. I am hoping that my team member can help me develop our own and most likely anything we develop I will push as a free addon if i really get into this cart. I am a big fan of open source communities.