Shopping cart software

[aiGTs]

Hi I'm looking to build an online store. After researching online, I've found a few that are highly recommended by users but most of them are hosted service and have to pay monthly payments. My ideal shopping cart solution is to be able to download a software and upload it onto my own webhost. What would you recommend? Thanks!

[JEccles]

Zen Cart or OS Commerce might suit you.

[roban]

Cs-Cart is the one I use.

[aiGTs]

Thanks for the suggestions. How customizable is CS-Cart? Will I be able to design it with Dreamweaver and possibly integrate some flash on the indx page? Thanks.

[roban]

You can integrate Flash but Dreamweaver is a no-no as Cs-Cart uses the Smarty templating system. You'll find that most cart systems don't lend themselves to editing in a WYSIWYG editors because they are written in either PHP or ASP. I believe that Dreamweaver has an e-commerce extension that can be integrated with either Google Checkout or Pay Pal buttons if you want to go that route. Cs-Cart comes with about a dozen skins out of the box and a very good support forum. I suggest before using any system, you spend some time on their forums to see if the help you need is available and more importantly you can discover the problems others have.

[Shannonlp]

Hi I'm looking to build an online store. After researching online, I've found a few that are highly recommended by users but most of them are hosted service and have to pay monthly payments. My ideal shopping cart solution is to be able to download a software and upload it onto my own webhost. What would you recommend? Thanks!

I have been putting together a list of carts. http://www.ecarttemplates.com

I would say a good PHP based cart. Most of the ASP carts a expensive and the windows backend is expensive.

If Roban says CS-Cart is good I would give it a try. I have just installed X-Cart. It is a little hard to customize if you don't have a decent PHP and Smarty background.

osCommerce, Zen Cart, CubeCart are all decent carts. You may find yourself having to buy mods for what started out as free. Before you buy think about what you want and need the cart to be able to do for you site.

Make a list of features then look at the carts comparing against your list of features. Be sure to note how much a mod will cost if it is needed.

Another problem with buying 3rd party mods is making sure that if you upgrade your shopping cart it will A work and B not break the upgrade.

Hope this helps

[aiGTs]

I have been putting together a list of carts. http://www.ecarttemplates.com.....

Shannonlp,

Thank you. I looked at your website, very nicely put together, but there are so many softwares to choose from, that's why I'm asking for suggestions on this forum. All I'm looking for a software that I can upload to my webspace and do minor design changes, which one would you recommend?

[Shannonlp]

It really depends on your knowledge of programming. CS-Cart and CubeCart are probably good carts to start with for what your looking to accomplish. If you spent a little time learning Smarty Cs-Cart would be the one I would choose from the 2 carts.

CubeCart the free version CC3 is probably a little easier for someone that has never setup a cart before. It does require CSS and HTML knowledge. CSS and HTML will be a mandatory piece of knowledge for most carts.

Smarty is a little more complex. It is much more versatile.

osCommerce and Zen Cart I have never personally liked.

Hope this helps.

[roban]

shannon's list is well done and a sorely needed breakdown. Just a side bar to note that Cs-Cart is developed by the same people who developed x-cart. A group of x-cart's employees broke away to put together Cs-Cart.

[rfresh]

Most Linux web hosters also offer several free ecommerce applications. You can install each one and try them out and then settle on the one that best meets your needs.

If you're already on a Linux box, you can still install them since they are free but it will be a little more work (the ecommerce apps that come with new Linux websites have a one click install program).

[aiGTs]

I looked into CS-Cart a little bit more, it's quite nice. I'll give it a try. Thanks guys.

[QuikShop]

If you are looking for a desktop based eCommerce system that you modify then upload the changes, try Actinic, I think its up to version 8 now - we used it at version 5 and its great for newbies to eCommerce

[dennisb]

Do you want to make money of be in IT engineer?
Too many storeowners are spending too much time on IT issues instead of taking care of their customers. Yea you have to start somewhere and yea you may pay a little more but in the long run, your able to make money if you let the professionals handle the IT.

[Tatiana]

http://www.ecarttemplates.com/ I use this one and have to tell that this is very confortable for me.

[QuikShop]

Do you want to make money of be in IT engineer?
Too many storeowners are spending too much time on IT issues instead of taking care of their customers. Yea you have to start somewhere and yea you may pay a little more but in the long run, your able to make money if you let the professionals handle the IT.

And this is especially true for new businesses which is why a hosted ecommerce solution is ideal for those who want to focus more on running their business rather than learning html and css.

It is horses for courses (cheesy English expression ) and for complex ecommerce requirements that need to integrate with back-office stock control and other software then the bespoke solution makes sense but in most cases choosing a good ecommerce service provider to take care of all the technical issues including hosting, maintenance and ongoing upgrades of your shop in return for a monthly or annual subscription makes more business sense.