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Shopping Carts For The Faint Of Heart

T. O' Donnell, Sat Dec 10th

The chief criteria for judging an ecommerce shopping cart arethe number of credit card processors and shipping services itsupports, and the number of people that support *it*.

Why? Because credit card processors and shipping services mutateall the time. Your cart will require updating. Which serviceworks today may go out of business tomorrow, and leave you withthe orders piling up.

Other important criteria are how easy it is to set up, and addproducts, and how easy it is for the customer to use.

When you set up your shop test it using a wide variety of theoldest and buggiest browsers you can find. If your web storeworks under them you're home and dry.

Here are the cheapest, simplest, and most effective carts I'vefound:

1. Oscommerce (free) - http://www.oscommerce.com

A very good, full-featured, cart. Uses Php and MySQL. Not easyto set up for a 'newbie'. Cookies are used to track the order.If you have PhpMyAdmin installed in your web account, it'seasier. Requires a customer to register before they can make apurchase. Supports a wide range of credit-card processors andshipping services.

Bad point: Technical support is limited to the Oscommerceforums, which are not helpful to newbies.

Also, it may be a while before an update is available to apayment module. These are done by unpaid enthusiasts.

Good point: Oscommerce is supported by thousands of unpaidenthusiasts; this means updates do eventually arrive, and it'sless likely to go out of business, unlike a commercial cart.

2. X-Cart (commercial) - http://www.x-cart.com

Similar to Oscommerce. Requires a customer to register beforethey can make a purchase. Lots of features and add-ons. Supportsa wide range of credit-card processors and shipping services.Has an affiliate program add-on, and lets others sell productsthough your cart.

3. Dansie Cart (commercial) - http://www.dansie.net

A well specified cart. Supports a wide range of credit-cardprocessors and shipping services.

Bad point: Apparently the Perl code is obscured, to make itharder to copy, which is annoying if you want to customise it.

3. Interchange (free) - http://www.icdevgroup.org

A version of the old Akopia / Minivend carts. Complex productwith lots of files and a lot of setting up to do. A completesolution, and includes the option of third party credit-cardreal-time order processing. Encrypts orders.

4. Agora (free) - http://www.agoracart.com

A Web-Store/Commerce.cgi hybrid.

5. The Commission Cart (commercial) -http://www.siteinteractive.com

A CGI-based shopping cart which also functions as an affiliateprogram. Other webmasters earn commissions by signing up andlinking to your site. 6. ShopFactory (commercial) -http://www.shopfactory.Com

Has a nice little wizard-based set-up. If you have a lot ofitems in your shop, this is an option worth checking out.

This is a very valuable feature. A person who's set up CGIscripts before will get the most out of this. Supports a widerange of credit-card processors and shipping services.

Bad points: It's ugly, awkward, and uses JavaScript too much.

7. WebGenie Shopping Cart Pro (commercial) -http://www.webgenie.com

A simple, wizard-based option. Uses Javascript a bit, but themain work is done by CGI scripts. It saves the credit cardinformation on your server.

It's for someone who hasn't set up a CGI script before.Expensive for what you get, but it works. Option to buy it onhire-purchase.

8. Actinic Catalog (commercial) - http://www.actinic.co.uk

Most suitable if you have lots of items in your store. It's a'wizard'-based PC program; you type in your information, and theprogram sets up the store.

You should set up the default store as-is, then customise itlater. Supports a wide range of credit-card processors andshipping services. A little complicated for an internet newbie;there's quite a lot in it.

9. Order Maven (commercial) - http://www.briggsoft.com

A clever little program. It's a standalone Windows executable,which the customer downloads. The customer starts it up, choosesthe product, enters their details, and sends off their orderlike an email, with the credit card details encrypted. It costs$29.00 at the time of writing. No secure server or order pageneeded; it's all done on the customer's PC at their leisure.

You need to customise it. Make sure you write your mail serverURL into the code. For the customer, the order module is a 160kbdownload.

NOTE: Try to avoid carts that use cookies and javascript only,or that tie you into only one secure server and credit-cardprocessor. Also avoid web-based services that you lease only.They can go out of business, leaving you flat.

Having read the above you should have eliminated quite a fewprograms from your shopping list. They either won't workproperly with all browsers, or they won't encrypt your order, orthey want to tie you into their manufacturers' secure ordersystem at $40+ per month.

Another option is to get a bespoke system set up for you by aspecialist company. These cost thousands of dollars. Aren't youglad you read this far?

About the author:About the author: T. O' Donnell(http://www.tigertom.com/web-designer-london.shtml) is anecommerce and web site design consultant in London, UK.

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