Customizing ProductCart

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Printed From: ProductCart E-Commerce Solutions
Category: ProductCart
Forum Name: Customizing ProductCart
Forum Description: Exchange messages with other users that are customizing ProductCart.
URL: https://forum.productcart.com/forum_posts.asp?TID=1816
Printed Date: 01-July-2024 at 4:37am
Software Version: Web Wiz Forums 12.04 - http://www.webwizforums.com

Topic: Uploading

Posted By: TheGOAT
Subject: Uploading
Date Posted: 11-July-2008 at 5:48am

Hello

I was wondering if its possible to add a little upload section, let me explain, i want customers to send pictures (so they have to upload it) then we print the pics and courier it back to them.
Is this even possible and if so how?

Thanks

Replies:

Posted By: Hamish
Date Posted: 11-July-2008 at 6:22am

Hi,
I'm not aware of any functionality like that. The closest is "Custom Product Fields" and that is a text box.
Why not advise the customer to reply to the Order Email and attach the image file to that?
It's not as slick as an upload feature, but it's quick, free & mostly reliable.
You also get the files delivered straight to you instead of them sitting on the server.

I would think, otherwise, your looking at quite a bit of custom work.
At the very least, the email solution would work as a stop-gap if you decide to have a custom solution.

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Editing ProductCart Code?

See http://wiki.earlyimpact.com/developers/editcode" rel="nofollow - WIKI Guidelines for Editing ProductCart's ASP Source Code

Posted By: netprofits
Date Posted: 11-July-2008 at 7:25am

The Help Desk functionality handles this types of scenario. After a customer makes an order they can post messages and upload files which are then linked to the order. The merchant can view the messages and files from the control panel and respond back to the customer.

From the Control Panel, click the Orders menu, then Help Desk...

For the customer, they would go to their My Account page and view their orders and View Previous Orders. There is a Help Desk link beside each order where they can post the message and upload files.

You could add a message to the final checkout page which explains what the customer needs to do and includes a link to the View Orders page.

See the User's Guide for complete details on Help Desk.

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NetProfits Internet Consulting

Certified ProductCart Developer

http://www.nicwebdesign.com" rel="nofollow - Our Site

Posted By: Hamish
Date Posted: 11-July-2008 at 7:42am

Hi NetProfits,
That's an excellent suggestion - I'd forgotten all about that!

TheGoat - It should be possible to customise the text on the help desk pages using includes/languages.asp so that it looks less like a reuse of the helpdesk feature.
You could even go as far as renaming the pages so that even the URL doesn't give it away - although you'd have to be careful of updating the links to the pages etc.

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Editing ProductCart Code?

See http://wiki.earlyimpact.com/developers/editcode" rel="nofollow - WIKI Guidelines for Editing ProductCart's ASP Source Code

Posted By: TheGOAT
Date Posted: 11-July-2008 at 7:47am

Geee thanks a lot guys, been a great help, im not very clued up on how this thing works. Someone just put the system in place now im running it....
Will shout if i get stuck
thanks again

Posted By: TheGOAT
Date Posted: 11-July-2008 at 8:08am

ok lets see if we can do this....
I dont want this option to show up in the main screen or storefront where all my product categories are, because I dont want this service to be affiliated with my current service (problems with dealers etc), so i made it hidden, is there anyway i can provide a direct link to the actuall hidden product/service so that I can bypass the product display page and go straight into business?

Posted By: netprofits
Date Posted: 11-July-2008 at 8:15am

I'm not sure what you mean here. The link to the Help Desk can be placed anywhere. It isn't a product or service perse, it is a support function related to orders. You could just send an email to clients after they place an order which explains how they go to their order and click the Help Desk link to upload images.

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NetProfits Internet Consulting

Certified ProductCart Developer

http://www.nicwebdesign.com" rel="nofollow - Our Site

Posted By: Hamish
Date Posted: 11-July-2008 at 8:39am

Hi,
I don't see any way you will be able to promote this as a service to customers whilst keeping it hidden from a small subset of users / visitors.

Can you clarify this requirement further?

The problem really is that until a customer logs in they see the public side of your site - including products that you would be offering this for. It's possible to not provide the link to actually upload the image until the customer has logged in and is placing/ has just placed, an order. But how would the customer even know to order the related product which will use the upload feature unless you promote it within your site?

It's possible to hide some / all products from all but "wholesale" clients - but that would mean you would have to make all the clients who may use this feature wholesale customers (which your Dealers may be anyway - Not sure of the relationship you have with "Dealers").

It's also possible to hide some products / categories from customers who are not logged in, with a bit of work - but Dealers may register a new account and would then see the information anyway.

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Editing ProductCart Code?

See http://wiki.earlyimpact.com/developers/editcode" rel="nofollow - WIKI Guidelines for Editing ProductCart's ASP Source Code

Posted By: Hamish
Date Posted: 11-July-2008 at 8:44am

Do you mean, could you leave the product / category out of your public visible site & promote it, say, by email, to a select lisyt of clents & provide a link in that?

If that's the case then the answer is yes, with a few caveats :-
- If you update you navigation you will need to remember to remove the category(ies) in question.
- You may have to do some work on the Search part of your site to prevent people from stumbling across your hidden categories.
- It's still possible for the information to be discovered by the dealers - It would just need someone who IS aware of it to mention it to them.

-------------
Editing ProductCart Code?

See http://wiki.earlyimpact.com/developers/editcode" rel="nofollow - WIKI Guidelines for Editing ProductCart's ASP Source Code

Posted By: TheGOAT
Date Posted: 11-July-2008 at 8:51am

hmmmm this is hard to explain in witting.

i want to create a site with a direct link to the "service" because i want to use the infrastructure in place instead of going out and re-creating the wheel again. So i will say bla bla bla click here to order, then that link must go straight past the product categorie page to a specific product (this product must not be visible to anyone on the front or product categorie page)

Is that better?

Posted By: Greg Dinger
Date Posted: 11-July-2008 at 9:19am

I believe that you can create a special category for this, and assign this product to that category. Next, use PC to navigate to that product and record that URL address for later reference. Now, edit the category and make it a "hidden" category. That way the general site visitor will not be able to simply browse the store and find it.

Use caution here though. Little is truly a secret on the Internet. If you post it, the spiders may likely find it. You can try coding meta tags for that specific product page, and a robots.txt file, in order to try to discourage spiders from indexing the page. But if you really need your dealers from locating this and associating it with you, it might be best to simply create a second web site that appears to have nothing to do with your business.

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GreyBeard Design Group

Certified ProductCart Developer

Web Design/Development/Hosting

http://tinyurl.com/5c8t4t" rel="nofollow - Add-Ons & Custom Code |

Posted By: intour
Date Posted: 15-July-2008 at 4:50pm

I added an upload picture option to one of my clients websites recently. I put the code into one of the content pages and made a database link for the pics on the server. it works fine.

I hvae to say though I wished i'd have thought of using the helpdesk upload feature - it would have been a lot easier !

Nigel