That Software Guy, Inc.
offering consulting services in
- software development
- web design
- Zen Cart™
My name is Scott Wilson, and I'm That Software Guy.
Right now I'm working with
Zen Cart, an open source shopping cart program
that you can use to build an online store. Welcome to my world!
Questions? New to Zen Cart?
Discount Marketing Text when Linked Products are used Zen Cart
(11/2008)
If your Zen Cart uses linked products and you
discount by category using one of my mods
Better Together,
Combination Discounts,
Big Chooser or
Big Spender,
you will see
misleading marketing text messages when you view a linked item
in a discounted category.
My
Zen Cart Category Issues page discusses how to resolve
this problem.
More Boilerplate Tips
(11/2008)
A Zen Cart user asked me how he would go about inserting a
product name into one of the
boilerplate files
for Zen Cart product descriptions. I updated the tip to
include instructions for doing this.
Creating a Facebook Page
(10/2008)
That Software Guy is
now on Facebook.
I'm going to write a series of blog posts about
creating a Facebook
page for your business, and hopefully build some
Zen Cart - Facebook glueware.
Keep an eye on
That Software Guy on Facebook to learn more.
Automatic Coupon Generation in Zen Cart
(10/2008)
My AutoCoupon modules have now been released with
versions for Zen Cart 1.3.7 and 1.3.8.
See the documentation on
Spender AutoCoupon and
Chooser AutoCoupon
for details.
Coupon Extensions in Zen Cart
(10/2008)
Want to know how to make a Big Spender offer dependent on a coupon?
Or how to create a coupon with Spender AutoCoupon that is required
for a Big Chooser discount?
Please see my
Zen Cart Coupon Extensions page for an explanation of my extensions to the built-in Zen Cart
coupon mechanisms.
Automatic Coupon Generation in Zen Cart closer to General Availability
(09/2008)
My AutoCoupon modules are now in limited availability.
The documentation on
Spender AutoCoupon and
Chooser AutoCoupon
has been finalized.
Right now, these modules are available for Zen Cart 1.3.8 only, but
I will be
preparing back-ports for 1.3.7.
Zen Cart - Wishpot Integration
(09/2008)
Wishpot is a new service
that allows you to maintain a wishlist (or registry).
I have integrated it into Zen Cart so that you can display the
"Add to Wishpot" button on your product info page.
You can see the details in my
Zen Cart Wishpot Integration page.
Bug in Big Chooser
(09/2008)
Big Chooser
versions prior to 1.2.0a had a defect in handling
certain set_constraint and set_choice_constraint parameters which
is described in
this blog post.
Better Together 2.0 Released!
(09/2008)
Better Together 2.0 is now available. The new features in this version are:
- The addition of add_cat_to_prod linkages.
- Automatic cart sort by price. This means that discounts which use add_cat_to_cat, add_prod_to_cat or add_cat_to_cat will automatically discount the least expensive item that matches the second id.
Related changes to other parts of the Better Together family:
- Users of the Better Together Admin Panel will require version 2.0 of
that software to create add_cat_to_prod linkages; the upgrade fee
is $10. Prior versions will continue to work but will be unable to create add_cat_to_prod linkages.
- Users of the Buy Both Now will require version 2.0 of
that software to create add_cat_to_prod linkages; the upgrade fee
is $10. Prior versions will continue to work but will be unable to create add_cat_to_prod linkages.
- Users of
the Better Together Promotional Page must download a new copy from my site
here.
- Users of
Discount Preview and
Checkout Candy
do not require any additional changes.
Upgrades to Zen Cart - MailChimp interface
(08/2008)
If you use my Zen Cart contributions
MailChimp Newsletter Sidebox or
Newsletter Discounts,
please upgrade; new versions have been released that use the latest API.
Discounting by Manufacturer in Zen Cart
(08/2008)
I have released version 1.2.0 of both
Big Chooser
and
Big Spender,
which allow
discounting by manufacturer. "MANUF" will work the same
way that CAT, PROD, PRICE and MINPRICE do now. For existing
Big Spender or Big Chooser customers, the upgrade price is
only $10 for this great new feature.
Automatic Coupon Generation in Zen Cart
(08/2008)
I'm working on modules that will allow you to automatically create
coupons based on the cart contents or order total.
They're called
Spender AutoCoupon and
Chooser AutoCoupon
(the syntax they use is derived from Big Spender and Big Chooser).
They'll be ready for purchase in the early fall, but you can
see how they will work now.
Gift Wrap at Checkout and PayPal IPN
(07/2008)
A bug was reported in processing orders using PayPal IPN in carts using
the
Gift Wrap at Checkout.
The fix is documented
here.
Better Together Admin and PayPal IPN
(07/2008)
A bug was reported in processing orders using PayPal IPN in carts using
the
Better Together Admin Panel.
The fix is documented
here.
FoxyCart: A Bolt-on Shopping Cart
(07/2008)
This month I spoke to the founders of
FoxyCart, an ingenious
system which allows you to add e-commerce to an existing website.
You can
read the FoxyCart interview here.
Well, I took up their challenge and
converted an existing site
to a shopping cart, and sure enough, it was quite straightforward.
Here's the result.
I look forward to doing my first real project with FoxyCart!
Boilerplate HTML in Product Descriptions
(06/2008)
A question came up on the Zen Cart forum about including HTML Files
in the product description.
When I first worked on this problem a couple of years ago, the
person who needed it just needed a few sentences here and there,
so I developed
a tip describing adding
boilerplate strings to the product description.
But this person wanted to replace the entire product description
with an HTML file, so I developed
a tip describing including
HTML files to the product description.
This is particularly useful if there
is boilerplate text you want to include in a number of products,
but the text is more than just a sentence or two.
Better Together Roadmap
(06/2008)
What's next for
Better Together?
- add_cat_to_prod() will be added.
The semantics of "category" will be changed so you can use a top level category or a category with subcategories instead of just one with products underneath it.
(This is how Big Chooser, Big Spender and
Combination Discounts work.)
This change will affect add_prod_to_cat, add_twoforone_cat, and add_cat_to_cat (as well as the new add_cat_to_prod linkage, if that is available at the time). (I later decided against doing this. It reduces the usability of Better Together Admin.)
If you are using other related software
(
Promotional Pages,
Buy Both Now,
Discount Preview,
Checkout Candy,
Better Together Admin),
you may need to upgrade; you will be advised at that time what to do, and everything will be available at once so upgrading won't break your site.
Look for these changes in the third quarter of this year.
Better Together Admin Panel
(06/2008)
The
Better Together
contribution has been well received by the Zen Cart community, but
a persistent complaint is that you have to edit a file to set
up discounts. Well, no more - the
Better Together Admin Panel
is now generally available. You can do all the usual linkages:
- product to product
- category to category
- product to category
- two for one (products)
- two for one (categories)
and because it uses AJAX, getting the product and category lists is
super fast. Show your support for Better Together - get the
Better Together Admin Panel
today!
Blog Integration
(06/2008)
Looking to add fresh content to your Zen Cart site? Take a look
at my
Blog Integration contribution.
It can take your blog (or any RSS feed) and display it on a page
in your Zen Cart shop.
Newsletter Discount Updates
(06/2008)
The
Newsletter Discount contribution has been updated to use
the new
MailChimp API.
In addition, two user exits have been added to the contribution
to allow the exclusion of products or categories from the
discounting computation.
Zen Cart Hosting Recommendations
(06/2008)
The question of which host to choose
comes up often enough that I thought I'd write a
blog post with
my Zen Cart Hosting Recommendations.
Issue with Discount Preview of Group Pricing in 1.3.8
(05/2008)
Users of Discount Preview in Zen Cart
1.3.8 who use Group Pricing should make the fix identified
in the
Discount Preview Help Page.
Quantity Discounts by Dollars Spent
(05/2008)
I have released the changes required to make the
Zen Cart Quantity Discounts Contribution
perform discounting on the basis of dollars spent, rather
than units purchased as is typically done.
There is no longer any need to use the
Zen Cart Price Sensitive Discount;
using Quantity Discounts has the following advantages:
- Extensive support for automatically created
marketing text
- Automatically created
Zen Cart Promotional Page for your discounts
- Support for including/excluding products/categories from the spend computation
- Support for unlimited numbers of spend levels
- It works with Discount Preview
- It was written by me ... so of course it's insanely great.
Download it. Do it.
You know you want to.
Beginner's Guide to Mod Installation
(05/2008)
Installing a mod to Zen Cart can seem daunting the first time you
do it. I wrote up a few notes to walk first-timers through the process
in my
Guide to Mod Installation on Zen Cart. Hope it's useful!
Dymo Label Printing for Zen Cart now for Firefox
(04/2008)
Well, I finally got my
Dymo Labels for Zen Cart
contribution working with
Firefox.
It's available now in the Zen Cart downloads area,
with instructions for installation on XP and Vista.
Newsletter Discount for Zen Cart
(04/2008) I've added a discounting module to Zen Cart which allows you
to offer a discount to newsletter subscribers, whether you use
MailChimp or the native Zen Cart newsletter system.
It's called
Newsletter Discount.
Documentation Updates
(04/2008) A couple of small documentation enhancements so far this month:
- The instructions for the SMS on Sale mod have been
enhanced to describe using this mod in conjunction with
Twitter. This might be a desirable option for Zen Cart operators outside the US who do not have an SMS to email gateway,
but still want SMS notification when a sale is made.
- A set of instructions has been written up to describe how to date-constrain your discounts when using
Better Together, Combination Discounts, Big Spender or Big Chooser.
Using just a small amount of PHP code, you can start and/or stop
your discount offers at dates of your choosing.
See Timing Discounts for details.
Dymo Label Printing for Zen Cart
(03/2008) It's no secret that
I'm crazy about my Dymo.
I've wanted to add Dymo printing to Zen Cart for a while, but
I was discouraged by the fact that the Dymo interface logic was
so tightly coupled to Internet Exploiter (it uses an
an Active X interface to a COM driver). Then I read that
some smart guy wrote an XPI to make it work with
Firefox.
Well, what the heck, right? I rolled up my sleeves, I got it to
work with Win/IE (XP, Vista),
but I'm still trying to make it play nice with
Win/FF. Of course, since this talks directly to the driver, it's
a real science project to get it going on other platforms.
Check out
Dymo Labels for Zen Cart.
Big Upsell for Big Chooser and Big Spender
(02/2008) Since the release of
Big Spender,
people have been asking for
Checkout Candy
functionality (display the discounts on the shopping cart page
and the first page of checkout to tempt shoppers with upselling offers).
Big Chooser users wanted the same thing.
The wait is over.
Check out
Big Upsell.
Extending the power of coupons
(02/2008) If you're trying to measure advertising effectiveness,
a common mechanism is to require a coupon code for a discount.
But Zen Cart coupons can only do so much.
Now you can create complex discounts with the
configurability of Big Chooser and add a coupon dependency.
Or you can use Big Chooser to allow a coupon to provide free
shipping as well as a discount (by default, coupons can only do
a discount
or free shipping). Check out version 1.0.4 of
Big Chooser.
Category Help
(02/2008) The most common questions I get about my discounting modules
are questions about category handling and category problems.
I wrote a brief FAQ about
how this works and the problems you might encounter
here.
A Podcast with That Software Guy, Inc.
(01/2008) I spent some time talking with the folks over at
Alpha Software, and they
released it as a podcast.
All Discounts Integrated on a Single Promotional Page
(01/2008) Are you using my
Zen Cart Promotional Pages to
show off your discounts? Are you using multiple discounting modules?
Would you like to show your discounts on a single page?
You're in luck! A single page showing all discounts called the
Integrated Promotional Page is now available.
Here's what it looks like.
Using Sandy with Zen Cart
(01/2008) If you enjoy using the electronic assistant
Sandy,
you can use Sandy to remind you to follow up with your
Zen Cart customers a few days after a sale. Just use
the
SMS on Sale mod;
instructions are provided.
External Polling Sidebox
(01/2008) The External Polling Sidebox, which allows you to more
easily integrate with hosted polling services, has been made
available in the Zen Cart Download area.
For more information on using this contribution to engage your
customers through polls, see
External Polling Sidebox help.
Required changes to discounting modules for Zen Cart 1.3.8
(12/2007)
Quantity Discounts, Better Together and Combination Discounts
all require a patch to run under Zen Cart 1.3.8. Take
this function and paste it
right above the function calculate_deductions()
in the file in includes/modules/order_total.
The latest versions include this patch, but if you haven't upgraded,
you must manually apply the patch.
Big Spender, Big Chooser and Military Discounts do not
require this patch.
Big Chooser Released
(01/2008) Big Chooser is finally ready for general release.
If you need something more powerful than Combination Discounts
to fully realize your marketing plan, check out the
Zen Cart discounting possibilities
that Big Chooser provides.
Blogging Release Notices
(1/2008) Starting this year, I'm going to add release notices to
my blog content.
If you use the URL
http://thecartblog.com/category/that-software-guy/feed
you can get a feed of only these release notices, which you can
add to your iGoogle page or to your RSS Reader.
Gift Wrap at Checkout Updated
(1/2008) My
Gift Wrap
module has been updated to Zen Cart 1.3.8, and is now available in the
Zen Cart downloads area.
Search Helper Released
(1/2008) My
Search Helper
module is now available in the
Zen Cart downloads area.
Changes to Gift Wrap
(12/2007) A small bug was found in version 2.2, so I released version
2.3. This will be the FINAL version for Zen Cart 1.3.7. In
the new year, I will release the required changes for Zen Cart 1.3.8.
Big Chooser getting closer ...
(12/2007) I made a lot of progress this week and buttoned up
version 0.0.2 of Big Chooser/Conditional Discounts.
It should be ready for final release
soon. Take a look at the
awesome cross-selling power
it gives you.
Search Helper
(12/2007) Looking for a way to correct typos and use
additional keywords in your cart searches without the headache
of having to update meta tags on every product? Take a look at
Search Helper!
Passing the Century Mark
(12/2007) Not my age - although it seems that way some mornings -
the number of newsletter subscribers I have. If you'd like to join
this awesome group of over 100 clued-in Zen Cart users, go ahead and
sign up today!
Looking for even more style points?
Read my blog!
What's in a name?
(12/2007)
Like a father confusing his children's names,
somehow I got mixed up the other day writing about Combination
Discounts and Conditional Discounts.
So I thought I'd give them more easily differentiated names.
Conditional Discounts is now
Big Chooser - Conditional Discounts.
Not only does this provide some separation from Combination
Discounts, it also re-enforces the similarity with Big Spender.
New Gift Wrap features for VAT liable shopowners
(12/2007)
Gift Wrap at Checkout
has been enhanced to allow the display of gift wrapping charges
in a tax-included format. If your tax regime requires this,
download Gift Wrap at Checkout 2.2 from the Zen Cart downloads area.
The Perfect Gift
(11/2007) I wrote a
fundraising appeal on my blog for
the Williamson Free School of Mechanical Trades, in
response to a challenge grant generously made by
Mr. Henry Rowan.
Please take a moment to read it and respond if you're able.
Quantity Discounts by currency per item
(11/2007) I've updated
Quantity Discounts
to provide per item discounting
on a currency basis. So instead of saying "10% off for over 10 items," you can now
say, "$5.00 per item off over 10 items." A number of people asked for this in
the past week, so I thought it was about time to add it.
On one condition!
(11/2007) .... or three or four.
People seem to like the specification flexibility of
Big Spender, so
I am refactoring it into a discounting module that looks at cart
contents rather than dollars spent.
I hope to have it ready by December, but you can get started
reading the documentation on
Big Chooser - Conditional Discounts now.
Updates to Gift Wrap at Checkout
(11/2007) I have added a series of user exits to
Gift Wrap at Checkout which allow you to disable or
surcharge wrapping services for
specific categories or product ids. It's available from the Zen Cart downloads area as version 2.1.
Welcome, Google Searcher!
(11/2007) I wrote a small contribution that recognizes when
surfers arrive at your Zen Cart and generates an internal keyword
search for them based on their Google keywords.
Here's the help for
Welcome Google Searcher. Happy Googling!
Super Orders Fixes
(10/2007) Thanks to Frank Koehl (Blindside)
for incorporating my changes into Super Orders.
These changes fix the bulk status update issues that some
users have reported. You can download them
here.
Magento and StoreSuite
(10/2007) I've gotten a few questions in the last month
about
Magento. Magento looks very promising, and as soon as it's
released, I'll be talking more about it, both here and on
my blog.
Of course, it never rains, but it pours.
Web Solutions provider
Interspire is building momentum in the development of
their own shopping cart, called StoreSuite.
Please see
my most recent blog post on
StoreSuite for more information.
It's a wrap!
(10/2007) A frequent topic on the Zen Cart forum was how to provide
(and bill for) gift wrapping services. I wrote up
some suggestions, then wound up writing a
small contribution, but I wasn't satisfied with either of them.
I really wanted to follow the Amazon model of wrap selection
at checkout time. Finally, I took the bull by the horns and
developed an
at-checkout gift wrapping selection interface.
I hope it helps your Christmas sales!
thecartblog.com - A blog about shopping carts, e-commerce and all the rest
(09/2007) I keep coming across things I think are interesting that I want
to share, but I'd like to keep my business home page for
business matters. So I started
thecartblog.com. Take a look!
Using Google Checkout with my discounting modules
(09/2007) If you are using Better Together, Combination Discounts or
Big Spender along with Google Checkout in your Zen Cart™,
you must be running at least the following versions:
- Google Checkout: v1.4.1_beta2 or better
- Better Together: 1.5a or better
- Big Spender: 1.1.3a or better
- Combination Discounts: 1.0.4a or better
Buy The Set extension for Combination Discounts
(09/2007) For linkages between products without attributes
using
Combination Discounts,
I have add the ability to purchase the entire set of items with a single
click. Not surprisingly, it's called
Buy The Set.
It does for Combination Discounts what
Buy Both Now
did for Better Together - making it easy for your customers
to buy all your cross-sells in a single click.
Hey, Big Spender!
(09/2007) Want to provide discounts or free gifts based on the
dollar total in the cart? Take a look at
Big Spender.
It is now available.
Promotional Pages for your discounts
(09/2007) A few people have asked for special pages that list all their discounts for the various discounting modules I've created.
I've made them available by download and installed them on my test cart so you can see how they look.
See
Promotional Pages for Discounts for more details.
