Re: Running separate stores in single catalog (& ISP's)

[mikeh@minivend.com]

Quoting Jeff Jones (jeff@canadianbiz.com):
> ******    message to minivend-users from Jeff Jones <jeff@canadianbiz.com>     ******
> 
> Hi,
> 
> I have been looking for shopping cart software for a while now and MV seems
> to be one of the best free or otherwise and the one I want to go with.
> 
> I have a couple questions regarding my application.  I want to create a
> site much like the standard MV demos where the user can enter, and log in
> with a user id and  password.  The shopper would have a choice of "stores"
> (my clients) to choose from (like a mall). When it came time to order, the
> customer would drop items into the basket and checkout and then move on to
> purchase from another store. The purchase order would then go to an email
> address, a separate address for each store.
> 
> I have sifted through the FAQ's and other docs, and the most likely way to
> do this would be to have each item from each store tagged for "Custom Order
> Routing", but this wouldn't barr customers from inadvertently placing items
> from other stores into the basket. (I know this requirement seems odd given
> that MV would route the orders properly, but it is what I need). I have
> also run into the MV concept of sub-catalogs but I am not sure if that is
> the answer...
> 
> Of course the best way would be to run multiple catalogs. But I  have 2
> problems: 1) I need the user data to follow the customer without the need
> for multiple logins. And 2) I will most likely use a MV friendly ISP to
> host (at least until the site cashflows well enough to afford otherwise)
> and they seem to limit the number of catalogs to two.
 
You could have them order to different shopping carts:

	[order code=99-102 cart="[item-field vendor]"]
		Order a t-shirt from The Art Store
	[/order]

(Put a code like TAS in the vendor field, not a name with spaces).

Then you can present a list of carts to check out of:

	[perl arg="carts scratch"]
		my @carts;
		for(keys %{$Safe{carts}}) {
			next if $_ eq 'main';
			push @carts, $_;
		}
		$Safe{scratch}{full_carts} = join "\n", @carts;
		return '';
	[/perl]

	[loop list="[scratch full_carts]"]
		[page href=ord/checkout arg="[loop-code]"]
			Check out for [data table=vendor column=name key="[loop-code]"]<BR>
		[/page]
		<P>
		Items include:

			[item-list cart="[loop-code]"]
				[item-code] [item-field description]<BR>
			[/item-list]
	[/loop]

Finally at the top of ord/checkout:

	[if session arg]
		[cart name="[data session arg]"]
	[else]

	[loop list="[scratch full_carts]"]

		[page href=ord/checkout arg="[loop-code]"]
			Check out for [data table=vendor column=name key="[loop-code]"]
		[/page]
	[/loop]

	[/else]
	[/if]

You should probably put a

	<INPUT TYPE=hidden NAME=mv_cartname VALUE="[data session arg]">

somewhere in the form.

-- 
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