[crazyjadles]

Hey All!
I've told a friend of mine i'd help her create her website. Annoying thing is she's purchased a template instead of letting me create it. So now i'm stuck with a template and need to integrate a shopping cart with it.
www.bumpchic.com/index2.html
I think she bought it from 'Hoover' and they said that paypal was able to integrate it. But my problem / question is....
How in heck to i get the software in there? What software would fit the design? I've been searching for the last week to find what scripts i need to 'add' items to the cart ect but there only seems to be software.
I'm at my ends wits and completely frustrated! I remember why I stopped coding...
Any help would be really appreciated!

[jaymanson]

Hi crazyjadles,

You probably need to think about this one the other way round - instead of trying to fit a shopping cart round the template, you need to fit the template into the shopping cart!

Which cart did you originally have in mind for your friend's site? Most carts come with good support telling you exactly how to make a template for that cart, so you should then be able to use the elements from the bought template to write a new one. You'll definitely need a decent grasp of HTML and CSS to do this, and possibly also an understanding of PHP depending on which cart you choose and what customisations you'll need to do to it.

If you wanted to code your own cart, or piecemeal some little scripts together, it sounds like you'd be on a steep learnng curve to be honest! Something to definitely learn if you're interested, but maybe not the solution for now!

Good luck

Jay

[crazyjadles]

Hey Jay,
Thanks for your reply. You see ineviatbly i'd love to make a template to fit the cart but when someones paid $100 for a template it's a bit hard to tell them i can't use it. *sigh*
The place said it was compatible with 2checkout and paypal.
You have to pay for 2checkout... i might see if i can loophole it all and implement it without paying.
Just kind of rambling to myself... I was just very frustrated with it all yesterday.

Thank you again!

[jaymanson]

There's no reason not to use that template Like I said, you should be able to do a little work on it to make it fit round any shopping cart. I've had clients present me with some horrible templates, but they're paying! I'll give my advice, but if they still want it then that's their choice! Just part of the job, but thankfully there's only one who's not listened to me

As far as shopping carts go, there are lots of open source carts out there which will give you a lot of flexibility and the features I'd guess your friend will want for the website - check out osCommerce, ZenCart, and loads of commercial and free carts at Hot Scripts. you should find a suitable one there.

For a payment solution, if your friend is only selling in Aussie or even NZ, then I would suggest you have a look at Paymate. Its similar to Paypal, but more suited to our side of the world Just make sure if you do choose a cart solution, that there is a Paymate payment module available for it!

Jay