OMG – what do i do now?
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Mario asks;
I have absolutely no knowledge of wed site or design but I have the task to set up a website from scratch. I have been introduced to OSCOMMERCE but I have no idea of what to do with it. So far i downloaded the program from the site, but I already know i shouldn't have done it to my PC. Can you give me the bearing of what I am doing, or link me to a blog or site that could tell me from scratch of what to do?
Mario – to run osCommerce you do need to have certain things lined up…
- A domain name! I'm guessing that you know where to get one from, if not, I suggest "Name Cheap" – com domains are less than $10.
- A hosting account. There are so many hostinf compnaies out there that I wouldn't know which to recommend. Maybe "Hosting Zoom" – so long as the hosting account that you purchase has PHP and MySQL, osCommerce will work.
- Once you got both the above, link one to the other. This is done by the host that you choose to use. You then get email, webspace and so on.
- osCommerce. You've already downloaded it which is the right thing to do. You now need to unzip it and you will find that the unzipped folder structure contains a "catalog" folder. Upload everything that is inside that folder to your website hosting account.
- Now set up a database for osCommerce to use. To do this, follow the instructions given by the host that you choose.
- Now install osCommerce!
It's all much easier than it sounds. If you think that you won't have any chance of getting it up and running, I have an osCommerce install guide that is only a few dollars. Alternatively, I do offer an installation service, however this is obviously quite a lot more expensive than the eBook I linked to.
Well, for starters, get your domain name and host sorted out. Once you've got that, please do come back and ask for more help if you need it.
Good luck!
I recommended Mario to install XAMPP on his local machine but Gary deleted this post. Gary, if you don't want comments, please disable it in wordpress. Thanks.
Comment by Torki — April 18, 2008 @ 11:42 am
Torki – please read this post making note of the "real email address" point.
In my opinion, advising a complete beginner to install XAMPP or any type of server is plain foolish as it will just be more confusing to him/her.
Comment by Gary — April 18, 2008 @ 1:56 pm
Oh, I see – it was an email problem. Sorry for blaming you, Gary.
Well, I really disagree with your opinion about XAMPP. Just download "XAMPP light" to a folder on your harddrive, start it and it runs. No installation is needed.
Then copy osCommerce in the XAMPP htdocs folder, create a new database with the included PhpMyAdmin, start osCommerce installation script and – e voila – osCommerce is running on Mario's local machine. It takes not more than 3 minutes for all steps.
What's so difficult about it?
Comment by Torki — April 18, 2008 @ 2:40 pm
Torki – that's OK
Comments without a "real" email address eg sddf@fsfd.com or whatever, just get binned.
I agree that XAMPP or phptriad, or WAMp or any other is easy! But when the asker of the question is not too knowledgable it's best in my opinion to crawl before walk before run. Well, that's my view anyway
Comment by Gary — April 18, 2008 @ 2:50 pm
I think another good reason for using XAMPP is the speed. I'm sure I had lost interest in osCommerce back in the days if I had made my first steps on a webspace.
Cause all changes have to be uploaded on the server by FTP and even if you use a FTP program like FileZilla which supports automatically uploads, it takes – compared with working on localhost – very long if you can see the result of your changings. And especially as a beginner you need IMHO a quick response about your changings if you play around. If you always have to wait 20 seconds just to see the next error-message, it starts to suck quickly
So my advice to any beginner (not only osCommerce but also CMS etc.): work localy!
Anyway, that's just my opinion and I don't wanna get any trouble here, haha
Comment by Torki — April 18, 2008 @ 3:16 pm
You cannot get in trouble here – say what you want to say – I don't mind. Your opinion is just as valid as mine.
Comment by Gary — April 18, 2008 @ 3:18 pm
Thanxs Gary,
I didn't get it running yet but I am working on it. I will
keep you updated on my progress.
Regards
Mario
Comment by Mario — April 24, 2008 @ 10:32 pm
Mario – please do keep us updated
Comment by Gary — April 25, 2008 @ 10:21 am