Turn ordering off when on holiday?

Had a few requests for “turn ordering off when I’m on holiday” and yesterday managed to find the time to put it together.

Needs

1. Ability in admin to turn off the checkout system, or leave it open
2. Ability in admin to set up a “we will be back on {date} message” and other “info” messages
3. Show an obvious message in the header of the shop
4. Show an obvious message in the header of the admin area

In less time than it would have taken to find a suitable existing addon, amend it appropriately and install, I made a new modification – with a few database entries, 1 block of code in admin/includes/template_top.php, 1 block of code in both stylesheets, and 1 block of code in includes/template_top.php.

Here is how it looks;

and

So, the admin can choose between 3 options;

a. Checkout = open. Checkout is as normal, no messages show.
b. Checkout = closed. Checkout is closed, those trying to checkout are redirected to shopping_cart page.
c. Checkout = partial. Checkout is as normal, but messages do show.

All in all, a nice little modification that has very little weight of code, so is easy to install on any osCommerce shop, even highly modified templates.