X-Cart forums

[funkydunk]

i have to say that this is beyond rediculous that already this year there are 3 new versions of xcart and security patches to boot.

I for one will not be using x-cart for ANY future stores - There are alternatives (that I have been using for the past 6 months to build numerous stores), that do not have to release patches every month (or week) to fix bugs that they dont test before releasing. Other companies manage to test before releasing - after all xcart it is people's businesses and livelihoods that you are messing with here.

x-cart - you have lost my business.

As far as mods are concerned - why would any developer invest time and effort in doing mods for something that will be changing in 2 weeks... not worth it. They will therefore be no further mods.

x-cart community - sorry

Security - need i say anything else - so much for the security consultant that came in to sort this last summer - the security patch now predates his work... good consultant.

Good luck to those that stay and continue in the hope that 4.0.12 or 4.9.99 will work as you want it to. I for one will save the endless time that is spent patching, upgrading and invest that into running my business on a secure, stable and quick platform.

[adubas]

we are one giant beta test... at least we don't have to pay for updates

[funkydunk]

it is not good enough.

[funkydunk]

Originally Posted by adubas

we are one giant beta test... at least we don't have to pay for updates

btw you do:
1 - time is money according to the old cliche
2 - lost orders through bugs costs too

[/rant]

if anyone wants to contact me get me on irc on QUAKENET #funkydunk

[jb1013]

Hey FunkyDunk I'm curious what alternatives you would suggest. I've barely gone live with my store, and it seems like I'm constantly updating. I don't dare change anything too much because of the nightmare of applying future upgrades.

I've tried Zen Cart and OSCommerce didn't care for either of those solutions.

What you will be using for future E-Commerce sites you develop?

Thanks,

JB

[cotc2001]

Im pretty sure that he wouldn't be able to say in the forums as it would be seen as promoting a competiting package, it might be best to take such dialogue away from the forum.

[funkydunk]

Originally Posted by cotc2001

Im pretty sure that he wouldn't be able to say in the forums as it would be seen as promoting a competiting package, it might be best to take such dialogue away from the forum.

spot on Adam. I dont think it is fair to x-cart to do that either through this forum or by pm.

[kevinrm]

I guess I remember back a few years when I spent an entire summer trying to find a good cart solution, and that the prices for such a system where in the thousands, and none of them were as good as this. For about 2 years I had a cgi cart that was "okay", but nothing compared to this. I've been with this thing since 3.4.4, and I love it. It's made me many tens of 1000's of dollars, and I personally like it that they are constantly improving it.

Just did the patch from 4.0.10 to 4.0.11 - no probs this time. At least these guys stay on top of it. To each his own...I'm staying.

Kevin

[sstillwell@aerostich.com]

Guys, Guys, Guys.

There is no one solution that is "right" for everyone. For Funkydunk, maybe the Xcart mode of operation doesn't fit his business mode. That's fine, he can move on.

For me and the company I work for, Xcart is great, we are on the verg of going live with xcart on our main site (to replace intershop/epages). I don't sell my services to clients for design/e-commerce solutions, I work for a company that sells things through a catalog and through the web (www.aerostich.com).

Yes it does take a lot of personal time, checking things out, but there are a few things that make xcart stand head and shoulders above the rest (bugs and all).

1. Smarty templating engine (probably the most powerful/ubiquitous templating out there).
2. Open Source (yeah, I've added many mods to my cart, beautiful)
3. Free upgrades? Are you kidding?! Our order processing software CMS from NewHaven is riddled with bugs (you guys have no idea). It cost us near $25K and an additional $6/year for support and upgrades.

Also, it depends on how adept you are at HTML/PHP/Smarty/Mysql. I am quite fluent in them all. So understanding how the cart operates and what needs to change to accomplish my goals is not too difficult. I take it that some here know little of the technologies mentioned, that may make xcart more difficult to truly adapt to their liking.

I'm staying for now.

[funkydunk]

i agree - xcart is good is that is what you want - i was merely making a point that perhaps a better model for the xcart community would be if xcart tested stuff BEFORE releasing then you wouldnt have to go through the process of upgrading every fortnight.

again not much hassle if you run one shop - but for any developer that has used xcart to build sites - that equates to a lot of work each time that an upgrade comes out.

Sure, xcart doesnt charge for the upgrades but they do cost both time and money and the nervousness of wondering whether your business will still be in operation after an upgrade is surely reason in itself to think twice about it.

In an ideal world people would have live and test servers where these things can be tested but in my 3 years of work with xcart I have met 3 clients that have test servers (out of hundreds).

There are alternatives, admittedly more money but speed, useability and reliability are all very important factors in determining whether a customer will place and order or come back if it fails or if the cart loses his contents. You cant measure those except to compare with a before and after xcart.

Not withstanding the fact that I have many xcart customers that run very big operations, xcart should listen to what a lot of people are saying (now me included) and get things right BEFORE launching.

Whether you continue with xcart is up to you - there is always a point when you have invested a lot of time and money into launching it, modifying it, paying developers to do work and even learning smarty and php just to make it work, is easier to say "in for a penny, in for a pound" but that is your choice. All I was saying on the alternatives were that I had been using a diff cart side by side for the past 6 months and have the following experience:

1) no bugs found yet
2) the last release has not needed updating every 2 weeks (not at all in fact)
3) the last update involved simply copying up some php files no amendments/updates to the templates were required
4) uses html templates (everyone can modify them)
5) donБ─≥t need to learn smarty
6) no security issues
7) runs quicker
handles large product numbers easily
9) open source


Ps Б─⌠ anyone want to buy some licenses?