The Real Soft Cart Version 1.21Release! Version .99a - Demo
Installation For easiest installationuse MS Internet Explorer 4
For the most up to date instructions, see the on-line version of this help file.
Step by Step
"How To" Guide for setting up the internet's
easiest to use Shopping Cart on your site!
Welcome to the Real Soft Shopping Cart "Getting Started Guide" for Setting up your Products. Since WYSIWYG HTML editors (like FrontPage) are designed to be web
design tools, there is little need to use these type editors to edit these templates.
You may be thinking BUT WAIT!! I'm not a programmer!!Relax! you don't NEED to be a programmer to set up this cart. If you are still a little worried about editing your templates by hand instead of with FrontPage or the like, try this:
To see if you are "qualifed" to install the cart try changing the value of the variable "CanIdoIt" below from "maybe" to "yes". (case is important) Go ahead, try it and then click the "Check my work" button. Remember to leave the quote marks (") and semicolon (;) undisturbed when editing the variable. Change only the values BETWEEN the quote (") marks.
When you are ready, change maybe to yes.
Seems pretty simple doesn't it. Just remember a couple of things as you modify these templates.
Be careful of using quote marks WITHIN the variable values. The JavaScript interpreter will think that the end of the variable value is reached unless you preceed each internal quote mark with a backslash (\).
For example: If your product name is:
"Really Cool" Pink Snorkel
then you would edit the itemsNamSt in the template to:
itemsNamSt = "\"Really Cool\" Pink Snorkel";
Change ONLY A FEW or ONE of the variables at a time and check your modifications often by reloading the template before you go on and edit more values.
If you get stuck you can always use ITEM0.HTML and save as ITEM1.HTML to start fresh. (NOTE: ITEM0.HTML is read only so you won't accidentally overwrite it.
CHANGE THE VARIABLE VALUES AND MAKE SURE THEY ARE CORRECT BEFORE YOU MODIFY COLORS, BACKGROUNDS ETC. There will be plenty of time to customize your shopping cart later...
A MAJOR POINT THAT NEEDS TO BE MADE HERE IS THIS: You do NOT HAVE TO USE these templates. They are provided for you as a starting point from which to build your e-commerce site. They are not meant to replace your site or to cause you to have to redesign your site.
If you are capable and willing you can use the critical functions in your OWN web site pages and transplant the cart applet into your existing HTML. This shopping cart applet is INCREDIBLY configurable so BEGINNERS and ADVANCED users have all the room they need to be lazy or really do something cool. Who knows? We might even end up showcasing your site to thousands of web visitors in our Cool Cart of the Week contest.
You no doubt already have product pages that you have taken great care with and have worked hard to make sure they are what you want aesthetically as well as being informative and complete regarding the benefits of your products. THE PURPOSE OF THESE TEMPLATES IS NOT TO REPLACE YOUR EXISTING PAGES, but rather enhance your site with on-line ordering of your products and services. Allow these templates to be "catalog pages" and your existing product pages to be "the Showroom examples" of your virtual store. If you're worried about your new "catalog" fitting in with the rest of your site, RELAX! all you have to do is overwrite the default background images with your own! Just place a file called bg.jpg and bgcart.jpg in the /img directory and your cart will blend right in...
If you don't know what I mean when I refer to the shopping cart as your "on-line catalog" I can best explain it like this:
Think of The Real Soft Shopping Cart system as a catalog. When most people think of a catalog the old Sears catalog, JC Penney, Victoria's Secret or maybe some other catalog comes to mind.
You can look at the products Sears has, for example, by looking in the Sears catalog.
If you spotted a lawn tractor in the catalog and wanted to investigate it further, you might hop in the car and head to Sears and check out the tractor first hand in their store. After looking over all the options, examining the color, checking the seat for comfort, etc. etc. you might then decide that you need to go to the checkout counter and tell the clerk you want that tractor. As you stand there next to the tractor you see that Sears also has a bagger system that fits the tractor so you grab that box too and get your wallet out to pay the clerk.
Stay in imagination mode for a moment and think about how you can provide this same experience to your web site shoppers virtually. The Real Soft Shopping Cart provides the on-line equivalent of the "paper" catalog. Each of it's ITEMx.HTML pages make up the pages of this on-line catalog. Instead of your customer having to physically "go somewhere" to see your product up close, simply include your existing product page address (URL) in the ITEMx.HTML templates and all your shopper has to do is click the "(More...) Link" to Take a closer look at your products.
Your virtual cash register is reached by clicking the Check Out button (at left) on the cart applet window. This intuitive design (and the fact that the cart stays visible) makes it so easy for your customer to buy your product they almost can't resist!
Just like our example Sears customer who picked up an accessory when he bought the Lawn Tractor of his dreams, you too can expect greater instances of "additional items" being purchased by your customers because they don't have to fill out an additional form to buy two or more items from you. They all go into the cart! Your customer can quickly and easily buy as much of your products as he can afford.
This is the key question you need to ask yourself. "If your customer CAN'T impulse buy on your site, what is the chance that he WILL impulse buy?.
Answer: none. He can't impulse buy if it is not possible to do so on your site.
The difference is that this catalog allows your customer to actually buy your products on-line!
With the click of ONE BUTTON your customer can make a decision (perhaps an impulse decision) to buy your stuff! The ITEMx.HTML pages are simply a quick overview of each of your wares with links to more detailed info.
If you are familiar with our previous version of the Real Soft Shopping Cart then you will notice right off that we have included a "Pull Down" product selector menu. This was by far the most requested feature besides a shipping function. Using the pull down menu is optional as we will explain later in this guide. Also, repetitive values like your company name, home page URL, total item pages and "edit mode" have been removed from the individual ITEMx.HTML* pages and relocated to CART.HTML. This allows you to configure these values once, in a central location, and forget about them until one of them changes. The only drawback to this is the necessity to load the CART.HTML page before any of the ITEMx.HTML pages are loaded.
That is the reason for the new "Shopping cart is loading... splash page". This page may be customized if you want with your company logo, message to your customer etc. It must remain the first page that loads, however, so the cart can initialize before the product pages get loaded. The product pages, if loaded into a frame by themselves, will cause a javascipt error saying that the "app" window reference is "not an object" Please always view your item pages in the frames they were intended to be in. If you are an advanced html and or javascript guru on the other hand, have at it!
*NOTE: An ITEMx.HTML page is the generic term we use to refer to your finished individual catalog pages.ITEM1.HTML, ITEM2.HTML, ITEM3.HTML etc are the only item pages that will end up in your directory. There is no "actual" ITEMX.HTML file, we reference that name as an example only. Furthermore, ITEM0.HTML is your master template. You can always rely on this file as a "Backup" in case you accidentally damage your item page template while editing it. ITEM0.HTML is shipped read only to prevent accidentally overwriting it.
If you downloaded the UPGRADE FILE (RSSCxxxU.EXE), you will notice that the UPGRADE download package installed the cart files by default into a directory called "/upgrade". RENAME YOUR EXISTING CART DIRECTORY TO CART.OLD AND THEN RENAME THE CART.NEW FOLDER TO 'CART'.
Before you dive in and edit your product pages there are a couple of questions you might ask yourself.
How many productswill you be selling immediately? .
There is no need to set up your "Total Item Pages" value to 100 until you actually have all of the product pages done. For now, set this value to the number of product pages you can generate and upload to your site to test with different browsers. You can always expand your catalog to whatever number of pages you want (there is no limit) any time you finish more product pages.
Would I rather just transplant the cart applet into my existing site? You should be an advanced site builder to attempt to do this. Our technical support is limited to the templates provided with the Shopping Cart. The individual critical functions like addProduct(), UpdateTax
You will be editing your files with Notepad.exe if you use Internet Explorer (recommended) to install your cart. We recommend replacing your NOTEPAD.EXE (Windows users) with EditPad. It's as easy to use as NOTEPAD.EXE except you can edit multiple files simultaneously. Let's say you want to change the backgound color of the template's tables from "Silver" to "#E8F4F9". just drag all of your ITEMx.HTML pages into an open EditPad window and you can search and replace "Silver" with"#E8F4F9" on all your pages at once! Try EditPad. It is "CareWare". If you like the program and want to keep using it all you need to do is send the author a post card!
If you decide to add more pages to your catalog later. You simply start EditPad, open the /cart folder on your hard drive and edit CART.HTML by modifying the TotalItemPages param value to your new total item count. Add your new pages and you are done!
If you have some products that are really add ons for other major items include them in your catalog! The more items you have listed in your on-line catalog, the more items your shopper can buy! Try to be complete! Get your entire product line, (in small increments that you can accomplish in one sitting,) listed in your catalog and you will have higher incidents of multi product sales! Once you have completed the First steps to take you are ready to edit the CART.HTML file.
Editing your CART.HTMLShopping Cart Page. Do this First!
These are the required things to change in this file.
EditMode parameter value (Do this LAST)
CheckOutURL parameter value
TotalItemPages parameter value
SiteName parameter value
SiteURL parameter value
DecimalPlaces (international versions)
If you want to take a stab at editing your CART.HTML page now, click the button below. (do this from the local copy of this file -- the one on your hard drive).
If you get an "Access Denied" error, go BACK to the local copy of this file. (If you loaded our on-line version of this file, click the BACK button on your browser one or more times to return to the local copy...)
There are also these optional values to change.
The Shopping Cart Applet background colors
AppletBackR Red value for Applet
AppletBackG Green value for Applet
AppletBackB Blue value for Applet
ListBackR Red value for List background
ListBackG Green value for List background
ListBackB Blue value for List background
For easy RGB color configuration, try this handy FREEware Color Picker:
HTML Color Picker.
Finally there are these advanced values. (not recommended for beginners...)
CheckOutFrame If you are transplanting the applet into your existing site.
VendorID and VendorForm. These are reserved for future integration with RegNow.com: a real-time, secure credit card ordering service. They require no upfront money and charge a percentage of the sale for their fee.
UserDefinedParm1 and UserDefinedParm2 can be used to store, and recall, values that you define. Like maybe a bgcolor for the item pages, the secret location of Jimmy Hoffa, your old high school locker combination. Whatever!
Editing your CATALOG.HTMLProduct Index Page. This is the OPTIONAL pulldown menu!
Getting right to the product instead of having to wade through the individual pages was a common request from our version 1.0 and 1.1 users so we have allowed a CATALOG.HTML page to serve as a product index (or directory.) From any of the product pages your shopper can access this product listing by clicking the [ <Index> ] button at the bottom.
Since we advertise that you don't have to know javascript to install this shopping cart (and you don't) we allow you the option of editing a simple HTML page with links to the ITEMx.HTML pages, editing a JavaScript version via simple "Copy and Paste" or replacing this page altogether with a simple Begin Shopping Link. Using the simple shopping link version removes the ease and functionality of the "direct access" mechanism but if you would rather keep your installation simple you can rely on it for now and always add the fancy versions later.
To use a simple begin shopping version just click the catalog-begin.html page link below and SAVE AS CATALOG.HTML. If you chicken out =o) and go the easy route you can go on to the next step. Adding your products step.
To use a simple begin shopping version click this --> catalog-item.html. SAVE AS CATALOG.HTML.
To integrate a simple list of products in a table you can use our default catalog page, the one above, by simply clicking on it's [ EDIT FILE NOW ] button and modifying it to suit. If you have already loaded the other catalog page you can go back to the installation default here:
To integrate a simple list of products in a table click this --> catalog-html.html. SAVE AS CATALOG.HTML.
To integrate a pulldown menu of products you can use our JavaScript catalog page by clicking catalog-begin.html page link below and then click on it's [ EDIT FILE NOW ] button then modify it to suit. It's not as hard as it sounds - especially if you are qualified to "Copy -n- Paste" =o). At any rate, we won't go into great detail on how to edit this page as the page itself contains all the guidance you should need to get going.
To integrate a pulldown menu of products click this --> catalog-java.html. SAVE AS CATALOG.HTML.
Since Many of our users requested some type of built in navigation which would quickly take their shopper to the product he or she is interested in buying. The bottom two Catalog Page choices allow you to simply list all of your products with links to their respective pages. Alternatively you can group products by category (if you have a lot of products) and point the respective category names to the ITEMx.HTML page that the first product in the category resides.
For example. If you have an on-line computer store you might alter the CATALOG.HTML file as follows...
As you can see in the sample code above. The number appears three times. Copy and Paste one of these table rows as many times as needed to cover all of your product pages. Just be sure to change the numeric references. The additional examples above also show how you can navigate your catalog by category. This will prevent having to list each and every item in your index thereby saving your fingers a lot of typing.
You can do the same thing with the JavaScript version below:
The JavaScript version let's you specify a "page name" as well as the page URL. Knowing almost nothing about JavaScript will not prevent you from successfully editing this page and using it in your site. It is by far the most convenient way to surf for your customer. We have taken great pains to assure that it works in the major browsers we support. (as listed in our FAQ pages)
Edit these values in the top part of the page.
"Catalog page 1", // comments.....
You can change these to match your product description or categories:
Copy and paste as many as you need.... Just be sure you have the same number of elements in the bottom and top halves of this script. See the file itself for additional instructions. Be sure and check other user's carts in the on-line forum as well as the Cool Cart of the Week contest.
Now is the time to create your first product page. If you screw up the page, you can always extract item0.html (read only) out of your RSSCxxxx.ZIP download file and try again. When you are ready to try editing your first product page, click the [ EDIT FILE NOW ] button on the product page (while in Edit Mode only.) To get a full description of what each variable is and what it should be set to, click the help link above in the template page. (while in edit mode only)
The default examples (four are provided) show various configurations, with and without feature lists, with and without the more link and with and without the ZOOM feature. Familiarize yourself with how these different options can be configured by studying the examples before you get started. Just click the [ EDIT FILE NOW ] button to see the source code for any or all of these files.
Click the Edit button to edit the form and the help link above (while in edit mode) for additional information on configuring the variables for your checkout form.
By now you should have edited each of the following HTML files:
One ITEMx.HTML for each product you will sell on your site.
Your CART.HTML page.
Your PAY.HTML page.
Your THANKS.HTML page.
After editing all of them. Make sure you have turned "Edit Mode"
OFF. Next you are ready to upload the files in your /cart directory,
/cgi-bin directory and /img directory to your server to test the cart.
If you run into any problems, READ
OUR FAQ PAGES!. If you are still stuck, VISIT OUR FEEDBACK AREA to ask any questions you may have. Thank
you for your interest in the Real Soft Shopping Cart and may it serve you well.
When you are ready to see your cart the way it will look to your web site shopper, CLICK HERE.
The quickest response to your tech questions (even with an hour or two wait time) is via posting a message in our user forum on DejaNews. We have just completed work on a joint effort with DejaNews to create a totally interactive user based support community where we can learn things from each other and get some great customizing tips by sharing techniques with the other members of the forum.
To utilize this support resource simply go there and sign up for a user name. YOU'LL EVEN GET A FREE "SPAM FREE" EMAIL ADDRESS just for signing up! There is a painless form that asks your name, age, email address and zip code among other optional items. Fill out the form, submit it to DejaNews and then a few moments later you will get your email confirmation. Important! Go to the address in the email to confirm your email address with DejaNews. Then you will be able to ask support questions! And best of all IT'S FREE!
In our users support community you can keep up to date on the latest announcements. Check out our Cool Cart of the week as well as other popular features of our site in our community Book Marks. You can't appreciate the full scope of our FREE support without experiencing it for yourself. Go there today!. Don't forget to include your cart URL when posting in the user forum!