OSCommerce....help!!

[lex6819]

I bought an OSCommerce ebook store on ebay a few weeks ago.

I am having a lot of trouble figuring out how to configure the store feeds to get the feeds to run. I tried to configure the Yahoo Shopping store feed, but when I click to run the feed it keeps erroring out.

The seller is a work at home mom, and she doesn't check her emails very often. I emailed her a couple of times earlier this week with no response.

I think I may need to hire a freelancer on elance or rentacoder or somewhere, just to help me get all this cr*p configured correctly. I ordered an OSCommerce manual on Amazon, but it hasn't arrived yet. I have had my store for 3 weeks now, and I am eager to get it all up and running, but the seller and web hosting provider isn't providing tech support at all really...

*le sigh*....

Does anyone know where I should look to find some OSCommerce tech support, cheaply, as I don't have much of a budget at all ...

[padma]

What software are you using? Maybe you should get a refund and buy from someone more professional.

[webgal]

I'd take that database and spend what you have to turn it into a yahoo store. Oscommerce is a behemoth. I know that's not what you wanted to hear. But it is open source and it doesn't usually index all that well. Yahoo stores do. I think if you were to contact a yahoo sales rep they could tell you how to transfer. I'm sure you're not the first to want to go from os to yahoo. They can often download the database tables and upload to a new one particularly if the host has cpanel.

[soozcity]

I agree with webgal. osCommerce is a mine feild, except, once it is set up, then it can do a bunch of cool things. The open source community is very helpful online, but you have to be prepared to participate and spend a number of hours 'searching' for answers and solutions. Doing a Yahoo store is much quicker and easier.

I just went through something similar, but after a short while decided to outsource the os Commerce setup to someone else (which I did on elance for a good price $300USD), then I spent the time loading the product and everything else. It worked out well, although I still have some refining to do. Took me about two weeks all up- which is pretty quick.

I found that time wise it was easier for my product to buy a wondows frontend program called Store Manager ($150USD) to deal with the product and organization. I know that there are free opensource programs that do this- but after experimenting I found I didn't want to waste any more time and energy trying to recreate what someone else (or a team) had done, so I broke down and bought the program online. Best thing I did. They are hugely supportive.

So, yes, it cost me. But I was able to do other cool stuff instead.

If you can afford it, its worth sticking with osCommerce- if not, then start off with a Yahoo, or Google store.

[dhanson358]

Speaking as someone with a significant technical background in OSCommerce, I would say it's a great platform for this type of thing since it is so flexible.

But, it's not something you can dive into if you're not technical...it works best if you have someone who can take care of the code side for you...in that case your imagination (and your wallet, of course) are about the only limits on what OSC can do.

[webgal]

TimW posted his software favorite on here. TimW? You there? What's the name of your ecommerce?

And it might be worth your while to contact soozcity to see who he/she uses to manipulate the code. $300 isn't much to ask considering the headache it saves you.