Bye Bye OsCommerce.... I have a new love...

48 replies
I have been using OsCommerce for one of my e-commerce sites for the past couple years and it has treated me fairly well. Considering it is open source with a decent variety of contributions available, I have been able to accomplish most of things I have wanted to with it.

But then.....

I set up newest store with Magento. I must say, I haven't spent more than a month or so with it, so I am sure there will be a few things I run into that will be slight drawbacks... but this platform is the shit.

Are there any other Magento users here? I would love to hear your thoughts. Especially those that have been using OsCommerce or ZenCart for years.

I have in recent months become sick and tired of the "clunkiness" of OsCommerce. From an SEO standpoint I also found it to be a bad platform, no matter how many contributions I utilized.

For those of you that are not familiar, check out the Magento site. Its also completely free and open source just like OSC.

Magento - Video Tour of Magento - eCommerce Software for Growth, Powered by Open Source
#bye #love #oscommerce
  • Profile picture of the author Mike Hill
    Holy cow that's pretty cool software... I had no idea you could find this caliber in Open Source

    Great find!

    Mike Hill
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  • Profile picture of the author jbreezy
    Looks pretty solid..how easy was it to change templates and customize design?
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  • Profile picture of the author freudianslip27
    Looks pretty cool. I haven't used oscommerce for a while but will definitely be checking this out as I will have a need for it in the future.

    It is amazing how much open source can offer. Just take a look at WordPress.

    Matt
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  • Profile picture of the author Gail Sober
    Looking forward to playing with it.

    Fingers crossed that it can set pricing by length/width on the fly.
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  • Profile picture of the author tommygadget
    OSCommerce killed my business because after years online, Google did not know what I was selling. What an SEO nightmare. At the time I did not know that I was getting NO organic traffic because I chose the wrong software. When I realized it, I had a customized setup that would break with the slightest change and so was stuck with it to the bitter end.

    TomG. - Magenta looks very nice IMO.
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  • Profile picture of the author blakekr
    I have really wanted to use Magento, the first time I saw someone using it I HAD to find out what it was. It's a little tricky to set up, or was a few months ago. Also I'm not sure if it can handle dropshipping. But I agree, it's head and shoulders ahead of what else is out there, or so it seems.
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    • Profile picture of the author sentient
      Originally Posted by blakekr View Post

      I have really wanted to use Magento, the first time I saw someone using it I HAD to find out what it was. It's a little tricky to set up, or was a few months ago. Also I'm not sure if it can handle dropshipping. But I agree, it's head and shoulders ahead of what else is out there, or so it seems.
      Not entirely sure what you mean by handling dropshipping, but the site I run on magento is using a dropshipper. It's just the same as running any other ecommerce site.

      The one caveat I'd give for Magento is that you should not expect any support whatsoever from the official Forum (in effect everyone is a newbie) and it's complicated enough to make it imperative that you hire a professional. Almost sounds intentional doesn't it, to drum up business. Perish the thought.
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  • Profile picture of the author Mike Bogowski
    Agreed!

    oscommerce is junk, its a clunky app and horribly written!

    The plus is that Magento is built on the Zend Framework so its sooooooo easy to customize and add to.
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  • Profile picture of the author Jeffery
    It is good, but it should only be used on a Dedicated or VPS if the site will be a moderate or busy site. Some shared hosts with low-end servers will not allow Magneto because of the high resources.

    Jeffery 100% :-)
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  • Profile picture of the author sentient
    Hi

    I use Magento for one of my ecomerce stores: Not sure if I'm allowed to post a link so to play it safe I won't.

    It's fantastic considering it's "free", in that it is robust and has a huge amount of functionality and features. The problems come with customisation. It has a complicated database which isn't the easiest to manipulate. I've outsourced mine to people in Vietnam and Romania, but it's still cost me a few hundred dollars. So very good, but not completely free.

    I use Prestashop for my other ecommerce stores - not as many features and more lightweight, but very quick to get up and running and easy to use. Also open source.
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    • Profile picture of the author prodozoan
      I just started with shopping carts.... I compared oscommerce and zen cart and went with zen cart owing to its simplicity and active user community.

      I had a look at magento, it looked very neat but was concerned by the size of the site it churns out.
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    • Profile picture of the author momo4444
      Originally Posted by sentient View Post

      I use Prestashop for my other ecommerce stores - not as many features and more lightweight, but very quick to get up and running and easy to use. Also open source.

      Magento is usually pretty slow, unless you have a dedicaated server.

      I also found Prestashop to be a good alternative for smaller e-commerce sites.
      Looks good and runs fast.

      Most of the Prestashop forum is in French, so getting help casn be a little tricky.
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  • Profile picture of the author Warrior Simon
    Originally Posted by blase40 View Post

    but this platform is the shit.
    I guess 'the shit' is a good thing? (at least in this context)
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    • Profile picture of the author blase40
      Originally Posted by Konja View Post

      I guess 'the shit' is a good thing? (at least in this context)
      Yes, in this context it is anyway
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  • Profile picture of the author RBum78
    Is this good or bad?
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  • Profile picture of the author simonpiemon
    I ran a site with oscommerce a few years ago, and spent thousands on cusomtization to get it to do what I needed it to, it did the job, in the end.

    I'll certainly be looking elsewhere for the next site I need to build that needs a cart. Magento sounds cool, but some of you say it's easy to customize, and others say it's expensive. So which is it?
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    • Profile picture of the author FrankRumbauskas
      I really wanted to go with Magento after looking at it but unfortunately there is no recurring billing support, and as I sell all my products on 30-day free trials that was out.

      I have modified X-Cart to handle 30-day trials (the recurring billing script was modified to only bill once). Problem though is integrating an affiliate script. I'm still stuck on 1shoppingcart for now since that's the only way I can sell on a 30-day deferred payment and have affiliates get credit when the charge goes through a month later.
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  • Profile picture of the author Davegfx
    Have any of you had experience with virtuemart - the addon for Joomla? I was looking at implementing it.
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    • Profile picture of the author TelZilla
      Originally Posted by Jeff Hope View Post

      Design can be tricky. Even after you've learned it, the files are located in two major directory structures many levels deep, and it can be a real pain looking for individual files to customize.
      I checked out Magento several weeks ago for a friend, and while it is a robust system with a ton of features and fairly easy to setup, I just couldn't wrap my head around their template system.

      Maybe I'm just being dense about it, but it almost seemed to be intentionally confusing for us non-designers.
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      • Profile picture of the author Quentin
        as mentioned before be careful as it is very resource hungry and many of the shared hosting companies don't like it for this reason and could cost you sales.

        Quentin
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        • Profile picture of the author FrankRumbauskas
          Originally Posted by Quentin View Post

          as mentioned before be careful as it is very resource hungry and many of the shared hosting companies don't like it for this reason and could cost you sales.
          Even with a dedicated server I'd avoid anything that will slow my site down. Slow site = lost sales. Site load time is also now a major factor in AdWords quality score and I don't want my campaigns to get slapped because my site is slow!!!
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  • Profile picture of the author Sirius Lin
    I've had more trouble with OSCommerce than I care to list. This is one heck of a find indeed. Personally, I resorted to CRELoaded after fighting a losing battle with OSC.

    ~ Sirius
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  • Profile picture of the author keywordguru
    I have also been a big fan of osCommerce for many years. Can across Magneto a while back and was impressed, but still haven't turned out any projects with it. It has definitely broken the mold in a good way, and has changed in many ways I always wished osCommerce would without too much extra programming. Guess i'll have to load it up and test it out to see how it is.

    I wonder what resources are required to run an ecommerce shop with thousands of products since osCommerce handled that quite easily.
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  • Profile picture of the author Frostfire Gifts
    I have used Actinic, but who are the other major players in mid range online commerce packages?
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    • Profile picture of the author GeorgeO7
      Originally Posted by Frostfire Gifts View Post

      I have used Actinic, but who are the other major players in mid range online commerce packages?
      I've used the Interspire shopping cart (Google it) on several projects. One caveat... it is not free or cheap but blows away pretty much anything else on the market.

      There are dozens of templates included.
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  • Profile picture of the author Talltom1
    Last time I checked, a month or two ago, Magento did not support digital downloads after purchase, which ruled it out for me...

    TallTom
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  • Profile picture of the author Debbie Songster
    The Magento cart does some cool things. I wish my zencart stores had a couple of those functions.

    My tech says she has played with Magento and when I found this thread her and I have been IM'ing back and forth about it - pro's and con's

    She says Magento is a resource hog and if you have 10 or more people on it at one time it bogs down - thats not good.

    By the way, for those who have tried and suffered with OSC - don't let that affect your judgment on other shopping cart systems.
    OSC is the bottom of the pile
    Its also the easiest to hack - according to my tech

    This is what she thinks about OSC - "and whomever uses OSC should have a bullet put in their head LOL. that is the most easily hackable store software out there"

    Anyway, everyone has an opinion and of course its all speculation until you try it.
    I might give it a try on my next store build.

    Jeff - what are your clients saying about it? Are they finding it slows down when a lot of cutomers are on it?
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  • Profile picture of the author Devan Koshal
    It is a lovely piece of open source software.
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  • Profile picture of the author Debbie Songster
    Jeff
    I spent a little time on their forum.
    I saw someone had started a thread so individuals could post what they had done to help speed things up. There were several good points posted that people had success with.

    The other thing I always check for is the ability to bulk upload product. It was not easy to find and I found numerous threads where others had the same question. I finally found the answer on someone else's blog post.
    I see that you can bulk upload.

    You mentioned the system slows down on concurrent check out.
    I was wondering if you had experience with their multi store set up. Is the check out through the main store or is the check out with each individual store but you can access the admin through the main store.

    I would think having multiple stores would help the traffic problem (as opposed to having all products in one store).

    I have a dedicated server so I'm not worried about extra use of resources.

    I think I'll install this cart and play with it. I have another store on my schedule to build. I'm going to use this and see how it works.
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    • Profile picture of the author Tom B
      Banned
      No downloadable products as of yet. They state it will be out at the end of this year.


      I think the main problem is their database design. That is what causes a lot of the resource problems. It takes a lot of sql statements to get any type of information out of that database.


      I worked on a similar database design for a big insurance company. It was a pain in the arse.


      If you want to customize it, coding wise, it will be a pretty nice size learning experience. I think they have an api which may make it easier. I just know from experience how hard the database design will make learning to customize it more difficult.
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  • Profile picture of the author Debbie Songster
    I'm interested in their multi store function although I don't have a lot of customers that shop in more than one of my stores. Now that I know how its tied together I can see how it would slow to a snails pace with multiple checkouts happening at the same time.

    I think I will stick with self contained individual stores.
    I'm still going to use it for the next store - I want to test it out.

    That will give me a chance to compare "new store" stats as I kept pretty detailed records on the last store build as far as rate of indexing with the search engines and keyword ranking.
    That was a Zencart build so it will be interesting to see how they compare.

    Most of the time I just turn my tech loose on the templates (although the last store was completely my build). I usually get her to do that which saves me time and while she works on the template I work on the products. When we were chatting today about it, she said she felt confident she could do a custom template for it.

    If I hate it, you guys will probably "hear" me grumble about it here. LOL

    I would love to hear of anyone else's experiences with it.
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  • Profile picture of the author sentient
    The database is the big problem, as you've said Thomas. My site sells products from a dropshipper supplier, who provides an XML feed for product updates, so in theory I just need to do my meta tags and marketing. But I can't find anyone to match the feeds up to the database, as it's so complex (and I'm not a programmer), so for me it's manual process every day updating the products (it's a clothing site, so you can imagine sizes and colours going in and out of stock every day).
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  • Profile picture of the author SamLewi
    many of my developers have also told me about the inefficiencies and resource hungry solutions out there. they all recommend interspire now.
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    • Profile picture of the author Debbie Songster
      Originally Posted by SamLewi View Post

      many of my developers have also told me about the inefficiencies and resource hungry solutions out there. they all recommend interspire now.
      Doing a little self promotion are ya?
      At $1700 I'll keep the shopping carts I have - thanks

      You might want to edit your post and the other one you made (saying the same thing) so you are contributing something useful.
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      • Profile picture of the author GeorgeO7
        Hi Debbie,

        I hope you were not referring to me as being SamLewi.

        I am not.

        Originally Posted by SamLewi
        many of my developers have also told me about the inefficiencies and resource hungry solutions out there. they all recommend interspire now.


        "Doing a little self promotion are ya?

        At $1700 I'll keep the shopping carts I have - thanks"

        I bought a license while it was still in beta and loved the software though it is expensive. You will note I did not provide a link to Interspire but for those who were interested suggested that they Google it.

        I played with Magento and found it awkward to work with as well as very slow.

        George
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  • Profile picture of the author Dave777
    In case some may have missed a good review on Magento! I posted the following regarding Magento in a few other related threads. Sounds great in the video if you know what you're doing...
    The PeC Review: Magento Is the Open Source Powerhouse | Practical eCommerce

    Dave
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  • Profile picture of the author dug
    Hi guys! I see almost everyone here is a fan of Magento. I hope those who are also interested to switch to this shopping cart will find this info useful. I guess you also know what moving to different shopping cart is - it's quite a pain.

    Recently i came around a web service cart2cart. that automates data transfer. Maybe it will help somebody.
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  • Profile picture of the author CBSnooper
    I ran my bricks and mortar business using OSCommerce. I managed to get to the top of Google for my two word phrase which conveys what the store sells. It took a lot of effort and SEO optimisation. Yes, OSC is badly written and difficult to implement new themes and layouts without a lot of code hacking, but I took over $500,000 worth of orders using it, and customers did say it was an easy site to use.

    I did look at Magento when I first saw it some months back, and thought 'wow I'll give that a shot'. Unfortunately I couldn't install it as my host wasnt running php5 and something else it needs.

    @DaveGFX - I have installed Virtuemart for a Joomla site. It's good, but quite often it won't let people add a product to the cart and has a 'call for price' message. It's usually down to cookies. Get them to clear them out and it's ok. I only have a dozen or so items on, each with different sizes and but works ok.
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    • Profile picture of the author nicalyngroup
      Does anyone have any experience with AbleCommerce? While not free, it does appear to have a ton of functionality and from what others have said it is one of the top carts out there. I would be interested in any feedback about it. Thanks!

      Sean
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  • Profile picture of the author ztrek
    One big problem I had with Zen Cart was different shipping charges for different dropshippers. Does Magento handle this easily?
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  • Profile picture of the author TheRealDomainer
    This look pretty cool man.
    Thanks for sharing
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  • Profile picture of the author swissmark
    I'll give it a try... Since I'm not a big fan of oscommerce I hope magento will do the trick.
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  • Profile picture of the author Droopy Dawg
    I am a ColdFusion developer... where could I get some kind of tutorial to make carts like these work in a non-CF environment?

    Thanks in advanced.

    DeShon
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    • Profile picture of the author Magento modules
      After reading all reviews and Reply's i suggest Magento, 1st of the best thing in Magento is it's a SEO Friendly platform, i mean if you use a right way like no spamming or no black hat world tool use your website is soon in top 10 simple and easy.. Magento is a Great..

      Magento themes
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      • Profile picture of the author rts2271
        We have been getting dozens of Magento jobs this last few months. It's a very robust platform and much much more secure than OSCommerce. It's easy to extend and skin (We've been building extensions as well as OSC - Mag conversions) and it is very well documented, supported and well maintained. Overall my team and I love working with the Magento platform.
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