E-commerce: start here #

This section is for people who sell online with Exponential: merchants who own a store, store managers who run it every day, developers who build and extend it, and agencies that deliver stores to clients. It is the e-commerce hub of the help: it sends you to the right existing page for each question and adds the pages nobody else covers, such as how the checkout runs internally, how to read every shop setting, how to extend the shop with your own handlers, and how to test, report on and operate a store over a year.

Contents #

1. The two sections this hub builds on
2. Pick your path
3. What this section adds
4. The shop in one diagram
5. Every part of this section
6. Quick answers
7. Where else to look

The two sections this hub builds on #

Two sections of the help already cover the store from a business point of view. Read them first; this section links into them and does not repeat them.

The technical setup pages for website creators are Running a shop: overview, Products, prices and VAT, Basket, checkout and orders and Payment gateways.

Pick your path #

All four paths are explained side by side in Paths by role. The whole section in reading order is the E-commerce reading path.

What this section adds #

The store sections answer "what" and "how often". This section answers "how exactly" and "what if":

• Catalog modeling in depth: choosing between ezprice and ezmultiprice, options, product categories for VAT, and the folder structure of a catalog (Catalog modeling).
• Shop settings walkthroughs: every shop-related setting, file by file, with the shipped value and when to change it (Shop settings walkthroughs).
• The checkout from the inside: the four shop operations, the temporary order, the workflow triggers, and the payment gateway, simple shipping and multiplexer events (Checkout and workflows).
• Order operations: the lifecycle of an order in the database, status transitions limited by FromStatus and ToStatus, archive versus remove, and the order mail handler (Order operations).
• Extending the shop: shipping, VAT, basket info, shop account, confirm order and exchange rate handlers, payment gateways of your own and custom price datatypes (Extending the shop).
• Operating a store: testing, accessibility, multisite, landing pages with Layouts, analytics, reporting and export, product imports, headless commerce, the commerce audit trail, a yearly calendar, decision checklists and troubleshooting (Operating a store).

The shop in one diagram #

Product page --(shop/add, trigger shop_addtobasket)--> Basket (shop/basket, trigger shop_updatebasket)
   --> Customer data (shop/userregister or shop/register, chosen by shopaccount.ini)
   --> Confirmation (shop/confirmorder, trigger before_shop_confirmorder: shipping)
   --> Checkout (shop/checkout, trigger shop_checkout: payment gateway)
   --> Order activated: order number, status history, order mail, receipt link
   --> Store tab: dashboard, order list, statuses, archive, statistics

Each step is explained in Checkout operations step by step.

Every part of this section #

Quick answers #

• Is the shop an add-on? No. It is part of the kernel: the shop module and its views are in kernel/shop/module.php (What the built-in shop does).
• Which payment providers? The repository has two payment extensions, ezpaypal (PayPal) and ezauthorize (Authorize.Net). Others are written as gateways (Payment gateway development).
• Does it charge VAT by country? Yes, with VAT rules, once a VAT handler is switched on (Product categories and VAT rules).
• What is not included? Stock management, coupon codes, accounting invoices, shipping labels and automatic file delivery are not in the kernel (E-commerce FAQ).

Where else to look #

Related pages #

• Online stores and small shops
• Running your store
• Businesses: start here
• Customers: start here
• E-commerce reading path
• Free documentation: this page is free to copy, translate and improve under the GNU FDL 1.3.