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OsCommerce 
- The correct title of this user's page is osCommerce. It appears incorrectly here because of technical restrictions.
| Fast Facts | |
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| osCommerce | |
| Developer | Harald Ponce de Leon |
| Latest release | 2.2 RC 2a / January 30, 2008 |
| Programming language(s) | PHP |
| OS | Cross-platform |
| Genre | Webshop |
| License | GNU General Public License |
| Website | http://www.oscommerce.com/ |
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osCommerce (“open source Commerce”) is an e-commerce and online store-management software program. Available as free software under the GNU General Public License, it can be used on any web server that has PHP and MySQL installed. While officially still in its development stage, the current Milestone 2.2 release is considered stable.
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2. osCommerce was started in March 2000 by project founder and leader, Harald Ponce de Leon, in Germany and was originally called The Exchange Project. As of July 2008, there are over 14,000 websites using the program, with over 4,800 add-ons available for free, contributed by a large community of developers who volunteer their service to help extend its functionality.[1] Its success has spawned a number of forks, including CRE Loaded, OSC Max, xt:Commerce, Holbi's TrueLoaded, and ZenCart.
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3. osCommerce MS2.2 does not profess to be the "ultimate" e-commerce solution. Rather than attempt to be all things to all people, it provides a basic set of functionality that meets the common needs of almost all online businesses. By taking this approach, osCommerce has avoided the pitfalls from which many applications (including its own forks) historically suffer: too much functionality, requiring an overly complex implementation. This does not mean that osCommerce is in any way "basic". Its ability to be augmented, via either community-supplied add-ons or custom code, means that it can be customized to meet the specific needs of any business.
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4. Major features of osCommerce MS2.2 include:
- Compatibility with PHP 4 and MySQL - easily portable to version 5.
- Compatibility with all major browsers.
- Multi-lingual English, German and Spanish by default.
- Automatic web-based installation.
- Automatic setup of e-commerce payment systems: Authorize.net, 2Checkout.com, iPayment.de, PayPal.com, PsiGate.com, SECPay.com, and TrustCommerce.com. Many other user-contributed on-line and off-line payment modules can also be installed as add-ons.
- Multi-currency support via manual update from exchange rate server.
- Support for dynamic images (one image per product).
- Supports physical products as well as product downloads.
- Web-based administration module.
- Database backup and restore.
- Temporary and permanent shopping carts.
- Secure transactions with SSL (Secure Sockets Layer) support.
- Real-time shipping quote integration with UPS, USPS.
- Zone-based shipping options, as well as a free shipping option, as part of Order Totals Module.
- Full tax functionality, included compounded taxes, different zones for different products.
In implementing osCommerce MS2.2, one key decision is how to integrate the design because, unlike its forks, it does not come with a template system. Many third party osCommerce templates are however available, including STS, BTS, and SMARTY.
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5. The planned Milestone 3.0 is expected to be a major rewrite of the osCommerce program to incorporate the following during installation:
- an object-oriented backend;
- a template system to allow easy layout changes; and
- inclusion of an administration-area username and password definition. more... at Wikipedia
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