The Glories of Programmable Database-Driven Shopping Carts

There are many excellent off-the-shelf e-commerce packages that meet the needs of 95% of the small to medium business users. But the final 5% need special features programmed into their shopping carts or integration with existing company databases. These companies need to consider programmable database-driven shopping carts.

First, let me distinguish between "customizable" and "programmable." Nearly all shopping carts allow some degree of customization, either with wizards for novices or importing custom HTML templates. But few shopping carts offer an integrated gift registry, for example (though one is available with MerchandiZer) or a live connection to your in-house inventory database to check if products are in stock (though one is available with Yahoo! Store). For this kind of functionality, you usually need a programmable shopping cart such as Miva Merchant, Able Commerce, and Microsoft Commerce Server. Since they are programmable, developers and programmers are marketing an increasing number of code plug-ins to add specialized features. In addition, your own programmer can tweak functionality to do exactly what you want, from dynamic page display to a customized ordering system.

When I was doing online store design in the late '90s, I built a complex store for a large pet mail order company using iCat Commerce Suite. Though the language was a bit buggy, the Web applications programming language and underlying Sybase database made it possible to do just about anything the customer desired. We built a wonderful store. Programmable database stores are extremely powerful. (Unfortunately, a few months after launch, iCat was acquired and announced that it would no longer support the product.)

Most shopping cart systems consist of a product database that allows a display of products using HTML and an ordering front end to receive payment. Off-the-shelf shopping carts usually employ some kind of proprietary database that the user doesn't have easy access to. Hosted applications, such as MerchandiZer, Yahoo! Store, Bigstep, Mercantec, and others, don't allow users direct access to the database other than through the proprietary code, since one huge database may contain data from many merchant stores.

Programmable Shopping Cart Systems

Programmable shopping cart vendors, on the other hand, sell a software license for their programs to be run on the merchant's in-house server, a co-located server, or a virtual server under the merchant's control. Such systems typically consist of the webserver and:

1. An online database,
2. A database server that manages and displays the records on command
3. Webpages that are programmed using a Web applications programming language, and
4. A Web applications programming language server that reads the programmed webpages and translates them into commands that the database server can understand.

Web Databases

The most popular databases used for programmable online stores are relational databases that use SQL (Structured Query Language):

1. MySQL is a low-cost database available on most Unix and some Windows servers.
2. PostgreSQL is another low-cost database often available on Unix servers.
3. Microsoft Access is sometimes used for online stores, but just isn't robust enough for higher traffic stores. Not recommended.
4. Microsoft SQL is commonly used with Windows NT/2000/XP operating systems. It costs more since it requires a license.
5. Oracle is considered the top-of-the-line database and runs on many operating systems. It costs more since it requires an expensive license.

You can read about several of these in Timothy Dyck, "Clash of the Titans: SQL Databases," PC Magazine, 26 Mar 02, which reviews IBM DB2, MS SQL, MySQL, Oracle, and Sybase. http://www.pcmag.com/article/0,2997,s=1732&a=23362,00.asp

Off-the-Shelf vs. From-Scratch Shopping Carts

Programmers are tempted to write their own shopping cart system for their clients from scratch. It's a challenge for the programmer, an accomplishment. But this means that the merchant is paying for a great deal of programming to deal with the basic infrastructure that all e-commerce programs need. A better approach is to purchase an out-of-the-box shopping cart program that contains most of the features and infrastructure you need, and then pay a programmer to make needed modifications. This provides the debugged experience of several versions of the code, offers cost savings, and allows you to take advantage of third-party plug-ins that add features inexpensively. It also protects merchants from being left high and dry by programmers who move to Tahiti. If you use a common e-commerce infrastructure, many programmers can be found to maintain and improve your system. The most popular off-the-shelf e-commerce programs for small to medium businesses are Miva Merchant, Able Commerce, and Microsoft Commerce Server. Each of these has thousands of merchant users and hundreds of programmers who can make modifications as needed.

Perl and PHP Shopping Carts

You'll find some shopping carts written in Perl, PHP, and other popular scripting languages. Typically, Perl shopping carts can be modified, since the code is accessible on your server, but they generally use flat text databases. While they can be programmed to interface with MySQL and other more sophisticated databases, usually this is better accomplished with a Web applications programming language such as ColdFusion or Active Server Pages. A number of Perl carts are listed in the CGI Resource Index (http://cgi.resourceindex.com/Programs_and_Scripts/Perl/Shopping_Carts/).

A few carts programmed in PHP that access MySQL are listed in the PHP Resource Index (http://php.resourceindex.com/Complete_Scripts/Shopping_Carts/). MidiCart (www.midicart.com) is available in ASP and PHP versions for $59. The ASP version runs on Windows and uses MS Access database, while PHP runs on Linux and uses a MySQL item database.

Cold Fusion and ASP Shopping Carts

ColdFusion and ASP have extensive commands to manipulate databases. By its nature, ColdFusion and ASP code is accessible to the merchant because it resides in the .cfm or .asp webpages on the website. Thus it can be easily modified. Besides Able Commerce (www.ablecommerce.com), a few commercially-available ColdFusion shopping carts are available, though I haven't tested these. ColdFusion.Pro Commerce Cart (http://coldfusionpro.com) is a hosted solution that works with MS SQL and sells for $3000. cf-ezcart (www.cf-ezcart.com) sells for $300 and runs on either Windows or Linux versions of ColdFusion, and can access MySQL, MS SQL, or MS Access databases. HALLoGRAM ColdFusion Shopping Cart (www.hallogram.com/cfshopcart/) sells for $395.

Several shopping carts are written in ASP, a Web applications programming language also accessible to the merchant, usually designed on run on Windows operating systems. iisCART (www.iiscart.com) sells for $245. ASPCart (www.aspcart.com) uses an MS Access ($99.95 version) or MS SQL database ($297 version). VP-ASP Comprehensive Shopping Cart (www.ausiphotos.com) costs $135 to $250 and runs on either Windows operating system with MS Access or MS SQL or on Unix system (with Chili!isoft ASP) on a MySQL database. CyberStrong eShop (www.cyberstrong.com/eshop) sells for $179 and runs on Windows with an MS Access or MS SQL database.