Monthly Archives: July 2012

The Basics of Creating a Magento Module

Posted by on July 24, 2012 No comments

A lot many modules and community extensions are available for the feature-rich e-commerce solution, Magento. But what if they do not work as expected? It is absolutely essential to better understand the structure of a Magento module to the point that you could either modify it to suit your business needs or create your own module from scratch.

Before getting ahead with the basics of creating a Magento module, let’s assume that you already have installed Magento, running either on a development server or locally, to be able to add more files to it. Some of the most important elements of this tutorial include:

Disable the Cache

This is the first lesson to be learnt by a Magento development professional. Disabling the cache can be done by going to Admin Panel → System → Cache Management → Select All → Actions: Disable → Submit. The cache is a developer’s enemy as most of them face problems when a cached copy of their website is displayed by Magento instead of the updated one.

The App/code Directory

The app/code directory divided into core, community and local is where the real brains of Magento integration lie. Core is better kept off-limits as its files should not be modified. Modules provided by third parties can be found and are stored at app/code/community. The empty local directory is where one can add bespoke modules and this is where we are going to work for the rest of the tutorial.

Structuring our Directory

New directories and files can be added by opening your favorite editor and navigating to app/code/local. The first directory we create here is in the name of the company or the author’s module. The name of the second one can be more descriptive one. The directory and its name are case sensitive hence capitalize where essential for a better Magento customization.

Configuring our Module

Configuring our module is the next step. The directory named etc contains the configuring files, which is to be created with a new XML file. This XML file will inform Magento integration about several things like the files’ location in our module, version number and the events to observe.

Activating our Module

The next step is to create a new XML file in app/etc/modules. This is to inform Magento application that our module exists. By mow we have a new module that is enabled in Magento. Do a sanity check by logging onto the Magento admin panel, navigating to to System → Configuration → Advanced → Advanced and viewing the “Disable Modules Output” listing. Your module should be enabled here.

Defining an Event Observer and Configuring our Model’s Directory

To observe the event dispatched by Magento, just after saving a product, use code catalog_product_save_after. It is one of the cleanest and the best ways to extend the functionalities of this platform without having to override or rewrite any of its core lessons. Updating config.xml is essential to inform Magento where to find models in this module.

A Custom Magento Website Developer Can Guarantee Success of Your Online Store

Posted by on July 3, 2012 No comments

Introduction

With office hours extending up to ten to twelve hours per day for many people. Time is increasingly becoming a rare commodity for working professionals in India. With high disposable income and small nuclear families, online shopping is becoming the preferred mode of buying stuff.

Everything is sold from mobile to nappies, to woman lingerie at these online stores, that also at competitive prices. These online portals have exclusive tie-up with many FMCG and durable manufacturing companies. Product ordered is delivered right to your home and have multiple payment options.

Everything from airline, train and bus tickets, to movie and concert tickets are sold online now. Most of these online shopping sites use Magento e- commerce platform. Affordable Magento web development applications is the only cost effective e-commerce medium available to portals.

Why Magento?

Magento is the most flexible e-commerce platform available in the market, which seamlessly adapts and optimized itself on a desktop or a laptop, as well as on a smart-phone or a tablet PC.

In India the market of these application will grow in future due to its young population, but not as rapidly as predicted. People are still concerned about fraudulent activities.

According to expert statistics mobile web will rival desktop users by 2013, and custom Magento website developer should be poised to take advantage of this newly created market.

Though e-retailers think the percentage of sales through mobile app. is not enough to warrant setting up a mobile store, but it could be argued that all the online self service sites lack mobile  friendly versions.

The Advantages of Magento

  • The same application can be accessed on PCs as well as mobiles, minus additional codes.
  • Magento’s flexible pricing rules enable the efficient creation of a variety of promotional offers to increase conversion rates.
  • Marketing Tools provide the functionality and ease-of-use to increase online sales.
  • It allow for further insight into store performance through integration of Google Analytics and Website Optimizers.
  • It also has provisions for catalog management.
  • It enables the site visitor to browse through the products as well as the catalogs in real time.
  • It Automatically detects mobile browsers and show the mobile-optimized version of the site. It provides the full site catalog or a smaller selection of products tailored for the mobile customers.  It also has easy payment option.
  • One don’t even have to register to buy a product.
  • It’s integrated with multiple payment options, from Pay Pal to  cash on delivery.
  • It can support  60 languages and multiple currencies, taxes and payment methods.
  • Customers can ship items in an order to multiple addresses. It also displays real time carrier rates.
  • Customers can save items to a wish-list and share with friends and family. They can access and edit their profiles too.
  • Customers can view orders, create invoices and shipment records for sales orders and issue refund request. One can re-order previous orders from their account, while the administrator can view the full order histories.
  • Customers can view their accounts and receive tracking information and order status. They can submit requests too on contact page.
  • Customer care executives can see the customer profile and account history. They can also view items in customers shopping carts and wish-lists in real time, and satisfactorily answer a customers quarries on phone or internet.