Sneak Peek: OpenCart 1.5.0 *ALPHA*

its going to be this month.

nearly everthing is done now. I have some one else working on a new design. Only the order system is left. everything I have done so far including customer credit, manual orders, reward points etc.. tie into the order system.

Daniel wrote:its going to be this month.

nearly everthing is done now. I have some one else working on a new design. Only the order system is left. everything I have done so far including customer credit, manual orders, reward points etc.. tie into the order system.

+1
Thank Daniel and opencart team for hardworks.

Daniel wrote:its going to be this month.

That sounds great! Thanks for the hardwork Daniel and Q, and everyone who has helped in some way to improve this wonderful system.

I am really looking forward to having it in my test server!

Marvin
Costa Rica

whats more important? one page checkout or address books? i would say address books for all the repeat customers.

Daniel, let's focus on customer and not our convenience.
Just heard on the news today about a recent study of consumers shopping on the Internet that confirms what I have mentioned before. If the customer is "forced" to enter a lot of data to be able to make the purchase (read press the Buy button) there is many customers who choose to cancel the purchase instead of being subjected to all the steps that are required! Customers find it difficult and tedious. There are facts that speak for themselves. Just look objectively at things. Would you like to feed a lot of information to be able to complete the buying process?

One Page Checkout is maybe not the optimal solution but the process must be improved.
The New OC 1.5.0 deserve it.

Get over it. Its not going to be in 1.5.0
Maybe 1.5.1 so you can wait a few more weeks. One page checkout isnt the second coming of Christ. You want more sales then offer better prices or features. Once a customer found something he wants at a price he likes, he has likely commited his mind to the purchase. So long as your checkout works and is intuitive then there is no likelyhood of losing thw sale. A few extra steps is a minor issue.

A shipping estimator on the cart page is a larger deterrent for those who want a quick estimate before taking the time to enter their address, so if anything, that should be the first focus in the checkout improvement.

QNAP wrote:Daniel, let's focus on customer and not our convenience.
Just heard on the news today about a recent study of consumers shopping on the Internet that confirms what I have mentioned before. If the customer is "forced" to enter a lot of data to be able to make the purchase (read press the Buy button) there is many customers who choose to cancel the purchase instead of being subjected to all the steps that are required! Customers find it difficult and tedious. There are facts that speak for themselves. Just look objectively at things. Would you like to feed a lot of information to be able to complete the buying process?

One Page Checkout is maybe not the optimal solution but the process must be improved.
The New OC 1.5.0 deserve it.

What a load of crap that is!

If, like Q says, you offer the best product for the best price customers would not give a sh*t if they have a 1 or 2 page checkout.
Next thing you know is customers complaining because that 1 page checkout is so crowded that they do not understand it anymore and move away.

The best move ever for me is that OpenCart has a checkout without having to create an account.

Qphoria wrote:A shipping estimator on the cart page is a larger deterrent for those who want a quick estimate before taking the time to enter their address, so if anything, that should be the first focus in the checkout improvement.

+1

For those wanting a shorter checkout procedure, you can have it now: http://forum.opencart.com/viewtopic.php?f=131&t=26937

Fido-x's auto account vQmod sends orders through the guest checkout, shortening the checkout procedure, and automatically creating an account for the customer. It's great. I really don't think it needs to be any shorter then this.

If you really want the checkout procedure changed to one page, wait until the release of a stable 1.5, then submit it as a feature request. I don't think any thing you say here will make it happen.

Or, make a mod for it so you can apply it to your own store.

Get over it. Its not going to be in 1.5.0
Maybe 1.5.1 so you can wait a few more weeks.

I am not saying that it should already be implemented in 1.5.0

Following steps according to previous preferences should be great:

Public release (1.5.0) so everyone can test and report bugs.
Stable release (1.5.1) + bug report topic.
1.5.2 can be a release with new features + bug fixes for 1.5.1 and so on.

QNAP wrote: I am not saying that it should already be implemented in 1.5.0

QNAP wrote: One Page Checkout is maybe not the optimal solution but the process must be improved.
The New OC 1.5.0 deserve it.

that is exactly what you said

I am working on a new combined checkout process as I've listed above.. I am looking to also improve the process (remove the account success page and make it a message, combine the login and non-registered checkout into the same page, etc)

Qphoria wrote: (remove the account success page and make it a message)

that would be good, and the other biggest problem I have with the current non guest system is that you end up back at the shopping cart page. Once you've clicked on checkout from the shopping cart page you should not end up back at the cart having to click checkout again.

Instead, a customer registers, should choose the preferred payment method as well as the shipment of the product so that during the checkout pages to appear in less than 2

I am working on a new combined checkout process as I've listed above.. I am looking to also improve the process (remove the account success page and make it a message, combine the login and non-registered checkout into the same page, etc)

Absolutely wonderful!

Xsecrets wrote:

Qphoria wrote: (remove the account success page and make it a message)

that would be good, and the other biggest problem I have with the current non guest system is that you end up back at the shopping cart page. Once you've clicked on checkout from the shopping cart page you should not end up back at the cart having to click checkout again.

again something else that does not happen.

once payment has been completed you are directed to a success page even using guest.

Daniel wrote:

Xsecrets wrote:

Qphoria wrote: (remove the account success page and make it a message)

that would be good, and the other biggest problem I have with the current non guest system is that you end up back at the shopping cart page. Once you've clicked on checkout from the shopping cart page you should not end up back at the cart having to click checkout again.

again something else that does not happen.

once payment has been completed you are directed to a success page even using guest.

Yes it most certainly does happen new customer to the store doesn't have an account and want's to create one. you go from shopping cart to choice page they choose to create and account then you go to account create success page and after you click continue on the account create success page you wind up back at the shopping cart where you started and have to click checkout again. I just tested in on 1.4.9.3 like two days ago, so yes this absolutely does happen. The guest checkout is not bad, but the user checkout if you don't already have an account is way too long.

as long as the get to the success page.

are the products still in the cart?

Daniel wrote:as long as the get to the success page.

are the products still in the cart?

yes there are products in the cart. give it a try on the demo add something to the cart while not logged in click checkout and follow the path for creating a new account you'll see.

Yea Xsecrets is right..
when you add item to cart and make a new account you go from
1. Click Checkout and goto Login/Register page
2. Choose Register and Click continue
3. Enter address and click continue
4. Goto Account Success page (worthless extra page)
5. Then click continue on that page and end up back at the cart page when you really wanted the shipping page (this is what xsecrets is talking about)
6. Then click on checkout again to goto shipping page
7. choose shipping and click to payment page
8. Choose payment and click to confirm page
9. Click confirm and goto uninformative success page (pending any gateway steps)

So that's 8 steps minimum.

A temp fix for that step 5 in the current version is to maintain the redirect setting through the create and success page. As it is now, it dies on logon only to redirect if you login with an existing account. But a quick way to assume that after success the customer will want to checkout is:

1. EDIT: catalog/controller/account/success.php

2. FIND: 3. REPLACE WITH:
The new combined guest and registered checkout I'm working on would flow like this:

New Customer (no account):
Add items to cart and Click Checkout

1. Login/Create Page:
Redirect to combined Login/Create page. Enter both shipping and billing address (with checkbox like current guest checkout) and optional password and click next.
-- if password was entered, then create account and redirect to shipping page. Account success message shows in green message box on shipping page.
-- if no password, then just redirect to shipping page

2. Shipping Page:
Choose shipping and redirect to payment page
-- if account, then "change" address takes them to address page to add new address and choose. Choose shipping and and redirect to payment page.
-- if no account, then "change" address redirects to the login/create page with the current address pre-filled. At this point the guest has a second chance to enter a password as well and create an account.

3. Payment Page:
Choose payment and redirect to checkout page
-- if account, then "change" address takes them to address page to add new address and choose. Choose payment and and redirect to payment page.
-- if no account, then "change" address redirects to the login/create page with the current address pre-filled. At this point the guest has a second chance to enter a password as well and create an account.

4. Checkout Page:
Submit order
-- if account, then "change" address takes them to the respective address pages to add new address and choose.

5. Success Page:
In addition to the success message, the success page will have a full (printable) invoice of the order, possibly with some area for custom payment details (some countries require you to show the payment transaction id from the gateway). I originally thought about having the password fields here for optional account create, but I think it is better to just leave them on the login/create page as optional fields

That's a solid 4 step checkout for both reg and guest, with enhanced success page. That should work without changing any existing extensions and be worldwide compatible.

From there, we can work on options to combine shipping/payment on the same page if not using any restrictions. And then from there combine the steps into a proper one page checkout.

Hi Qphoria,
You sd, 1.5.0. will be released this month, only a few days left, any exact day yet, I need to create like 5 sites asap, just waiting for this release so I can have all the new features, any idea ?
Thanks

Feb 30th!