OXID eShop easy Manual

Update eShop to UTF-8 encoding

Philipp Grashoff — Mon, 06 Apr 2009 10:13:54 +0200

Requirements

These instructions are for updating a Version equal or newer to 4.1.1 to UTF-8. Older eShop versions cannot be updated to UTF-8.

Update Files

1) Check if system Requirements for UTF-8 are met

Log in to eShop Admin
Select Service -> System Requirements
Check if mbstring and UTF-8 support are green:

The UTF-8 update will only work if
the requirements mentioned above are met (green square). Otherwise,
installing this update might break your eShop!

2) Make eShop temporarily offline

The eShop has to be offline for this update. The best way to do so is to replace the index.php file in the main directory of your eShop.

Backup your existing index.php file located in the main directory of your eShop.
Create a new index.php file with the following content:
<?php echo "The eShop is temporarily offline for maintenance. Please try again later";?>
Overwrite the index.php with the new one.

Try opening your eShop in your browser. The maintenance message should appear.

3) Backup Database

Make a complete backup of your database.

4) Change Database to UTF-8

Next, the database is updated to use UTF-8 encoding. All database commands are in the .sql file in the update package.

Before running the database commands, you have to edit the file: replace _NAME_OF_DB_ with the name of the database.

There are several ways to execute the file:

Many web hosts offer phpmyadmin for managing databases. In phpmyadmin, you can use the Import function.
If you have command line access to the database, you can run the update via command line.

The database commands cover the standard database of OXID eShop. If you made any changes to the database, you have to convert
these changes to UTF-8 manually.

5) Check language files

While working in UTF-8 mode non UTF-8 data stored in language files
must be prepared. For doing this, the charset of each language file has
to be defined. Check all language files in the following folders
(LANG_ABBR stands for language abbreviation, e.g. en, de, fr):

Admin language files: /out/admin/LANG_ABBR/

Frontend language files: /out/basic/LANG_ABBR/

Check each file if the charset is defined in its code, e.g.: 'charset' => 'ISO-8859-15',
If the charset is not defined, the language files are ignored. To
get them properly working, find out the character encoding with a text
editor and add the charset information to the language file after the
line $aLang = array(:
$aLang = array(
'charset' => 'CHARSET_NAME',

The following charsets are supported by PHP: ISO-8859-1,
ISO-8859-15, UTF-8, cp866, cp1251, cp1252, KOI8-R, BIG5, GB2312,
BIG5-HKSCS, Shift_JIS, EUC-JP

6) Check custom files

If you made any extensions to OXID eShop, these files should be
encoded as ISO-8859-15. Otherwise, special chars can lead to problems.
Only language files are allowed to have other encoding than ISO-8859-15.

Check all your custom files except language files if they are saved in ISO-8859-15.

7) Run update.php

Copy update.php from the UTF-8 update package to the main directory of your eShop.
Open the update script with your browser (http://www.youreshop.com/update.php).
In the first update step, the character set currently used is detected automatically. Click on Proceed to run the update.
After the update, the results are shown. Here you can see all
updated data. Please review the data if any chars are not as they
should be (especially currency setting, see public bugtracker). If necessary, change the data in admin after update is finished.

8) Update config.inc.php

Check if the entry $this->iUtfMode exists in the config.inc.php (located in the main directory of your eShop).
If yes: Adjust the config.inc.php file: set $this->iUtfMode to 1.
If no: Add the following line to the config.inc.php file: $this->iUtfMode = '1'; // 1 - enables UTF-8, 0 - disables UTF-8

9) Delete temporary files

Delete all files in /tmp.

10 ) Restore index.php

Copy the backup of index.php made in step 2) back to the main directory of your eShop.

Update is finished

The Update to UTF-8 character encoding is finished.

Display certain products or categories with a different template

Philipp Grashoff — Tue, 02 Jun 2009 17:55:26 +0200

Products

You can set for each product that the detail view of the product is rendered with a different template:

Go to Administer Products -> Products
Select the accordant product
Go to Extended tab
In Alt. Template, enter the name of the template to be used for rendering this product. Example: page/details/mydetails.tpl
Click Save

Thereby the referenced template is used for rendering the detail view.

You can use the template details.tpl as a draft for a custom template. This template is used by default for rendering the detail view.

Product pictures: Basics

Roman Felger — Mon, 10 Nov 2008 15:39:29 +0100

You have the option of uploading multiple pictures for each product. The pictures must be copied from your computer to the server on which OXID eShop runs. This operation is referred to as uploading.

There are four different picture types:

Icons are the smallest pictures. You can upload one icon per product.
Thumbnails are also small pictures. You can upload one thumbnail per product.
Pictures are standard-sized pictures. You can upload seven pictures per product.
Zoomed Pictures are extra-large pictures. You can upload four zoomed pictures per product.

Where the various picture types are displayed

Icons

In the shopping cart.
If products are displayed in the right sidebar, e.g., in Top of the Shop and Bargain.

Thumbnails

In product lists. Examples of product lists are category views (all products in a category are listed) and search results.
In promotions that are displayed in the center of the home page, e.g., Long-running Hits and Just arrived!.

Pictures

In the detailed view of a product (an individual product is displayed).

Zoomed Pictures

The detailed view of a product will contain a link if zoomed pictures are available. This link can be used to open the zoomed pictures.

What next?

Instructions for uploading an icon, a thumbnail, and a picture are given in Uploading product pictures.

If product pictures are too large, they are reduced automatically to a defined size. This prevents interference with the eShop design caused by pictures that are too large. You can specify the maximum size of product pictures. This is primarily of interest if you want to adapt the design of the OXID eShop. To find out where you can modify the maximum sizes, refer to Adapting the size of product pictures.

Find more information also about technical details in OXID eShop developer's platform OXIDforge.

When which e-mails are sent

Roman Felger — Tue, 18 Nov 2008 17:03:03 +0100

The e-mails are managed in the CMS pages: The CMS pages can be found under Customer Info -> CMS pages.

If you want to edit e-mails, read Adapting the content of e-mails in advance. This gives you important information on editing e-mails.

Your Password in eShop (Ident: oxforgotpwd):
This e-mail is sent if users have sent their password. Via the Forgotten Password link you can have an e-mail sent to users, which gives their password.
Newsletter Confirmation/Newsletter Confirmation Plain
This e-mail is sent to users when they register for a newsletter. In the e-mail is a link which users must visit. Only then are they registered for the newsletter (double opt-in).
Your Order/Your Order Plain
These e-mails are received by the user as soon as they have ordered. The order is summarised once again in the e-mail. The summary of the order is not set up on the CMS page. eShop generates the summary automatically. The text on the CMS page is displayed via the summary.
Your Order Admin/Your Order Admin Plain
This e-mail is sent to the administrator as soon as the user orders something. The order is summarised in the e-mail. The summary of the order is not set up on the CMS page. eShop generates the summary automatically. The text on the CMS page is displayed via the summary.
Your Order (Other Country)/Your Order (Other Country) Plain
This e-mail is sent to users who order from countries for which no shipping costs have been set up. The e-mail is sent automatically when users order. These users must be informed of the shipping costs subsequently.
Your Order Admin (Other Country)/Your Order Admin Plain (Other Country)
This e-mail is sent to users who order from countries for which no shipping costs have been set up.
Thanks for Your Registration/Thanks for Your Registration Plain
This e-mail is sent to users when they register with your eShop.
Your Order has been Shipped/Your Order has been Shipped Plain
This e-mail is sent to users when you mark an order as shipped (if you click on Ship Now for an order).
Your Order Terms/Your Order Terms Plain
These CMS pages are not separate e-mails. The content is appended to the end of the order e-mail: Your Order/Your Order Plain.
E-mail Footer (Ident: oxemailfooter)/E-mail Footer Plain(Ident: oxemailfooterplain)
These CMS pages are not separate e-mails. The content of these CMS pages is appended to the end of each e-mail. In this e-mail you can insert your contact data and a link to your eShop, for example.

Settings for variants

Philipp Grashoff — Wed, 07 Jan 2009 14:28:40 +0100

Under Master Settings -> Core Settings -> System -> Variants, you will find four settings that allow you to adapt the behaviour of variants:

Display variants in assignment lists in eShop admin
In eShop, there are often lists in which you can assign products, e.g. when you assign products to discounts, attributes to products, etc.
- If the setting is active, the variants of the parent product will also be displayed in these lists.
- If the setting is not active, only the parent product will be displayed.
"Parent" products can be purchased
Here, you can specify whether or not the parent product can be purchased:
- If the setting is active, the parent product can also be purchased.
- If the setting is not active, only the variants can be purchased.
Variants inherit scale prices from "parent" product
This setting influences the behaviour of the eShop if scale prices are set up for the parent product: If the setting is active, scale prices will also be used for the variants.
Show variant ratings for "parent" product
Your users have the opportunity to rate the product. This setting affects the behaviour if variants are rated: If the setting is active, the ratings of the variants will also be displayed for the parent product.

Creating multidimensional Variants

Philipp Grashoff — Tue, 08 Dec 2009 12:18:32 +0100

Since version 4.2.0 you can create multidimensional variants. Multidimensional variants are needed if a product has several different versions, e.g. if clothes are available in different sizes and different colors. Using multidimensional variants, you can create a variant for each combination.

Creating multidimensional Variants

Multidimensional Variants are created for the accordant product - like normal variants - in the tab Variants. The single "dimensions" are separated by a pipe sign |. In the following example, multidimensional variants were created for a polo shirt: It is available in different sizes and different colors:

In the detail view of the product, a selection list is shown for each dimension:

Creating multidimensional variants using selection lists

If a product has many variants, it is time-consuming to create each variant separately. Alike normal variants, multidimensional Variants can be created using selection lists:

In the following example the multidimensional variants from the example above are created using selection lists:

Create a selection list for the different sizes (S, M, L). How selection lists are created is described in this tutorial.
Create a selection list for the different colors (red, brown, gray).
Select the accordant product and go to Variants tab.
From the list to the left, select the selection list for different sizes and click the arrow ==>.
Select the list for different colors and click the arrow ==>.

Thereby the multidimensional variants are created. If many products shall have the same multidimensional variants, you can save much time that way.

Setting up variants of a product

Philipp Grashoff — Wed, 07 Jan 2009 09:55:37 +0100

Variants allow you to set up different product options for which you can specify nearly all settings. Variants are saved as separate products. Accordingly, you can adapt variants the like standard products. You can enter a stock inventory for each variant, upload various images, modify the description text, etc.

The product for which you set up variants is called the parent product.

Setting up variants

You can specify variants of a product on the Variants tab for a product:

In Name of selection, you can specify a name for the selection between the various variants, e.g. Color or Size.

Below you will find entry fields that you can use to set up new variants:

In Selection, you enter the name of the variant, e.g. Red, if the variants are differentiated by colour.
In Prod.No., you can assign the variant its own product number. If you do not enter a product number, the product number of the parent product will be used.
In Price, you enter the price of the variant.
You can use Sorting to specify the order in which the variants will be displayed. The variant with the lowest number is displayed at the top, and the variant with the highest number at the bottom.
In Stock, you enter the stock inventory of the variant. You can use the selection list behind it to select the delivery status. The various delivery statuses are described in Settings for stock management.

What next?

A step-by-step procedure for setting up variants for a product is presented by means of an example in Example for variants: Different sizes.

Since version 4.2.0, multidimensional variants can be created. This is needed if e.g. a cloth is available in different colors as well as different sizes. Further information can be found in the article about multidimensional variants.

A few settings are available for the variants. These settings are described in Settings for variants.

If you are setting up the same variants for many products over and over, you do not have to set up the variants for each individual product. You can set up a selection list as a template for the variants. You will find additional information about this in Implementing frequently occurring variants with selection lists.

How SEO URLs are calculated

Philipp Grashoff — Thu, 28 May 2009 09:49:55 +0200

The SEO URLs are calculated as follows:

Products: category tree + product name + .html, e.g. www.youreshop.com/category1/category2/name-of-product.html
Products can also be accessed over the manufacturer/distributor
navigation. In this case: name of manufacturer/distributor + product name, e.g. www.youreshop.com/manufacturer-name/product-name.html
Categories: category tree, e.g. www.youreshop.com/category1/category2/
Manufacturers: By-Brand/Manufacturer/ + manufacturer name, e.g. www.youreshop.com/By-Brand/Manufacturer/manufacturer-name/
Distributors: By-Distributor/ + distributor name, e.g. www.youreshop.com/By-Distributor/distributor-name.html
CMS Pages: Title of CMS page, e.g. www.youreshop.com/title-of-CMS-page

Multilingualism

Since version 4.1.3 language abbreviations (de, en etc.) are used again in SEO URLs. Only for the default language the URLs are generated without language abbreviation:

English: www.youreshop.com/category1/product1.html (default language in this sample)
German: www.youreshop.com/de/kategorie1/artikel1.html

If the SEO URLs of languages would be similar, the SEO suffix is added for creating different SEO URLs.

Updating SEO URLs

The SEO URL can change, e.g. if a product is renamed. The SEO URLs are changed automatically: They are updated as soon as you save your changes.

You can also manually update the SEO URLs.

Adjusting SEO URLs

You can adapt each SEO URL. Read Manually adjust SEO URLs for further information.

SEO Settings

Philipp Grashoff — Thu, 28 May 2009 09:49:56 +0200

In Master Settings -> Core Settings -> SEO you can find some settings influencing search engine optimization:

Title settings

The title settings influence the page title (<title>-Tag in HTML-Code). This title is used for the browser window.

Title Prefix
The prefix is shown at the beginning of each page title.
Title Suffix
The suffix is shown at the end of each page title.
Front Page Title
The title of the front page. The prefix is shown additionally.

Other SEO settings

Default language for SEO URLs
For the default language no language abbreviations (en, de, fr etc.) are used. For all other languages the accordant abbreviation is inserted in each SEO URL.
SEO IDs Separator
The separator is used if category names and product names consist of several words. The separator is used instead of spaces, e.g. www.youreshop.com/category-name-of-several-words. If no separator is entered, - is used.
SEO Suffix for differing Similar SEO URLs

If several products have the same name and are in the same category, they would get the same SEO URL. For avoiding this, the SEO Suffix is attached. If no SEO Suffix is defined, oxid is used.
Characters which are replaced in SEO URLs

Some special characters like German umlauts should be removed from URLs. They can cause problems. Here you can define how they are replaced. The syntax is special character => replacement character, e.g. Ü => Ue. Enter only one replacement per line.
For German, the replacements are already entered. In the German OXID Forums an accordant thread with further replacements exists.
Reserved Words
Some URLs are defined in OXID eShop, like www.youreshop.com/admin for accessing eShop admin. If a category was named admin the SEO URL would be www.youreshop.com/admin too - the category couldn't be accessed. Therefore the SEO suffix is attached to these URLs. You can define here which URLs are suffixed automatically.
Words which are ignored in automatic Creation of Meta-tags
If no Meta tags are defined for products and categories, the Meta tags are created automatically. Thereby very common words can be omitted. All words entered here are omitted when creating the Meta tags.

Static URLs

For static pages in eShop (e.g. General Terms and Conditions) you can define SEO URLs. How to create and edit SEO URLs for static pages is described in Manually adjust SEO URLs.

Updating SEO URLs

If changes are made in eShop admin, the SEO URLs are automatically updated. However it can be neccessary to manually update the SEO URLs, e.g. if you made changes to the database. With the button Update SEO URLs (until version 4.1.2: Reset SEO IDs) you can do this: The next time a page is opened, the SEO URL is recalculated.

Creating and sending newsletters

Philipp Grashoff — Wed, 10 Jun 2009 11:42:16 +0200

You can send newsletters to all customers who subscribed. A Newsletter, as other e-mails, consists of 2 parts: A HTML newsletter and a text newsletter. Both newsletter are sent together. The program that users deploy to look at e-mails selects whether the HTML e-mail or text e-mail is displayed (Most current e-mail programs can display HTML e-mails). Due to this, always edit the HTML and the text newsletter.

Creating newsletter

Go to Customer Info -> Newsletter.
Click on New Newsletter Sample at the bottom of the screen.
In Title, enter the Title of the newsletter. The title is used as subject of the e-mail.
In Sample, create the HTML newsletter.
Click Save.
Go to Text tab.
In Plain Text Sample, create the Text newsletter.
Click Save.

In newsletters, you can use Smarty tags to include data from eShop. In the sample newsletter you can find some examples. You can include products in newsletters, too. Further information is available in Display Products in Newsletters.

Sending newsletter

Go to Selection tab.
Click Assign User Groups. A new window is opened.
Select the user groups the newsletter is to be sent to.
Close the window. Now the amount of users the newsletter is sent to displayed.
Click Send Newsletter.

Hints

The newsletter is only sent to users who subscribed the newsletter. This isn't necessarily equal to the members of the user group Newsletter-Empfänger. You can see in Administer Users -> Users -> Extended -> Newsletter if a user subscribed.

OXID eShop easy Manual

Update eShop to UTF-8 encoding

Requirements

Update Files

Community Edition

Professional Edition

Enterprise Edition

1) Check if system Requirements for UTF-8 are met

2) Make eShop temporarily offline

3) Backup Database

4) Change Database to UTF-8

5) Check language files

6) Check custom files

7) Run update.php

8) Update config.inc.php

9) Delete temporary files

10 ) Restore index.php

Update is finished

Display certain products or categories with a different template

Products

Categories

Product pictures: Basics

Where the various picture types are displayed

Icons

Thumbnails

Pictures

Zoomed Pictures

What next?

When which e-mails are sent

Settings for variants

Creating multidimensional Variants

Creating multidimensional Variants

Creating multidimensional variants using selection lists

Setting up variants of a product

Setting up variants

What next?

How SEO URLs are calculated

Multilingualism

Updating SEO URLs

Adjusting SEO URLs

SEO Settings

Title settings

Other SEO settings

Static URLs

Updating SEO URLs

Creating and sending newsletters

Creating newsletter

Sending newsletter

Hints