Acatalog - Changing name.

[leehack]

It does seem a few wishlist items have been cherry picked that are relatively easy to add, so the added features in the new version can be upped a bit. But that might be a cynical view, which i certainly always take. What i want to see more than anything is an issue done to the Nth degreee and completely finished. This strikes me as another 'half address' and almost certainly will not see any further changes for the next 5 years - that's not good enough IMO.

They obviously have to make money to survive and continue moving the product forward, i would just love to understand the criteria for features being added to new versions. VAT shortcomings aside, the features that have been added do not match those that i have seen people wanting addressed, but maybe i miss the bigger picture.

I have tried to remain out of chats on V9 as i wanted to see what people were thinking, before i really thought about it. However, the info I have mainly picked up (offline admittedly), is that people are generally a bit deflated by this release. Much of the release seems to be sold around the vat amendments, however these have just brought things up to as they should have been anyway. For me and by also listening to chats on the subject, V9 is at the moment looking like Vista, something to skip and go to the next version if you possibly can.

I expected VAT, GC and the checkout addressed in V9. Getting 33% of what i expected is what explains a flat feeling i guess. I'm actually looking forward to V10 if i am honest. Its a shame cos there have been some nice little features added, they just get lost in the deflation for me.

[Ginnys Attic]

I agree again Lee, v9 does seem to be nothing more than a step towards version 10 and should maybe actually be v8.5.3

So so many basic eCommerce functions are just not possible or at least not easily possible with Actinic and they appear to rely on addons, hacks, mods and the community to get the software to function in a more realistic and usable eCommerce way such as to name but a few.

1. Customers ability to login and check previous orders, shipping details and tracking
2. Single products per page
3. Multiple pages per section list X amount of products per page
4. Google Checkout
5. Display Pricing Info (eg: Our Price, RRP and You Save amounts to customers)
6. Different directories for product sections
7. Product reviews
8. Stock control and reporting

Although some of these features are possible via mods or addons it's not exactly what you would expect from a paid for product such as Actinic especially when free solutions such as do these things and so so so much more and at least with an open source free solution you can understand the reliance on the community and developers for the addons to get functionality.

Look at it like this, just to add what i would consider basic functionailty of an ecommerce store and add the ability for customers to check order tracking or add product reviews that would be how much extra using Code Path addons or to have half a chance of live stock control using a mole end addon again costing how much extra?

Jeeze, Actinic doesn't even have a built in spell checker which yet again there is a mod available via mole end for £74.95 so i don't know what realistic hope we all have of Actinic catching up with the ever expanding world of ecommerce tbh.

[Darren B]

I place my curry next to me and reply

Well Lee how can i add to this, not sure but i agree with what you have said.

To me this should have been V8.7 i see no major changes to warrent a version changes, what i see is enhancements to existing features. Maybe i am cynical to. There is some lovely little features but these to me are more gimics than new out and out features.

The VAT thing is long in the comming, the cost price long in the comning, yet we did not feel the need to add manufacturer at the same time? Shipping has still not been finished, PSP's are incomplete, im not going to harp on about it but we all know. Customer accounts, sheesh i sick of hearing this one. Ordering by part number, norman has written me a hack for that, how long ago ermm V7 i think. Adding more fields to the contact us form, Nope, Adding captcha to the contact us form nope.

Im with you, will i go for V9 not sure its worth the trouble to be honest, thats why im still on 8.5.1, the upgrade to 8.5.2 will mean another round of script changes to get back what i have already.
so will V9

Alot of hype and 18 months later ? V10 had best be and improvement or perhaps i have out grown actinic, is it time tpo look at open source shopping carts ?

But i cant tell you the 1st company to develope a ecommerce package that allows designing on the desk to with uploads and an sql database will be the one to go with, just MO and what do i know

D

[Darren B]

Well seems like someone was thinking the similar things

[pinbrook]

I expected VAT, GC and the checkout addressed in V9.

Luckily for me i only expected VAT, and thats what we got.

Personally i tend to only recommend clients upgrade alternate versions, thus i will be suggesting v7 and earlier upgrade to 9 whilst peeps on 8 hang around for 10 unless they are desparate for VAT.

[completerookie]

I've downloaded, looked and played, and sat back a bit (like Lee has said) and watched the threads, but most of whats coming seems "superficial", certainly not a major version upgrade.

I reckon that the same sort of investment in actinet would give a lot more return for my bucks with the "possibility" of more bangs coming in the pipeline. and those bangs seem to be coming quite a lot faster than actinic seems capable of offering.

[Darren B]

could not agree more, always adding neew things to it

D

[OriginalTouch]

Coming back to the /acatalog/ thread

The reasons we need the acatalog thread to be removed are many, mainly:

- SEO values URL breadcrumbs by relevance - "acatalog" means nothing.

- "acatalog" should be replaced by the folder name that it refers to, eg Sunglasses/blue .. Sunglasses/red : Lee spot on.

- acatalog just tells the user - hey we are using ACTINIC for our website - or maybe that is just it - it's a marketing ploy??

- V9 changing acatalog for another name such as SHOP instead of a relevant folder name just defeats the purpose.

Shame, I was really looking forward for something really mind-blowing in V9.

[RuralWeb]

I was waiting for this to kick off as I highlighted it as a big problem in testing. IMO it is very dangerous to be playing with as it can easily trash the ranking and thelink popularity of a site.

Its very usefull for a site starting out but the idea that it should be populated by section names could also be a problem as G regards long keyword stuffed urls as spam.

[Stereo Steve]

A new site, yes, use it. If you already have an acatalog site, I would think very carefully about changing all your URL's.

As for V9, I think it has some worthwhile changes and we will upgrade our site to it in the future I think. Problem is we all want different things from a desktop package.

What I particularly want is a way to channel ebay and amazon etc. orders into actinic using a simple .csv. This would be a killer app for many multi channel sellers and make actinic the heart of the order processing system, not just another channel to fire into sage / exchequer etc.

At the end of the day, I don't think an upgrade to the full release of V9 is going to be too painfull from a V8 site so many will gladly accept the improvements.

[completerookie]

At the end of the day, I don't think an upgrade to the full release of V9 is going to be too painful from a V8 site so many will gladly accept the improvements.

only at a price ! and I'm not convinced there's enough "quality stuff" for the price.

there has to be enough in it to warrant the upgrade. How do you get everyone to upgrade? - you start by making good some painful problems and work arounds ahead of the pretty stuff, you've only got to look at the wishlist to see what the users really want.

some of it can be done (and done without a great deal of resource - don't mean that harshly Gabe), look at the hacks we already see, look at actinet, look at the addons from other people. Bite the bullet, Give the users what they really want not what's easier to code.

[BodyBits]

Hey Leehack and Darren !

Thanks for looking at the design...I always listen and take good advices..so uploading right now with a changed versions..thanks guys...I like the "Steve wonder" bit Leehack !

But the idea of showing that site (designed by many upgrades from Version 3 in actinic over many years !) was the implementing of the change of "acatalog", it was not my intention to get freebies advices from the pro designers..! but thanks, I took them !

Always been used to pay at every corner for every bit I need..so appreciated..if anybody needs body jewellery..let me know..I make it!

Going back to the subject of this thread, I agree with the capability to create folders on the same level as the "acatalog", not only for SEO point of view(more food for the spider for each relevant folder), but also because the idea of having everything on one folder will make any work that bit more difficult when you have a site built on one product per section, and 9000 products in the store ..

[Jan]

It does seem a few wishlist items have been cherry picked that are relatively easy to add

A lot of the features added this time have been wanted for a while but have been difficult to implement, which is why I think they didn't make it into earlier releases. Sometimes a simple feature is a nightmare to put into place.

Getting back to this thread, with regard to generating a htaccess file, would you be able to do this quickly by generating a google or yahoo site map and then editing it in excel?

Regards,

[leehack]

A lot of the features added this time have been wanted for a while but have been difficult to implement, which is why I think they didn't make it into earlier releases. Sometimes a simple feature is a nightmare to put into place.

I totally understand about the simple feature request, especially in my trade, but that was not the point being made. I was interested to know how things were decided upon and who asked for the features we actually got.

I've stated that i maybe blinkered, i've also stated i am perhaps cynical, but i would absolutely love to see a 1000 people vote on what they actually wanted in relation to what they got. On the surface, the VAT fix must have been a real biggie as it appears to have taken 75% of the time.

I love the design library changes, that had always bugged me, the site wizard should be a good thing and Google Analytics is certainly going to make people happy as long as actinic stay up to date with it. Few new themes and some wider ones are good too. So it's not all doom and gloom, i am just a bit disappointed and i think this seems to be the general consensus. Not to slate actinic, not to take cheap shots, just to communicate with them, what we as users are thinking.

V10 is going to be a very key version IMO.

[Stereo Steve]

I guess I'm coming from the perspective of a cover customer so the upgrade is free and seems worthwhile to me. I had held off from 8.5.2 and waited for v9 and I'm glad I did. There are some excellent usability tweeks in the content tab and some good new templates, one of which I think we will be switching to as Exec is just too limiting.

I think we need to recognise that v8 was a major step that is only just become stable. Do we really want another wholesale change? Or do we want to keep the stability and let it evolve over time? I'd vote for the former. Yes there are things we need but many are catered for by outside writers which in turn creates a mini industry in itself. No bad thing.

Overall, I'l pretty pleased with it. Would have liked GC but I'm sure it will come and it's hardly a killer app now that we have missed the cash giveaway.