: How to identify a scalable (and appropriate) eCommerce platform for a medium-sized company? Possible Duplicate: Which Ecommerce Script Should I Use? Maybe you can help me identify

@Ogunnowo487

I'm posting this as an answer because it's too long to fit in the comments, but it's really a reply to JulianDroid's comment:


First off--thanks a lot for this input
guys... it's definitely a unique
position to be diving head first into
a fairly high profile project, but
being super green to ecommerce. I'm
fairly new to PHP, but I've heard that
Magento takes weeks (months?) to
familiarize yourself with... I wonder
what features Magento offers over
Prestashop, because if it's truly a
better choice, our client is probably
okay with us taking a more
practical-in-the-longrun approach. I'd
hate to be 2 weeks deep into Magento,
and not be able to add 2 fields to the
order page to accommodate our client's
vision


One of the reasons I switched from home-rolled (long, long ago) e-commerce stores to Magento is that it's a really robust solution. It's a bit bulky largely because it's designed to meet the needs of most store owners without needing any custom coding. So most customizations (e.g. custom fields, custom attributes, custom product types, web services, pricing rules, payment methods, etc.) can be done via the admin area. And most common features (tags, user reviews, Google Base integration, parcel tracking, etc.) are already built into the system. So for 99% of store owners out there, it's very user-friendly, and you'll find Magento will do everything you want with minimal difficulty. It's also designed with a very extensible architecture such that, if you're familiar with the system, you can customize it however you want simply by writing a custom module for it (of which there are a ton).

The down side to all of this is that it's got a fairly complex architecture, so it takes a while to learn the API, the file structure, the EAV model, the templating system, etc. Unlike managing the store, which has a very useful and thorough user guide, developing for Magento can be quite intimidating at first, and you've got very little documentation to guide you.

So that's the dichotomy. For 99% of customizations and business needs, it will take you no more than half a day to set up through the admin panel. But if your needs fall into that other 1% that requires a custom module, then it's going to be a lot more work initially than lighter e-commerce solutions. Luckily, there are modules for almost everything and it's only the initial learning curve that is hard.

So I can't speak for Prestashop, but I would take a look at the demo Magento store/admin area and see if it's got everything you need. If not, search Magento Connect for a module that you could use.

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@Turnbaugh106

A lot of this comes down to the old question of whether to use an existing service/product, or develop it yourself.

Pros of using an existing product/service are:


quick to launch
community of users to provide support and feedback
cost effective
will probably do 95% of what you want out of the box


Cons of using an existing product/service are:


although the existing product/service will probably do 95% of what you want, the remaining 5% can be very, very difficult.

If it's a hosted 3rd party service, it may be impossible.
If it's a downloadable, installable open-source solution, it may be next to impossible to implement without learning how the product works, and it will almost certainly be very time-consuming

User interfaces (both front end and back end) are often designed to satisfy everyone, and end up satisfying no one.

For the front end, being innovative in user experience can be difficult
For the back end, having something that doesn't confuse the user with the variety of options is desirable.



Ideally, building your own system using a core or framework that you're familiar with is the best approach (given time, money, expertise).

Looking at your timeline, i'd say that for a Jan 1st launch, your only choice is a hosted 3rd party product -- i don't think you'll have time to get something built, or installed/customised in time. Also, it takes care of things such as PCI compliance, which can be expensive and time consuming to get right, especially if you are handling credit card data yourselves (i'm not sure if this is what you mean by 'handling payment processing internally'.

There's so much more to say about this, but i'll stop rambling now. Feel free to ask follow up questions.

Final word: given the short timeline, work hard to set expectations in your organisation, remove inessential features, and consider a phased approach.

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