Php, mysql, and other tools

jb415

About 10 years ago I studied computer science a bit at college and I found that I had some aptitude for it, though I didn't continue to work in the field afterwords. And I have fooled around some with PHP and MySQL. Now I have an idea for an ecommerce website with not too many frills, just selling some products of my own creation from my home.

But it's been a while since i've been involved with coding, although I'm pretty comfortable reading manuals and learning what I need to learn. I'd like to know if I can create an entire commerce website with PHP and MySQL alone, or what additional tools I might need to do it. I will be working in a Windows environment. Yes, I'll need a shopping cart, and security. I may take a couple years to design and code everything on my spare time; it's not like i'm in any real big hurry. But I don't want to get bogged down with too many tricky details if I can pull some of the more complicated stuff off the shelf.

If anyone has any suggestions then I would like to hear them. Many thanks.

Weedpacket

You certainly can (assuming you're naturally aware of the need for a web server 🙂); look at some of the existing systems for examples.

bpat1434

My honest suggestion is to not reinvent the wheel. An ecommerce application is not something you can really develop in your spare time. There are too many components and areas of failure to keep anything really secure and worth using.

I would highly suggest you download and install Magento as an ecommerce platform (or osCommerce or ZenCart). Magento has a fairly good code base you can start with to create your own extensions and make it how you want. At least then you'd be selling items while you're developing in your free time. Plus, all the security and main issues with the cart, customers, and all that jazz is handled by a core team of developers who are paid to focus on that product, rather than devoting their free time to it.

Magento is written purely in PHP and utilizes MySQL. So yes, you can write your own ecommerce solution in PHP and MySQL; however, why do it when you can download something that already works and works fairly well 😉

halojoy

Hi!
OpenCart is in PHP MySQL
and is my personal favourite e-Commerce freeware.
http://php.opensourcecms.com/scripts/details.php?scriptid=93&name=OpenCart

Here you have 10 popular FREE:
http://php.opensourcecms.com/scripts/show.php?catid=3&cat=eCommerce
... with User Ratings 🙂

jb415

Thanks to all for the suggestions. You are absolutely right, bpat1434, i don't want to reinvent the wheel. But I would like to maintain control over certain details; so i kind of chafe at the thought of pointing and clicking..then WHamo!..there's your prefab webpage.

I will definitely check out Magento and OpenCart. thanks a bunch!

bpat1434

That was part of my point. While you have a "prefab" webpage, you still have the ability to override everything in the Magento codebase so you can change how everything works, down to the finest detail. And skinning Magento takes time; however, every piece is editable. I can't really think of one piece that isn't.

My point was that you could leave all the hard stuff to someone else (or a team of developers) and then create your own functionality and change the store to work the way you want it to work fairly easily.

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