Beta 1 Battle Plans

Posts: 4256
Joined: 08/07/2007
AdministratorHead Code Monkey - I eat bugs.

Well, isn't this special? A battle plans thread that's looking forward to a new release cycle... to beta and beyond! It's hard to think about all the things I'd love for Ubercart to do but which just aren't necessary to hold up the release cycle any longer. Some things will just have to get put off for Drupal 6 and Ubercart 2.0. (In case you're wondering, I am already keeping a list.)

However, I do hope to see the following things make it into core for beta, assuming I have development time. Evil

  1. Revisit the line items API to make sure it's production ready.
  2. Revisit the order total preview so line items can be removed if need be.
  3. Put in core a recurring payments API with some simple core support.
  4. Some example default workflow configurations.
  5. HTML/CSS fixes:
    • Order admin page view/sort forms
    • Order editing update controls
  6. More as they come to mind...

This list doesn't include the fact that I need to better document some things, like payment methods, and make sure other documentation is up to date (Checkout Panes anyone?). Also, Shawn is hard at work on a core reports module that will be most excellent to have in beta.

I invite everyone else to post up their plans, pet projects, and desires for the beta release. My best estimate is a month to move to beta, and then a month to get to 1.0. That's ambitious given our past releases, but Alpha 8's been going surprisingly smooth.

In the meantime... keep those bug reports coming!

Posts: 1998
Joined: 08/07/2007
AdministratoreLiTe!

Saving this space until I figure out what I'm going to be doing.

Posts: 79
Joined: 10/29/2007
Bug Finder

Here's a small fix I'd like to see, when you select a shipping method, the total pane on the bottom is updated, but when you add a coupon, it does not show untl the review screeen, it would be cool if it applied the coupon immediately

Posts: 4256
Joined: 08/07/2007
AdministratorHead Code Monkey - I eat bugs.

Your suggestion is a shortcoming in the coupon module... part of my plans are to rework the line item API that handles that update you mentioned, and with any luck, part of Lyle's plans will include a new discount system to replace the old coupon module. Eye-wink

Posts: 85
Joined: 09/08/2007
Bug Finder

Here's an example of default WF configuration. Let me know what you guys think, and I can add some more.

Posts: 41
Joined: 09/07/2007

"pet projects"...

I just finished my Addresses module. Smiling I hope it can be utilized. There needs to be a few hooks into the order and checkout screens for it to be used by Ubercart, but they should be minor.
uc_addresses

Posts: 475
Joined: 08/13/2007
Bug FinderEarly adopter... addicted to alphas.Getting busy with the Ubercode.Internationalizationizer

Hi there,

Nice battleplan, you begin to know me, I always have suggestions Smiling

  • Discount (coupon, order, product) functionnalities
    The discount is a very important functionnality in ecommerce, this is the principal way to make efficient marketing to make your store living. Today, ubercart has a lack of these functionnalities. There were some modules to bring discount with coupons, order... but there were bugged and are not maintained anymore, it could be great to add these feature in ubercart core
  • Addresses in profile
    The idea above is very good, it would be excellent to consider the address like profile field, I don't know how. But it could bring more functionnalities to user to manage addressbook, and, in addition, it could make compatible a lot of modules that works on profile. I especially think about the excellent site user list module, and could bring, later, better and easier integration with CRM software like CiviCRM...
  • VAT integration
    There are a lot of efforts and thread about that, but not ideal solutions today. I make some little module to make ubercart more 'european based store'. A lot of people (me included) can bring their opinion on that.
Posts: 3
Joined: 08/14/2007

I think it'd be really helpful for the product price to be optional and have any product that doesn't have a price show something like "Call for Price"... and have that term be configurable through the admin interface. And any product that doesn't have the price set would of course not have an add to cart link shown anywhere in any of the catalog/product pages.

There are just so many times when retailers don't want to or can't show the specific price that they can sell an item at, either do to fluctuating market prices or competitive pricing agreements with manufacturers/vendors. I have run into this issue with both ubercart sites I've put up.

I was kind of able to get around it by doing a massive views setup and doing custom templates to not show the add to cart link, but it really makes it insane to maintain that site now. I'd much rather be able to use the builtin catalog functionality of ubercart and just have it -work-. It seems that it would be a fairly simple feature to implement into the core and it would be really useful to a lot of people.

BTW, alpha 8 is running great for me, really like all of the changes you guys have made in the last few months. Thanks for all your hard work!

Posts: 805
Joined: 11/05/2007
Bug FinderFAQ ModeratorGetting busy with the Ubercode.

I think Inventory in some form is essential.

--

<tr>.

Posts: 475
Joined: 08/13/2007
Bug FinderEarly adopter... addicted to alphas.Getting busy with the Ubercode.Internationalizationizer

Inventory already exists in a pretty elabored form, it's essential for a store, but I think this is not the bigest lack in drupal features.

Posts: 22
Joined: 12/08/2007

I know I'm a relative noob to uBercart but from my perspective I'd like to see

(1) more flexible shipping rates per product - either several fixed rates or perhaps country based?
(2) auto-adding VAT for UK customers (obviously, being English means I'm biased)
(3) a BUYITNOW option to pass the first item name as well as order number to paypal - purely selfish reasons
(4) discount-codes or promo-coupons

ehm.... thats it for now. Cheers.

Posts: 118
Joined: 08/22/2007
Spreading the word - Ubercart for president.

Suggestion for the coupon/discount module and Google Analytics.

The coupon should be passed into Google Analytics as a product with a negative price. This will allow a user to see which coupons are being used in GA and have true revenue total.

Posts: 4256
Joined: 08/07/2007
AdministratorHead Code Monkey - I eat bugs.

I'd be happy to accept a patch for that, but I guess it should really be more generic to handle any applicable line item...

Posts: 57
Joined: 08/18/2007

Thanks to all for their work on this project.

Here is my wishlist:

**Lyle's (planned) new discount system to replace the coupon module. Roll based discounts, on rolls that are assigned according to user points. It would be nice if user points are used up when a discount is applied.

**Better userpoints integration. A user can earn points according to how much they spend.

**It would be great to attach images to attributes. If a user selects a different color, for e.g., the image attached to that color is displayed.

**Display the price adjustment when an attribute option is selected that has a price adjustment.

**More flexible attribute option naming. It would be nice to specify option names when editing a product. For instance, when dealing with unique color choices, it would be nice to not have to set up a unique attribute for each product. One way to do this would be to add a field in the adjustments section that would let you add to the name of the option. E.g. Attribute=Color, Options=1,2,3,4,etc..., Then you could add to Option 1, say, 'Fluffy Muffin' (the unique color choice Smiling ). The select box would show just 'Fluffy Muffin.'

Cheers.

Posts: 24
Joined: 08/29/2007

Highly agree on inventory management in core, and a better DISCOUNTS system (use of coupons not just for amount deduction, the ability to "buy x get x free", display of original price and sale price in catalog, etc.).

very much looking forward to beta 1 Laughing out loud

Posts: 1998
Joined: 08/07/2007
AdministratoreLiTe!

Tim, products don't have to use every option that an attribute has. There's a link to the attribute administration section from the options tab that will let you add the "Fluffy Muffin" option quickly. Then you can add it to the product you were just on, and none of your other products with the color attribute will list "Fluffy Muffin". Unless you go change them, of course.

cYu made a contribution that dynamically updates the price when you select an option, too.

Posts: 57
Joined: 08/18/2007

Lyle, that's a good point regarding attribute choices. Our store sells cosmetics, and almost every color choice is unique. There are hundreds of them. What I will do is categorize color attributes by type. Instead of having a single attribute called 'color', I will set up a number of more specific attributes, for e.g., I could set up an attribute called 'Lip Stick Color.' Cheers.

Posts: 475
Joined: 08/13/2007
Bug FinderEarly adopter... addicted to alphas.Getting busy with the Ubercode.Internationalizationizer

Hi,

Lyle's (planned) new discount system to replace the coupon module. Roll based discounts, on rolls that are assigned according to user points. It would be nice if user points are used up when a discount is applied.

I want to say that I already work on a coupon module that allow to apply coupon for specific user, specific role, and recently specific products with attributes. And I continue to maintain it.

We should put out efforts on Discount module, that add powerfull discount management that are not based on coupons.

Better userpoints integration. A user can earn points according to how much they spend.

For user points, I contact the maintainer to speak about his module especially how the points are used in checkout. I think it could be better to use points as a discount system instead of a payment gateway. It would allow to pay just a part of the order with points and finish to pay the order with other payment gateway. I think I will spend some times soon on that in agreement with the module maintainer. In addition, I will try to provide maximum options for the store administrator to manage how points are distributed.

It would be great to attach images to attributes. If a user selects a different color, for e.g., the image attached to that color is displayed.
Display the price adjustment when an attribute option is selected that has a price adjustment.

Yeah, I'm agree. I saw that somebody works on an ajax attribute calculation. It could be great to contact him and see to extand his module functionnalities to provide attributes image, and dynamically change them on attribute selection as the price.

Display the price adjustment when an attribute option is selected that has a price adjustment.

For your last need I think we could make a module that simulate option and attribute creation on product page instead of administration panel, don't know if ubercart provide enough hook to do that.