Absolute Newbie

[PaulE]

Hi - I am new to OSCommerce and there are a few questions I would like to ask:

 

Can I set up OSC on my laptop and 'play' with it offline, set up store etc to see if it is for me ?

It would appear that you need to be realtively 'techie' to even attempt working with OSC ... would that be a correct assesment ?

 

I do not have any web hosting facilities yet - just wanted to 'try out' OSC first before going down this route

 

thanks for any advice - Paul

[Guest]

Lots to learn, can drive you nuts, I did it so almost anyone can. Plenty of info here and check the links top right of your screen for lots of answers. Dont know if you can play with it on a laptop.

 

Rolf

No learning curve here, its a cliff.

[mondi]

Hey Paul,

 

Yes you can set it up on a laptop... you need a web server on your laptop, PHP, and MySQL. Unless you want portable... it's almost easier to setup a 'nix' box in the house somewhere and have it be the store and access it through a home network.

 

I assume you are using windows on your laptop, which means you will need to install all of this stuff becuase none of it is standard for a windows instalation.

 

If I sound like I am speaking a different language and you have no idea how to install a web server (you probably want to use apache), PHP, or Mysql... this may even start out as a daunting task.

 

Oscommerece is in my opinion one of the very best e-commerece solutions out there, but it is kinda like driving an old car. Not that it's old, but it's not like buying a brand new car and away you go. There is some tuning, some tweaking, and sprucing up to be done. There are people you can pay to do it for you, but it's kinda like finding the 'right' mechanic for that old car... And by the time you have spent all the money having someone else do it for you, you could have bought a new car and away you go.

 

Mind you... that new car is going to have what it has and you are not going to chop the top off and make a convertable out of it.

 

This analogy could quickly get out of hand, so I will stop there. In short, if you want to learn, you like this kind of stuff, have some time and patience, and can access information resources (like this forum) anyone can put together a nice store.

 

If you want a store up and running in the next 30 days that looks like bigboy dot com, probably not going to happen.

 

As a side note. There are a whole bunch of hosting companys out there that offer OSC as part of there package. So you could bypass the first step and get to working with the store directly... though I recomend starting from scratch. In my opinion it provides a comprehensive understand of the basics that helps you to answer your own questions, or at least know 'what' to ask when you are looking for help.

 

I hope I helped in answering your question ;)

 

mindo

[PaulE]

phew !! Rolf, mindo - thanks for the responses

 

yes it is kinda daunting - but I will see if I can start off somewhere soon ...... may well be asking some dumb questions going forward :-)

 

all the best and thanks again - Paul