is this working ok

[mlmods]

my new sitewww.mlmod.com

[joannemojo]

You haven't completed your Shipping & Returns, Privacy Notice, Conditions of Use. You need to fill that it before you go live.

[mlmods]

ok thank you

[mlmods]

should i submit my site again

[joannemojo]

No, I was just letting you know. I wouldn't buy from a site without any of those filled in.......especially shipping/returns information and payment. Before you start selling stuff it needs to be sorted.

 

I tried to go to your site again so I could give you a review but I get the following error message now:

 

Warning: mysql_connect(): Lost connection to MySQL server during query in /home/www/mlmod.com/catalog/includes/functions/database.php on line 19

Unable to connect to database server!

[mlmods]

does it work

ok now

[Guest]

I went to your site tonight. I was going to start saying a bunch of nice things and then it happened...

 

It don't matter how nice you site looks when your client's get this:

 

"This domain still has no index.html page uploaded!

This page is hosted for FREE by: AWARDSPACE.COM"

 

My status bar shows your links as: "http://preview2.awardspace.com/mlmod.com/catalog/index.php?cPath=30" telling me that your dot com is merely a htaccess rewrite.

 

IMHO First suggestion: Get a real host. (By the way, who OWNS your domain name. I don't think you can take that free one with you to another host.) You usually get that for which you pay.

 

No SSL on Log-in or Sign-up. Necessary if you conduct financial business.

 

Oh yea when I first loaded your site, my Firefox2.0 gave me an SSL warning regarding Paypal.com (paypal.com vs. api.paypal.com [i think the certs should list such subdomains to avoid this unnecessary b.s.]).

 

Your site looked nice, but getting the AWARDSPACE.COM page stopped me cold. (just click on "Top")

[joannemojo]

One thing that I really don't like is the whole 'donate' thing. Why would anyone want to donate to a site that is aimed at making a profit? Help your site grow? Thats what happens when you get a customer base and some sales. Sell stuff and then expand and buy more stock etc. I can understand it when a non-profite fansite asks for donations but not a store.

 

"Yeah I'll donate to the site. Give you money so you can buy more stock and then charge me for it!"

 

You have no SSL on the account pages etc. I wouldn't give my personal information to a site without an SSL.

 

I do agree with the awardspace.com bit. When a page loads I always look at the status bar and for me it's a mega turn off when I see that a store has free hosting. I like to see the domain and only the domain not another url which is the free host etc. Having your own proper hosting and domain adds to the authenticity of a site (in the eyes of the customer).

[mlmods]

ok thank you i will remove the donate button. if i can afford hosting i will get it. i own the domain mlmod.com . http://preview2.awardspace.com/mlmod.com/catalog/index.php it should come up masked as mlmod.com. oh well. iwill try to get hostig. your dot com is merely a htaccess rewrite. what does that mean

[redbone]

In addition to all the above mentioned issues... you need to optimize your images. It takes forever for your site to load up and that's on a DSL connection!

[Guest]

ok thank you i will remove the donate button. if i can afford hosting i will get it. i own the domain mlmod.com . http://preview2.awardspace.com/mlmod.com/catalog/index.php it should come up masked as mlmod.com. oh well. iwill try to get hostig. your dot com is merely a htaccess rewrite. what does that mean

"mlmod.com" appears in my address bar, but "preview2.awardspace.com/mlmod.com/..." comes up in my status bar.

 

Decent hosting only costs $30-$50/year, give or take. Sometimes you have to spend money to make money. (But if you don't have the money you can not spend it.)

 

"should come up masked as" is merely a htaccess rewrite. (The .htaccess file controls your site. Your host determines through their .htaccess and ***.ini files what you can and can't do. I am not sure how to fully explain this...too much to try and boil down to a couple sentences. Basically mlmod.com is presented as a sub-directory of preview2.awardspace.com. (All websites are sub-directories of something.)

 

Let us see if we can prevent that FREE HOSTING page from appearing.

 

Post part of your configure.php (leave out everything about database and passwords!!!!), okay? I want to look at the server and directory definitions.

[mlmods]

<?php

define('HTTP_SERVER', 'http://preview2.awardspace.com');

define('HTTPS_SERVER', 'http://preview2.awardspace.com');

define('ENABLE_SSL', false);

define('HTTP_COOKIE_DOMAIN', 'preview2.awardspace.com');

define('HTTPS_COOKIE_DOMAIN', 'preview2.awardspace.com');

define('HTTP_COOKIE_PATH', '/mlmod.com/catalog/');

define('HTTPS_COOKIE_PATH', '/mlmod.com/catalog/');

define('DIR_WS_HTTP_CATALOG', '/mlmod.com/catalog/');

define('DIR_WS_HTTPS_CATALOG', '/mlmod.com/catalog/');

define('DIR_WS_IMAGES', 'images/');

define('DIR_WS_ICONS', DIR_WS_IMAGES . 'icons/');

define('DIR_WS_INCLUDES', 'includes/');

define('DIR_WS_BOXES', DIR_WS_INCLUDES . 'boxes/');

define('DIR_WS_FUNCTIONS', DIR_WS_INCLUDES . 'functions/');

define('DIR_WS_CLASSES', DIR_WS_INCLUDES . 'classes/');

define('DIR_WS_MODULES', DIR_WS_INCLUDES . 'modules/');

define('DIR_WS_LANGUAGES', DIR_WS_INCLUDES . 'languages/');

 

define('DIR_WS_DOWNLOAD_PUBLIC', 'pub/');

define('DIR_FS_CATALOG', '/home/www/mlmod.com/catalog/');

define('DIR_FS_DOWNLOAD', DIR_FS_CATALOG . 'download/');

define('DIR_FS_DOWNLOAD_PUBLIC', DIR_FS_CATALOG . 'pub/');

[Guest]

WOW,

 

Now I fully understand why your site acts like it does.

 

And I suppose nothing at all works if you change:

define('HTTP_SERVER', 'http://preview2.awardspace.com');

to

define('HTTP_SERVER', 'http://mlmods.com/catalog'); and remove the "/mlmodes.com" part from the other definitions.

 

So, to make "top" keep people on your site: find in application_top.php

$breadcrumb->add(HEADER_TITLE_TOP, HTTP_SERVER);

change it to:

$breadcrumb->add(HEADER_TITLE_TOP, tep_href_link(FILENAME_DEFAULT));

 

I think that would be the simplest and easiest.

 

Good Luck,

[mlmods]

that worked great thanks you so much. i still dont get my emails from my site any ideas on this

[Guest]

Yea, No mail services for Free Hosting Accounts. You'll see it several places in the awardspace control panel. That is why I never even uploaded any scripts after I got an account with them. (You having email accounts and having email services are two different creatures.)

[mlmods]

it says 5 POP3/IMAP E-mails not sure what this means? just want to learn a little more. sorry about noob question.

[Guest]

it says 5 POP3/IMAP E-mails not sure what this means? just want to learn a little more. sorry about noob question.

A simplified answer goes like this:

 

POP3 and IMAP are services which YOU use to send and receive emails, typically through an email reader such as Outlook or Outlook Express.

 

SMTP and sendmail are e-mail services your scripts (ie: osCommerce) use to send email.

 

Yes, you have email, but not the email you want and need. :(

[mlmods]

ok and the only way to get the email i need is through paid hosting? there is no OS site that offers mail and ssl cert. or am i asking for to much for free?

[Guest]

ok and the only way to get the email i need is through paid hosting? there is no OS site that offers mail and ssl cert. or am i asking for to much for free?

I am not sure about whether any free hosting plans offer script email access. There probably are some free hosting plans that do. Most likely script email access requires paid hosting.

 

Free SSL??? (In this case also known as "shared") I am not getting down on you but, how did they verify your identity? Did someone come out and visit you? Call you? Fax over a Driver's License or other ID? IMNSHO, shared SSL certificates (free SSL) are virtually worthless in site identification. (They ARE wonderful for sites needing encrypted connections for user_accounts when it is NOT a commercial venture.) You want the SSL cert in your site's name, not in your web hosts. Cheapest are around $50.00 or so. Personally I get a little confused between the various Certificate Authorities (Verisgn, Commodo, ect), their service levels (TrustLogo vs. Smart Seal, ect) and the real differences between them.

 

One of my clients pays $150.00 annually for their SSL Cert (because of the services provided). I'm too cheap on My Joke Site, which sells used comic books on the side, to have SSL because there are too few sales (the actual financial transactions are handled through PayPal's SSL site though). I have other personal commercial ventures online where I am a internet failure because of poor site design, bad planning, going on a whim, and an unpopular product selection, those sites also lack SSL because they no longer seem worth it. I've kept the sites live because someday.... maybe (yea right).

 

Building a business online in many ways is no different than what is required for a brick and mortar entity. Where I live it costs the same to file with the Secretary of State whatever your form of business (class).

 

It is getting late and time for me to get some sleep.

 

Good Evening and keep a Positive Spirit

[blackriverbaskets]

There is free SSL Certificates available, the main problems are this, many browsers don't recognize them as valid, mainly because anyone can get them, and your host will need to offer SSL support.

 

The most well known Free SSL Providers:

 

http://cert.startcom.org/

http://www.cacert.org/

 

But like I said, many browsers don't recognize this(Low Browser Ubiquity) Lamens terms means it will most likely throw up a "Unknown Certification Authority" type message. People Paying $150.00 are insane. GoDaddy gives Low assurance SSL for only $19.99 and High assurance at $89.99(I've seen better prices on high assurance), granted they don't have the reputation of Verisign, I haven't seen that make a huge difference, people just like seeing the lock. I love my host's shared ssl, it makes things so much easier.

 

Quote from dcphosting: "IMNSHO, shared SSL certificates (free SSL) are virtually worthless in site identification. (They ARE wonderful for sites needing encrypted connections for user_accounts when it is NOT a commercial venture.) You want the SSL cert in your site's name, not in your web hosts. Cheapest are around $50.00 or so. Personally I get a little confused between the various Certificate Authorities (Verisgn, Commodo, ect), their service levels (TrustLogo vs. Smart Seal, ect) and the real differences between them."

 

Shared SSL are fine usually because they are wildcard ssl which means the host is vouching for you. If done correctly, most users never know that you're using a shared ssl, most people just look for the picture on the site or the little lock in the corner. As for the TrustLogo and Smart Seal, those are literally their brands. SSLs are like shoes, you can buy nike, rebok, adidas, lugz, etc.. they're all just shoes. They try to make things confusing with words like High Assurance and 128Bit vs. 256bit. Unless you're a huge company 128bit is more than adequate, and you always want a high assurance cert, which most are. Buying Verisign is like buying a $60,000 Toyota Corolla because it has a nice paint job. You get all the same stuff as the $18,000 version, it just looks a little nicer.

 

Low Assurance: Verifies that the site being connected to matches the domain registered on the certificate

High Assurance: Actually Verifies the persons identity and existence.

 

Kristofer

[mlmods]

thanks all of you. so if i get hosting and ssl through godaddy or whoever. my email on my site will work if configure it in admin store owner area? the ssl cert do i have to install this is it html ,php? or does your host just insert it to your site when you pay for it?

 

quote::::I am not getting down on you but, how did they verify your identity? Did someone come out and visit you? Call you? Fax over a Driver's License or other ID? IMNSHO, shared SSL certificates (free SSL) are virtually worthless in site identification.

 

 

not sure what you mean by this? verify your identity. i paid for it all with paypal and credit card.

[Guest]

When I've gotten an SSL Certificate, I have had to prove my identity by faxing in my credentials (subsequently I just got calls). Then the site gets a little Logo which viewers can click to have a pop-up say Verisign (or Commodo) has verified our identity.

 

I haven't gotten a chance to install a certificate yet, someone else has always gotten to it before me. But, I do believe they come in email form and that you copy / paste part of those emails to the server SSL install interface. If you purchase through your host, mostly likely they'll install it for you often free of charge.

 

quote:: "i paid for it all with paypal and credit card". I am not making any implications/suggestions/innuendos okay, but have you ever heard of a high-jacked paypal account or of a stolen credit card? (A person with evil intentions would not care that the certificate is going to get revoked in 20-30 days, the time it takes people to discover their accounts have been stolen. They just want it long enough to get what they can.)(I have an account with an osCommerce hosting company which had to block credit card processing for their free accounts because of illegal activities by a bunch of store owners awhile back.) (I regularly get email that lead to SSL secured phishing sites.)

 

I suppose the real point is that I believe SSL these days represents more than just an encrypted connection, it also does/can/should provide site verification. (Some credit card processors require that 'High Assurance" SSL and often independent site security verification. Second Tier credit card processors don't have the same requirements and charge more fees to cover their increased risks; these are the folks who'll accept the little guy like us.) I may be getting too "theoretical" here and I am biased toward High Assurance certificates.

 

I believe everyone will agree that SSL is pretty much mandatory. Any difference in opinion is in the value of the various certificates. I believe the type of SSL will determine how much confidence a site instills in its visitors.