Post by labeshops » Thu Aug 04, 2011 4:53 am

Hi guys.

I'm new to opencart and am really thinking about switching all my stores to it especially if I can figure out the multi-store thing and it works like I think it does. Can someone give me dummy 101 instructions on how to do this? I've done a lot of browsing on here and the web and cannot find anything specific to do this.

I have multiple domains (some 53 registered though 10 active stores using other software right now each with their own url and cart and database though all hosted on 1 account with unlimited domains/database ability).

What I want to do is set up opencart on my main business domain (which I've already done and am playing with at http://www.labeshops.com/shop - it's a fresh v1.5.1 install). I want to put all products I carry on all my stores in this one database (over 20,000 products eventually) and have discreet stores with their own domains. (one question too - will opencart be able to handle that many products and potentially more? Or should I break down stores by type (apparel or home decor for example) with more than one setup?

I understand I can specify which store each category and product displays on and give each a unique layout - exactly what I want! And that all customers will be globally registered though which is great - they would have individual shopping carts on each store, right?

What I don't understand is how I set it up. Do I need to install multiple copies of opencart on each of my domains (they are subdomains of my main hosting account) as I read in one post or was that for an older version? Or do I just need to somehow point each of my domain names to the shop? I found where I can set up a second store on opencart, but just don't understand how it then displays to the world.

So confused! All help greatly appreciated! :-)

Running Opencart v3.0.3.2 with multi-stores and the default template from https://www.labeshops.com which has links to all my stores.


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Post by SteveSherry » Thu Aug 04, 2011 5:31 am

The short version is:
create 2 demo sub domains
subA.domain.com
subB.domain.com
and "point" both sub domains to the same folder on your web host.
i.e. public_html/shop
Install opencart to the first sub domain and then go through the admin and add an extra store.
So you'll have Shop1 subA.domain.com and Shop2 subB.domain.com both running the same code.

Hope that makes sense.

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Post by labeshops » Thu Aug 04, 2011 6:12 am

Yes, but I don't want to use subdomains as I have discreet domains and don't want all my domains to show as forwards under labeshops for SEO purposes as I have a number of very diverse niche-targeted stores.

So basically I'm looking to have opencart installed on labeshops.com/shop (as it is now)

but then http://www.allwicca.com would go to the store named allwicca in opencart,
fetish-fashions.com would display its correct store from opencart
etc.

So right now I have opencart set up with the default store for all products, allwicca as a secondary store pulling from its database and fetish-fashions as a third store pulling from its database. What I don't know how to do is make http://www.allwicca.com display that store, etc. I already have a allwicca subdomain on my hosting account (and an install of my current cart software as I was trying to figure out how to do this using it).

Do I need to copy files or something from opencart into it? What settings do I need to change in opencart to make it work?

Running Opencart v3.0.3.2 with multi-stores and the default template from https://www.labeshops.com which has links to all my stores.


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Post by SteveSherry » Thu Aug 04, 2011 6:20 am

You don't need to make any additional copies of opencart, just 1 copy works.

even if you have domainA.com & domainB.com
the principle is the same, "point" both domains to the same folder within your hosting. Then opencart does the rest.

When you set up a category or product you can then enable that product for a specific store.

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Post by uksitebuilder » Thu Aug 04, 2011 6:58 am

Only limitations currently with multistores is they share the same shipping and payment methods

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Post by labeshops » Thu Aug 04, 2011 7:52 am

Okay, so I'm getting closer! lol

now http://allwicca.com goes correctly to the opencart store BUT http://www.allwicca.com does not :(

Ideas?

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Post by SteveSherry » Thu Aug 04, 2011 8:17 am

both work for me......

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Post by labeshops » Thu Aug 04, 2011 11:13 am

http://allwicca.com goes correctly to the all wicca store BUT http://www.allwicca.com is going to the labeshops.com/shop store instead of the allwicca one.

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Post by labeshops » Thu Aug 04, 2011 11:15 am

uksitebuilder wrote:Only limitations currently with multistores is they share the same shipping and payment methods
Same shipping methods is not an issue as I do all my shipping by weight anyway.

The payment methods might be, but I'm thinking I can modify the template for the stores I want to offer only certain ones - hard code them instead of letting it dynamically pull the choices. I'll see how it goes :)

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Post by SteveSherry » Fri Aug 05, 2011 6:02 am

labeshops wrote:http://allwicca.com goes correctly to the all wicca store BUT http://www.allwicca.com is going to the labeshops.com/shop store instead of the allwicca one.
Both are the same so far as I can see.

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Post by labeshops » Sat Aug 06, 2011 5:50 am

Weird. Now it's working.

*sigh*

Hate weird things.

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Post by Kazoos » Thu Oct 06, 2011 12:57 am

Hey all,

Sorry to jump on this conversation but I have been playing around with this today. And all of your help has been great. But how would you go about this when using SSL on your default site.

Because the default site example.com has ssl, when example2.com tries to access it over a http 80 port it recieved either a no index file error, so when you force https on example2.com it recieved an error saying the SSL cert is for a different domain which is example.com which is correct because it is lieing to the SSL cert all along.

How can we get round this? Both websites are on a Virtualmin shared environment, all sharing the same global IP address.

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Post by labeshops » Thu Oct 06, 2011 5:15 am

Unfortunately I don't know a lot about SSL but I have one ssl certificate on my labeshops.com domain that is used for all stores using the multistore SSL mod in the extensions section. You've lost me on the 80 port thing - don't know what that is. I have the ssl directory for each store set to https://www.labeshops.com/ and ssl enabled on them.

I'm using Labeshops.com as a common checkout for all my stores as it is the domain for my company itself, so in my case this works. If you wanted totally unique, unconnected domains using multistores though, you'd probably need a separate SSL certificate for each.

It's working for me other than a few weird layout issues and link problems I'm still working on.

Running Opencart v3.0.3.2 with multi-stores and the default template from https://www.labeshops.com which has links to all my stores.


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Post by labeshops » Sun Dec 11, 2011 3:35 am

I would love each store to have it's own checkout layout and logo, but have not been able to figure out yet how to keep the layout design consistent when I only have the one SSL certificate on my main domain so I use it for all the secure server settings. You cannot specify different payment or shipping methods for each store right now, but certainly each can have it's own layout and design.

I believe if you had an SSL or each domain, you could specify them per store and the checkout would be cohesive. I really still don't understand SSL very well and might change this in the future, but it works for me as my email, payment receipts and everything is branded to LABEShops so it helps re-enforce it as my company name. I am hoping future releases of opencart will add better support for multistore design though as there are a bunch of little things I've worked around by using the common checkout.

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Post by uksitebuilder » Sun Dec 11, 2011 4:19 am

Certainly if you need to use SSL on your multistores, then you should have individual SSL certs and IP Addresses (contact your host).

Not everyone needs to use SSL, especially if you are using 3rd party payment providers such as PayPal Standard.

However, for customer piece of mind it is advisable to use SSL.

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Post by uksitebuilder » Sun Dec 11, 2011 6:55 pm

multi SSL certs should work fine - you will need multi ip addresses too because each SSL cert requires it's own IP address, which hopefully your host will be able to provide (not all hosts allow extra ip addresses)

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Post by labeshops » Mon Dec 12, 2011 1:40 am

I have been thinking about upgrading to this certificate - http://www.positivessl.com/ssl-certific ... dcard.html but not sure if it would work with opencart and if separate ip addresses would be required as well?

I always used Mals-e.com to collect my card info before opencart so never messed with SSL before. Since opencart doesn't have an option for Mals, I switched (which actually speeds up my order processing a lot too since I don't have to manually run each card in paypal website payments pro).

When I switched to opencart, I switched my hosting to include a static IP address and the positive SSL just for labeshops.com.

I agree blackhalo, setup was amazingly fast in opencart - I had my first few store designs done within a day - still adding a ton of products and opening my other stores, but as I had been looking for this kind of multistore setup for years, have been uber impressed with opencart.

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Post by uksitebuilder » Mon Dec 12, 2011 1:50 am

Hi Lori,

That may work out fine for you

You would still use labeshops.com but would be able to setup subdomans for it

store1.labeshops.com
store2.labeshops.com

etc

At least then you will be able to keep the them running through each of your sites as you will be able to specify separate ssl domains for each multi-store

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Post by labeshops » Mon Dec 12, 2011 2:48 am

So you mean the ssl part would be like allwicca.labeshops.com while the main store would still be www.allwicca.com ??? And opencart would maintain the template style for allwicca all the way thru checkout???

Hadn't thought of it that way. That might work out very well as it still supports my branding for labeshops.com but would give each store its own checkout identity. hmmmmmm

Running Opencart v3.0.3.2 with multi-stores and the default template from https://www.labeshops.com which has links to all my stores.


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Post by uksitebuilder » Mon Dec 12, 2011 3:27 am

Exactly, yes

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