Hi Folks
Just thought I'd run this by the Irish Drupal Community.
I'm starting two new projects very shortly which need ecommerce functionality.
I've used Ecommerce module before at www.runireland.com.
I've never used Ubercart.
Ecommerce module seems stalled, but not dead.
Ubercart seems to be ploughing on ahead.
Rumours are that the code for Ecommerce module is better and more mature,
but I wouldn't know enough to comment.
Ecommerce has a mature Worldpay module [thanks to Dublin Drupaller],
Ubercart has a contributed and not well tested Worldplay module.
Neither has a Realex solution.
I'm trying to decide whether to jump ship to Ubercart, and learn how that works.
Or whether I stick with Ecommerce module, as I know it better.
Any thoughts, experience with either module from Irish Drupallers?
i'm just implementing my first ubercart site. We're using paypal regular payments, which works fine. The areas where Ubercart works, it looks very polishedl. But you should be aware of some limitations:
-VAT: its tax handling (in uber-core) is not consistent with how we do VAT in Ireland when selling to consumers: prices are shown ex-VAT and VAT only added at checkout. There is a contributed module that attempts to sort this display issue out, but having tried it, I can tell you it is not usable out of the box, although the issues aren't too hard to deal with. In the end, I've decided not to use the tax module at all, and instead to use VAT-inclusive pricing and create a separate class of product for each VAT rate, which will allow me to segregate my reports by VAT rate.
-Discounting: There's no native discounting, only an unmaintained buggy uc_discount module. I've patched this up for my own purposes but haven't extensively tested my fixes. I'm planning on writing a new discount module for ubercart, but am only in the discussion stages now with other programmers. I have no delivery date set for this so don't hold your breath!
-Reporting: There are reports built in, but they seem limited. For example I would like to get a report broken down by product class (because of the way I've done VAT above), but don't see a way to do that through the UI, so I'm going to write some code for it.
All that said, overall I'm happy with it so far. My business partner has used e-commerce and he says Ubercart is better.
I'm in a similar boat. I'll need to implement ecommerce functionality on our site, however, unfortunately it seems I'm going to have to write a custom module (I'll neither be selling shipable products, nodes or roles) so a good API will be essential.
I've also heard that ecommerce is more mature, but the API documentation (http://www.drupalecommerce.org/api) seems sparse at best (most of what's there seems to regurgitate other drupal core documentation rather than explain how the module itself works and I've not had the time to explore the code in any great detail). Does anyone know of any good docs online (or hard copy) that might suit my needs?
Ubercart documentation seems much better, so I had been leaning towards using that.
Thanks for the heads up re Worldpay, I hadn't come across them before. How do their charges compare with Realex? Have they any other limitations I should be aware of in relation to taking payments in Ireland?
I'd might be interested in working with someone to develop a Realex module (I'm fairly new to the world of online payments so could use some guidance).
I'm using ecommerce on an existing site, but I'm currently in the process of migrating to ubercart. My main reasons for switching are that ecommerce development seems to have stagnated. There are some features in ec4 that I really want, but it's still not production ready. The documentation is woeful and, based on my experience, the ecommerce community just aren't that helpful.
I've been really pleased with ubercart however. The docs are excellent. The project is being actively worked on. A D6 version is in the works and it does everything that I need - including product attributes which I never managed to get working in ecommerce. The administration user interface is also much better than ecommerce. It didn't take me long to get a D5 ubercart installation working the way I wanted, though because this is for a personal site with no deadline, I think I'm going to hold out for the D6 version. I've even helped it on its way by converting a couple of the modules.
So I'd vote for ubercart. I certainly would go with ubercart or ecommerce before rolling your own solution. If you really need a Realex solution, then how about contributing a Realex payment module to ubercart - doing that alone should be faster than implementing your own full solution.
Apologies for the confusion, I wasn't actually thinking of creating a totally new payment module (that would be sheer madness!), but rather suggested developing a Realex module for Ubercart or eCommerce.
In addition, for my own needs (having a payment mechanism that links to the domain access module permissions - http://drupal.org/project/domain), I was also going to write a module to extend either ubercart of ecommerce - hence the desire to have good API docs for either ecommerce module.
Judging from peoples reaction, I think I'll go with ubercart.
As much as to see what the grass is like on the other side,
I've decided to build out the next site in Ubercart.
For this I'll need a Realex module.
I'm currently wating for our referral account to be set up. [ Takes a few days apparently].
This gets me access to the documentation.
If anybody want to help, let me know.
I'll post it as a contribution on the Ubercart site [as seems to be the way with these things] when it is done,
or at least is in some state for testing.
Just my two cents on this topic: Both Ubercart and Drupal eCommerce have their own merits and faults, but, neither are a "catch-all" solution for eCommerce functionality. The specific project and the Drupal developer experience play a role in determining which one to use.
I have experience of using both and I would summarise the following factors for when choosing one over the other for a particular application (using Drupal 5.x):
(a) If the project/client wants a very quick and simple out-of-the-box shop for a Drupal site and the Drupal developer isn't experienced (i.e. there aren't many changes required to the defaults)..I would tend to sway towards Ubercart.
(b) If the project requires more sophisticated ecommerce functionality or more specific features/theming requirements and the Drupal developer knows his or her stuff, I would tend to sway towards Drupal eCommerce API.
Worth adding that because Drupal eCommerce has been around a lot longer and the Ubercart code base & concepts was so similar, I found it very easy to jump into Ubercart code.
That said...the new Drupal eCommerce API is a complete departure from being "product led" to being "Drupal led" making it even more "Drupal native" than previous versions. In simplicity, what that means is instead of downloading a huge suite of ecommerce modules..you're just downloading a few key modules that work with other Drupal modules to provide ecommerce functionality. Simple but very powerful and I think it will still require a higher level of Drupal savvy than Ubercart.
It's almost ready for a beta launch, at the time of writing this, so there's not much in terms of documentation or reference material other than the API which is available on http://www.drupalecommerce.org or downloading the DEV version of EC4 to have a look.
The way the new Drupal eCommerce API is structured is very clever and hopefully, sooner rather than later, it means there will no longer be an excuse for having seperate payment gateways...e.g. the worldpay payment gateway module for Drupal eCommerce should be able to work with Ubercart without having to write a new module.
I'm currently porting a payment gateway from Drupal eCommerce to Ubercart at the moment and it's a little frustrating looking at the code....you realise you're just renaming a few function names/variables to do the exact same thing...submit the exact same data...and process the exact same information returned by the payment gateway.
Comments
Which to choose?
Hi Folks
Just thought I'd run this by the Irish Drupal Community.
I'm starting two new projects very shortly which need ecommerce functionality.
I've used Ecommerce module before at www.runireland.com.
I've never used Ubercart.
Ecommerce module seems stalled, but not dead.
Ubercart seems to be ploughing on ahead.
Rumours are that the code for Ecommerce module is better and more mature,
but I wouldn't know enough to comment.
Ecommerce has a mature Worldpay module [thanks to Dublin Drupaller],
Ubercart has a contributed and not well tested Worldplay module.
Neither has a Realex solution.
I'm trying to decide whether to jump ship to Ubercart, and learn how that works.
Or whether I stick with Ecommerce module, as I know it better.
Any thoughts, experience with either module from Irish Drupallers?
Regards
Alan
i'm just implementing my
i'm just implementing my first ubercart site. We're using paypal regular payments, which works fine. The areas where Ubercart works, it looks very polishedl. But you should be aware of some limitations:
-VAT: its tax handling (in uber-core) is not consistent with how we do VAT in Ireland when selling to consumers: prices are shown ex-VAT and VAT only added at checkout. There is a contributed module that attempts to sort this display issue out, but having tried it, I can tell you it is not usable out of the box, although the issues aren't too hard to deal with. In the end, I've decided not to use the tax module at all, and instead to use VAT-inclusive pricing and create a separate class of product for each VAT rate, which will allow me to segregate my reports by VAT rate.
-Discounting: There's no native discounting, only an unmaintained buggy uc_discount module. I've patched this up for my own purposes but haven't extensively tested my fixes. I'm planning on writing a new discount module for ubercart, but am only in the discussion stages now with other programmers. I have no delivery date set for this so don't hold your breath!
-Reporting: There are reports built in, but they seem limited. For example I would like to get a report broken down by product class (because of the way I've done VAT above), but don't see a way to do that through the UI, so I'm going to write some code for it.
All that said, overall I'm happy with it so far. My business partner has used e-commerce and he says Ubercart is better.
Aslo in tha same boat
I'm in a similar boat. I'll need to implement ecommerce functionality on our site, however, unfortunately it seems I'm going to have to write a custom module (I'll neither be selling shipable products, nodes or roles) so a good API will be essential.
I've also heard that ecommerce is more mature, but the API documentation (http://www.drupalecommerce.org/api) seems sparse at best (most of what's there seems to regurgitate other drupal core documentation rather than explain how the module itself works and I've not had the time to explore the code in any great detail). Does anyone know of any good docs online (or hard copy) that might suit my needs?
Ubercart documentation seems much better, so I had been leaning towards using that.
Thanks for the heads up re Worldpay, I hadn't come across them before. How do their charges compare with Realex? Have they any other limitations I should be aware of in relation to taking payments in Ireland?
I'd might be interested in working with someone to develop a Realex module (I'm fairly new to the world of online payments so could use some guidance).
Ubercart +1
I'm using ecommerce on an existing site, but I'm currently in the process of migrating to ubercart. My main reasons for switching are that ecommerce development seems to have stagnated. There are some features in ec4 that I really want, but it's still not production ready. The documentation is woeful and, based on my experience, the ecommerce community just aren't that helpful.
I've been really pleased with ubercart however. The docs are excellent. The project is being actively worked on. A D6 version is in the works and it does everything that I need - including product attributes which I never managed to get working in ecommerce. The administration user interface is also much better than ecommerce. It didn't take me long to get a D5 ubercart installation working the way I wanted, though because this is for a personal site with no deadline, I think I'm going to hold out for the D6 version. I've even helped it on its way by converting a couple of the modules.
So I'd vote for ubercart. I certainly would go with ubercart or ecommerce before rolling your own solution. If you really need a Realex solution, then how about contributing a Realex payment module to ubercart - doing that alone should be faster than implementing your own full solution.
Cheers,
Stella
Hi Stella, Apologies for the
Hi Stella,
Apologies for the confusion, I wasn't actually thinking of creating a totally new payment module (that would be sheer madness!), but rather suggested developing a Realex module for Ubercart or eCommerce.
In addition, for my own needs (having a payment mechanism that links to the domain access module permissions - http://drupal.org/project/domain), I was also going to write a module to extend either ubercart of ecommerce - hence the desire to have good API docs for either ecommerce module.
Judging from peoples reaction, I think I'll go with ubercart.
polls are fun
i have no right to an opinion.. but...
based on what everyone else said... sounds like ubercart is the way to go.
i just wanted to participate in the poll... for fun!
more polls!
Realex Module for Ubercart
As much as to see what the grass is like on the other side,
I've decided to build out the next site in Ubercart.
For this I'll need a Realex module.
I'm currently wating for our referral account to be set up. [ Takes a few days apparently].
This gets me access to the documentation.
If anybody want to help, let me know.
I'll post it as a contribution on the Ubercart site [as seems to be the way with these things] when it is done,
or at least is in some state for testing.
Thanks for the help,
Regards
Alan
Realauth Redirect Module available
Hi all,
I have posted the first version of the Realauth Redirect Module to
http://www.ubercart.org/contrib/6147
Use at your own risk.
As stated on that page, there is a lot of work that could be done with it,
[Especially some work with coder module - One step at a time for me Stella, I'll get there eventually!]
But it is working, so release early and often eh?
Regards
Alan
good stuff Alan
good stuff Alan. great to see you contributing code now :)
The code is shocking, but
The code is shocking, but functional.
I've a long way to go before I submit patches for core!
...
Hi Alan,
Just my two cents on this topic: Both Ubercart and Drupal eCommerce have their own merits and faults, but, neither are a "catch-all" solution for eCommerce functionality. The specific project and the Drupal developer experience play a role in determining which one to use.
I have experience of using both and I would summarise the following factors for when choosing one over the other for a particular application (using Drupal 5.x):
(a) If the project/client wants a very quick and simple out-of-the-box shop for a Drupal site and the Drupal developer isn't experienced (i.e. there aren't many changes required to the defaults)..I would tend to sway towards Ubercart.
(b) If the project requires more sophisticated ecommerce functionality or more specific features/theming requirements and the Drupal developer knows his or her stuff, I would tend to sway towards Drupal eCommerce API.
Worth adding that because Drupal eCommerce has been around a lot longer and the Ubercart code base & concepts was so similar, I found it very easy to jump into Ubercart code.
That said...the new Drupal eCommerce API is a complete departure from being "product led" to being "Drupal led" making it even more "Drupal native" than previous versions. In simplicity, what that means is instead of downloading a huge suite of ecommerce modules..you're just downloading a few key modules that work with other Drupal modules to provide ecommerce functionality. Simple but very powerful and I think it will still require a higher level of Drupal savvy than Ubercart.
It's almost ready for a beta launch, at the time of writing this, so there's not much in terms of documentation or reference material other than the API which is available on http://www.drupalecommerce.org or downloading the DEV version of EC4 to have a look.
The way the new Drupal eCommerce API is structured is very clever and hopefully, sooner rather than later, it means there will no longer be an excuse for having seperate payment gateways...e.g. the worldpay payment gateway module for Drupal eCommerce should be able to work with Ubercart without having to write a new module.
I'm currently porting a payment gateway from Drupal eCommerce to Ubercart at the moment and it's a little frustrating looking at the code....you realise you're just renaming a few function names/variables to do the exact same thing...submit the exact same data...and process the exact same information returned by the payment gateway.
Realex Module
Hey Alan,
As im based in Ireland I also will need to intergrate Realex into Ubercart. I am going to use your module. Is is functional? Any issues?
Aidan