E-Commerce Engine and ColdFusion = CFWebstore

Once in a while you may come across an opportunity to help create and implement an E-Commerce solution using the ColdFusion platform.  When this arises, I highly recommend using CFWebstore.  CFWebstore is not free, but is not really expensive either.  For (I think) $400.00 you can get a license of CFWebstore, which will work on a Windows server, Linux Server, and can use MySQL or MSSQL.

The install is pretty easy and straight forward.  Just download the files put them on your web server, setup a database, run the database scripts, change some settings in the config file and you are off and running.  If you work like most developers then you already should have an approved mock up of what the e-commerce site will look like.   For me the easiest way to implement a design with CFWebstore is to first build-out your approved mock up into valid XHTML.  Now you just have to cut and paste your build-out code into your default_layout file within CFWebstore.  Most code is well commented within files, and gives you a good idea what that code is doing.

Within CFWebstore there are many built in functionalities.  Some of these include  payment processing integrations (including Paypal, Authorize.NET, and a few others), UPS integration, downloadable products, articles, discounts, and promotions.  I know I am missing a bunch of other great reasons to use CFWebstore but I am just giving a taste.

There are many more positive notes in using CFWebstore than negative.  Other than the already given functionalities, the support is superb.  Mary Jo (creator of CFWebstore) is always updating CFWebstore’s yahoo group, adding comments, advise and instruction.  Not only is she daily making posts in the group, but Mary Jo also has live chat which is available on her website for the most part of the weekdays.  Another positive of CFWebstore is that it is often updated, and if you are using the same version number as the revision has, you can download and upgrade for free.

As for the negatives, here they are.  CFWebstore is still using table based layouts in a bunch of places, which can be annoying.  Also there are a bunch of tables and <td>’s that should use css, but have some unneeded inlined styles which are a pain to find and update.  Also CFWebstore’s main style sheet uses classes and id’s that are way too generic, such as .header, which becomes a problem when you build out your mock up and now have to change your styles so the two don’t mix .(I’ve always been in the frame of mind that the application should use some kind of naming convention for style naming.)

You can see that I don’t find the functionality of CFWebstore to be bad but the HTML code and CSS that the store runs with.  If you have a client that is not that picky about how every single thing looks like then maybe this won’t be an issue for you.  Overall I will give it 4 out of 5 stars for a ColdFusion E-Commerce engine.