» Broken

In ZenCart versions immediately prior to 1.3.6 using many of the public side manufacturers functions may produce this error:

The error is caused by a missing database column that was added in the official 1.3.6 release. If upgrade is not immediately possible the following SQL snippet will correct the problem in most cases:

If you are using other product types, some additional UPDATE statements will be required for your new product types.

I found this solution after some searching on the ZenCart forums.

Popularity: 24%

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I hate popups and links that open in a new window. I can control where I want windows to open. If I want a new window or tab, I’ll use the appropriate key combinations when clicking the link.

If a window opens in a popup without a menu bar or url bar, hit Apple + T to force a new tab in the popup window. Then you can click and hold on the first tab and drag it to the tab bar of a full window to get the page to open in a window with a menu and url bar.

Popularity: 27%

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I’ve had some problems lately with the BBEdit documents drawer disappearing. Clicking on the drawer open/close button, showed the button change as if it was actually opening and closing the drawer but no drawer action. The drawer just disappered.

Closing BBEdit and reopening would solve the problem, but with dozens of files open on multiple servers thats a time consuming fix. I found that when maximizing the affected BBEdit window, the drawer is redrawn correctly. So a better fix is to simply maximize and then minimize the window.

Popularity: 10%

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Hey all you people out there insistent on making your links open in a new window…

STOP IT!

It’s my computer and my browser. If I want your link to open in a new window, I will use Shift-Click (for new window) or CMD/CTL-Click (for a new tab in non IE browsers).

Several _major_ product sites that I visit utilize a new window link in their header menu to access their forums. That is so web 0.5. Like I said, if I want a new window, I can do it myself.

Small informational popups (like shipping estimate or information) are nice in processes such as an ecommerce checkout so my main window stays in tune with the order process. These should always be user initiated and not automatic.

Popularity: 12%

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In a conversation recently with a new ecommerce site client we were discussing how they planned to charge for shipping their goods. The client postulated charging customers shipping based on order total. This brought to mind a recent shopping experience at Crate and Barrel.

Crate and Barrel has a remarkably clean and easy to use site. Anyone wanting to know how to do an ecommerce site correctly, could learn a lot from their site. My only problem is their method of charging for shipping could be eating into their cart totals.

On my order, I had selected some kitchen toys and a few additional dishes I needed. With one set of refrigerator containers I thought it might be nice to have two sets for those weeks when running the dishwasher might be a stretch. Great! Order total: $54.90. Login to my account, select basic shipping option. Whoa! Shipping is $11.50 on a $50 order! That seemed a little expensive for the handful of small items I was purchasing. Shipping info, click. Ahhh, shipping cost is based on order total value. Less than $51, shipping is $8.50, over it jumps up to $11.50 and continues on up from there.

I hit the handy back button, remove one set of refrigerator dishes from my cart and check again. Shipping is now the quoted $8.50 for an order less than $51. Finalize the order and we are done.

Do you see what just happened? They lost an extra sale based on their shipping quotation and I saved $12. What’s more, a thoroughly great shopping experience was slightly tarnished by the perceived overcharging on the shipping. Twenty-three percent of order total for shipping is a little much.

I know some vendors use inflated shipping and handling to fees to help kick in a little extra for overhead, but I wouldn’t expect that from a tier one site like this. I really doubt this is there intention either. This is just how some decided they would set shipping charges. But, the perception is still there, and online, perception is all you have.

Popularity: 12%

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The Wordpress admin main page contains several blocks of content retrieved via RSS from Technorati and the Wordpress site itself. The content itself is a useful addition to the admin panel as it is used to post news, security alerts and development information. The problem I find is my main admin page takes up to a minute to load while these links are fetched. Reload the page and we wait again while same data is re-fetched.

While the feature is worthwhile, the implementation is broken. Not only do I (and every other WP user) have to wait eons for the page to load, the servers the data is being fetched from are needlessly overtaxed by all of this redundant fetching. A waste of resources on both sides. The data could be fetched once and cached for hours, saving local wait time and load on the Wordpress servers.

On one recent software project I was involved with, the vendor was using their blog to post a changelog, news and security alerts for their software. I wrote a simple RSS fetcher that saved the retrieved information to the database to be reused for up to a day before being refreshed.

Maybe the next time I have a weekend afternoon to kill, I’ll work out something similar for Wordpress.

Popularity: 11%

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