OS Commerce -a cry for help

[khadiya]

Hi All!

Help!

Has anyone out there got any experience of working with/web mastering OS commerce based sites?

I do some part time work for a friend and fellow dancer who runs a fledgling e-business selling unique beaded jewellery, some for dancers. Due to some early problems setting up the site, she ended up using a customised version of an OS Commerce package to get started.

Trouble is, no one else who works for her (including her proper proper techie guy!) really understands the package! I usually work in pure HTML and that, on simpler sites.

One of our major problems is that the meta tags spontaneously disappear from the saved pages about every 2 months or so. No one has a clue why. Its really frustrating and starting to set the progress of the business back.

Unfortunately the business is still too small and has insufficient funds to either a) start again with a new set up or b) find a more helpful and knowledgeable techie.

Any and all ideas welcome. If anyone wants, I will post up the URL of the site.

Cheers!!


J xx

[Bellydancingcaroline]

Hi - I noticed there were no replies to this, and wondered if there are there any message boards that are more techie than this one that you can find? OS commerce 'r' us or something ???

[khadiya]

Thanks Caroline!

Yes, everyone who works with my friend on the site has been trawling through all the OS commerce help pages/forums etc for months but they are all completely impenetrable(!!), especially for my friend who is not very web savvy, though learning fast. It would really help us if we could find a friendly lay person who also uses the package to give us an overview of how it works for their business but we're struggling to find anyone out there to talk to.

[sabrinabellydancer]

i feel for you. OSC out of the box is sticky enough. i can't give you specific advice because i don't know what "customization" has been done.

you need someone who can read your php code and identify where the problem is. it sounds like there is something in there that wipes the strings which = meta tags, after a certain amount of time.

normally, i would suggest the OSC books. but this is a coding issue which needs to be looked into by someone good with php.

if finances are an issue, i suggest posting notices at the local colleges where they have a computer science department "need php help". most likely there is a parameter which can be changed to stop this timed disappearance [if that is actually the problem]

also, you need to look through the OSC forums or forums from the "customizer". if you are having this issue, other people must have too.
try posting your issue here
http://forums.oscommerce.com

i personally got so frustrated with OSC that i commissioned my own version of a very reliable php cart. if you/your client can not resolve this issue to your satisfaction and you are interested, i can provide this cart software to you at a very reasonable price. the developer has 24 hr. email tech support if you ever need it.

best of luck.