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eCommerce vs Starter Database(s)

Thread began 8/04/2012 6:32 pm by elevy388997 | Last modified 8/06/2012 10:15 am by Jason Byrnes | 1646 views | 3 replies |

elevy388997Beta Tester

eCommerce vs Starter Database(s)

How much overlap is there between these two "products"?

For reference
eCommerce Databse - ecommerce-database/

Database Starter Kit PHP - database-for-php/


I see a lot of similarities but also some differences that I was wondering why they weren't in the Free eCommerce Database whether we want to use them or not. It would be nice to just download a DB where we didn't have to add Columns for:

Company Name (userCompany)
Username (to login with something other than an email address)
userLevel (to allow certain permissions based on level)
productType (for physical or digital)


productImage 2/3/4 (for additional product images)
productThumb 2/3/4 (for the respective thumbnails)
productImageAltText 2/3/4 (for respective alternative text)
productHits (to track product views)
UserUnique (track unique/new users per day)

Please correct me if they are included somewhere and I missed it. I am still very much new to databases.

Now looking at the Free Starter Kit Database the Physical Goods database has a "visitors" table (which I believe is the "users" table) but it has both Billable and nonBillable options such as VisitorFirstName and VisitorBillName. Then it has a States_Provinces table that the eCommerce database does not.


The digital goods database has an itemDownload (store file name) and detailDownload (number of times downloaded per order) column.

6
It seems like these items should be the norm in a database. How should I successful implement these (along with the event_registration database) into the eCommerce DB??

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Jason ByrnesWebAssist

these are completely separate data bases.

The Data Base starter kit is intended as a tutorial for getting started with using Databases and understanding the database structure.

The eCommerce Data Base is intended as a starting point database that you can use for creating a store. it is just a starting point, that you can alter to suit your needs.

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elevy388997Beta Tester

Perfect enough, my main question is; Is it necessary to expand the database before development or can I add columns as I go for coupons, referral points, product view number, download count, etc etc etc. I constantly find new posts about a certain feature that I think is neat and I am hesitate to start changing database entries after I have a whole dynamic set created.

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Jason ByrnesWebAssist

adding columns to the data base after your pages are created will not cause any issues, only removing columns will cause issues.


However, when you add a column to the database don't expect any existing pages to automatically recognize the new column.

in the case of an insert page, you would need to add a new form element and edit the insert behavior if you want the insert to manage the newly added columns.

The question you ask does not really have 1 answer to it. It is always best to have the database structure completed before you start development.

when you get to the point of adding features to a web site, you should consider whether updating the existing site is the best approach or is time to Upgrade the site to V2 by completely rebuilding it.


it may be better to rebuild the site into a new version rather than add to an existing house of cards.

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