AShop V 5.2.0 Update Instructions

This new version of AShop V has dropped the old simplified catalogue.php storefront and now uses a template for the main storefront. Because of these changes, you will need to make some adjustments to your templates to make things look like before when you update. This is a bit more involved with this update than usual, since it has had a lot of rather big changes, but if you check the new demo shop which shows off the changes in this update, I think you will find that it is worth it.

Note! You should always be careful if you have had custom work done on your AShop either by AShop Software or another developer. Uploading a patch may overwrite these customizations!

If you don't want to install the update yourself, you can always hire AShop Software to do it for you. This service costs $50 and can be ordered here

A. Replace index.php

The storefront now has its own template, just like the other pages, so you will no longer need to edit any php scripts to change the layout of your shop. If you are using the old default index.php storefront script, you will not need to change anything to make this work. Just upload the patch and you should be good to go. If you have modified the index.php storefront to use your own layout and/or design, you have to update the included catalog.html template to match those changes.

The file templates/catalog.html controls the layout of the storefront and product pages and it supports several different placeholder codes in the form of html comments, which replace the old php code snippets from the index.php script in previous versions. You can edit this template in any web design software since it is just plain x-html code. This is a suggested workflow for making this change...

1. Rename your current index.php to catalog.html.

2. Edit the file you renamed and replace each php code snippet with the corresponding html comment. Look at the catalog.html from the patch to see examples.

3. Make sure the table or div that contains your subtotal box has the id parameter set to "cartbox" to enable the add to cart animation.

4. Put the file in the "templates" folder of your AShop and make sure not to overwrite it with the one from the patch.

5. Upload the patch, overwriting index.php with the new version.

B. Replace catalogue.php

If you are still using the old simplified catalogue.php storefront, you will need to make a few changes to the catalogue.html template to keep things working the way they are.

1. Download and edit templates/catalogue.html from your AShop and replace the following code:

<!-- AShopstart -->
<!-- AShopend -->

With:

<table width="100%" border="0" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="3">
<tr><td class="ashopcategoriesbox">
<!-- AShopcategories -->
<!-- /AShopcategories -->
</td><td valign="top">
<!-- AShoptopbar -->
<!-- /AShoptopbar -->
<!-- AShopstart -->
<!-- AShopend -->
</td></tr></table>

2. Rename the file to catalog.html and upload it to your AShop templates folder.

3. Upload the patch but make sure not to include the templates folder.

4. Change any links to catalogue.php or search.php and point them to index.php, alternatively use rewrite rules to redirect them.

C. Button images in PNG format

To give the buttons in AShop mouse over effects, they have now been converted to PNG files instead of the original GIF images. A set of default buttons are included, but if you have created your own buttons or used a custom set, you will need to convert them to PNG.

D. Buy Now links have been changed

To clean up the code, the Buy Now links that are generated by the chain link icon in the admin panel have now been changed. All links should now lead to buy.php instead of shipping.php or basket.php and the parameters are changed to: item instead of product and parameter instead of attribute. If you are using Buy Now links, you will need to modify them to match these changes.

E. Email message templates must be moved

To keep things separate and easier to find, the email message templates are no longer placed in the top level of the templates folder but in their own subfolder instead. Create a subfolder named "messages" in templates, then move the following files there:

affiliatesignupmessage-en.html
membersignupmessage-en.html
membersignupmessage2-en.html
orderactivationmessage-en.html
orderactivationmessage-en.txt
outbidmessage-en.html
receipt-en.html
receipt-en.txt
signupmessage-en.html
winningbidmessage-en.html
wsreceipt.html
wsreceipt.txt
wssignupmessage.html