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Advice on E-Comm development
Hello Drupallers!
What's the best development path if I am trying to have a pure e-comm site (ie one with ERP as well as the shopping cart side)?
This will be included in my final RFP package as a specification. I am pretty sure that I would like to run this alongside CiviCRM for the Customer management part. Here's what I need:
1. Inventory control (both shipping and receiving goods) (E-Comm has a rudimentary module for that)
2. Generating and managing purchase orders & invoices
3. Warranty Management
4. Generating reports
5. Export and import from CSV files for mass updates and other reporting as needed.
Here are some possible development paths:
1. Use E-Comm module, and have a ERP module built to work with it.
2. Use E-Comm module, and CCK build fields for the ERP bits required. (Not even sure whether this would work. It would be messy in the end, I think?)
3. Use Ubercart, and have a ERP module built to work with it.
4. Use Ubercart, and CCK build fields for the ERP bits required. (Not even sure whether this would work. It would be messy in the end, I think?)
5. New module build from scratch, designed for B2B, B2C multi-channel distribution model.
Whether I go with Ubercart or E-Comm, some customization to the modules would still have to be done. If all goes well, any custom module work done from this project would be donated back to the community to support further open source development.
Hope I can get some advice!
Thanks!
Well, I'm obviously a little
Well, I'm obviously a little partial, but I highly recommend Ubercart. ; )
We have a custom inventory module designed to work w/ Ubercart that you can talk to Andy about demoing/using as well as a contribution by CpILL to handle inventory control. I've built an easy to customize invoice system that can easily be extended to have a separate template for POs. (Will have to do it for our use in the future anyways.) We would love for CiviCRM integration to happen, as we plan on using that as well but don't have time to code everything ourselves.
Other things are a sort of nebulous work in progress that is really just waiting for someone with the right enthusiasm and a little time on their hands to pitch in. I think you'll find our site welcoming, and I've been spending all week to make sure it's been constructed solidly. We recently had a server crash that resulted in old lost posts but a better than ever site w/ a custom issue tracker using CCK + Views and plenty of forum customization. The community has survived for the most part, including a few other development studios and individuals working on their own projects.
Most folks are saying they prefer the Ubercart backend, and we're continually working to improve it... another brain would be most welcome on the project.
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Current Drupal project: http://www.ubercart.org
You are so right. Ubercart
You are so right. Ubercart is the way to go. Another point to make - even if Ubercart doesn't have all the features that you're looking for most, if not all the drupal e-commerce development is focusing on Ubercart (regardless of server crashes).
This means Ubercart's advancement will be much greater than a custom cart or the standard Drupal e-commerce.
Thumbs down for e-commerce
Neither e-commerce nor ubercart will be ready for out-of-the-box use (for your requirements). However it sounds like you have the time to invest in developing an appropriate solution, and I would recommend directing your energies towards making Ubercart work for you. Its probably 60 - 70% of the way there and would save you a chunk of change in leveraging its existing functionality. Plus its community/developers are far more responsive than my experiences with e-commerce, so chances are that you're questions would be answered in a more responsive manner.