E-Commerce Documentation [#55427]

Poor Matt Westgate has been waiting for me to do e-commerce docs for like 4 months. ;( I work full-time now so it's really hard to find a few spare hours to make headway on it. :( I think I've finally come to the realization that I will never finish this project I'm working on, so I'm putting it here in the hopes that the rest of the community can help flesh it out.

I've attached what I have done so far in terms of an "E-Commerce Manual"... the last time this was updated was in maybe January though so it may not be totally accurate, but maybe it could help as a start?

The idea was to split the docs up into 3 sections:

1. How-to: from an administrator's perspective, basic how-to docs on how to install the module, how to configure basic settings, etc.
2. Reference: A thorough examination of all the various options and stuff (warning: sometimes requires looking through source code)
3. Case studies: A step-by-step "recipe" guide on how to make a few different common examples, such as making a t-shirt store, setting up Drupal to take PayPal donations, charging people for group membership, etc.

Another thing that would be far less time-consuming but extremely valuable would be to fill in module documentation for the 30+ modules that make up the e-commerce module. A sample page looks like http://drupal.org/handbook/modules/book and they would go as child pages to http://drupal.org/node/50350 probably. Looks like there is more E-Commerce documentation there now than the last time I looked, cool. :)

Also, there are a few getting started guides, including at least one or two for e-commerce, available from osddp.org:
http://osddp.org/node/284
http://osddp.org/node/287

Hope that helps someone out some.

Comment	File	Size	Author
	E-Commerce Documentation.zip	861.33 KB	webchick

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Comments

Comment #1

sime

any/any

Melbourne

CreditAttribution: sime commented 23 March 2006 at 04:54

Brilliant, this is great. Both the zip file and the links (I hadn't seen that deep dark section of the Handbook before).

Quick Q. Is there a requirement to write separate documentation for different versions? ie. 4.6, 4.7...

Comment #2

webchick

she/they

English

Vancouver 🇨🇦

CreditAttribution: webchick commented 23 March 2006 at 05:01

I think you'd find it much easier to just write one version of the documentation, and make special notes to point out where something only applies to either 4.6 or 4.7.

Comment #3

gordon CreditAttribution: gordon commented 23 March 2006 at 05:43

This is great, I was told about this at the end of last year, and we are going to need to do some updates, but this is going to give us shuch a great start.

Do you mind if I commit this into the E-Commerce docs directory?

Comment #4

webchick

she/they

English

Vancouver 🇨🇦

CreditAttribution: webchick commented 23 March 2006 at 16:39

No, go for it. Much better than on C:\webchick's hard drive\ :P

I'm not sure that it's quite "commit-worthy" yet though. There are still A LOT of places that need filling in. :(

Comment #5

fgm

French

Paris, France

CreditAttribution: fgm commented 23 March 2006 at 23:28

I made this UML class diagram of e-commerce 4.6 some time ago, and have been updating it for 4.7 since.

Maybe it can be of interest ?
http://blog.riff.org/index.php/2005/08/07/9-grokking-drupal-e-commerce
(temporary url, soon to be drupal-based)

Beyond that, I also expect to have a full E/R diagram for drupal 4.7 and e-commerce 4.7 at some point next month. This is less abstract than the UML view, but I find both useful.

Unless you're in much of a hurry, I suggest you wait for it.

Of course, these don't really belong in any of the 3 sections you mention: "reference" would be the closest match, I think.

Comment #6

sime

any/any

Melbourne

CreditAttribution: sime commented 23 March 2006 at 23:41

I made this UML class diagram of e-commerce 4.6 some time ago, and have been updating it for 4.7 since.

Thanks for that. Already have that in fact! That was one of the first diagrams I saw - see comment #1 on your page ;-)

I am in no rush myself. My timeline is to wait until we have an ecommerce 4.7. Hopefully, among other cool improvements Gordon is adding, we will have a variety of shipping methods ready for the 4.7 release. But I'm glad I put the feelers out because I would have hated to waste all the work that webchick has done for instance.