OFBiz User Community,
We are pleased to announce a new release of demo sites, with many
enhancements and features, to our site at
http://bigfish.salmonllc.com.
As always, the best way to see what it's all about is to visit the
site,
click on "demo" and play around with both an eCommerce
implementation and
the Admin Module.
Significant feature enhancements since the last release are as
follows:
** Many, many small enhancements and fixes, in both the eCommerce and
Admin Modules
** Check-Out: enhanced features to control single-page-checkout;
guest-checkout; multi-step-checkout; credit-card-required; store
credit
card for future use etc. All configurable of course via the Admin
Module ->
Admin -> System Parameters.
** Product Detail Page: ability configure a "recently viewed"
component.
This will display a history of previously viewed products in the
product-detail page.
** Product Loader and Feeds functionality: we have defined many
incoming
and outgoing BigFish feeds that our clients can use for daily
interaction
with BigFish from their existing ERP solution. The primary feed is a
BigFish Product Loader -- clients can use either an XLS or XML
format file
that is used to initially load and subsequently update the entire
product
catalog. We are finishing up writing some scheduled services so
that this
process can be more automated. Outgoing feeds include Customers
(registered
users); Orders; Catalog Requests; and Contact-Us events. Incoming
upload
feeds include Product Catalog and Order Status changes.
** Real "variant" intelligence: SEO-Friendly-URLs are now generated
to the
variant level. So, for example,
www.retailsite/apparel/**special-blouse
can now have several variant extensions such as
www.retailsite/apparel/**special-blouse-red
etc. This is useful for both SEO purposes and email campaigns
(since the
exact variant link can be put in the email, customer clicks on it,
and the
proper color variant is displayed initially)
** Product Listing Page: we've expanded the sort options to include
"Most
Viewed" and "Best Sellers". Available options offered are
maintained as a
system parameter.
** Expanded Content Spots: in the Admin Module -> Content section
we've
added many new content spots. These can be used to provide lifestyle
content on all the category listing pages, special recurring
content on the
product-detail-page (such as standard social media links) etc.
** New Admin Screens: Maintain the backend OFBiz Shipping Charges and
Scheduled Jobs via the BigFish Admin Module.
** Admin Module Skins: we created a GunMetal-Grey css skin for the
Admin
Module. Ability to create and upload your own skins is now
available in the
Admin -> Tools section.
** Multi-Site: we've made some progress in being able to support
multiple
Product Stores. The initial challenge was to allow for product
catalog and
all associated content to be segregated by Product Store. This is now
complete. Next steps is to move forward and create the actual
catalog and
content in order to demonstrate this.
** DIV-Sequencing: we've spent a ton of time on a concept we're
calling
"DIV Sequencing". Basically each component on a page, say the Product
Detail Page, maps to a DIV/Class in the CSS. Some clients may want
image +
product-name + color-selector + add-to-cart-button +
full-descriptions +
ratings-and-reviews. Another client may want product-name + image +
full-descriptions + color-selector + add-to-cart-button. The
DIV-Sequencing
feature allows retail clients to pick and choose which elements
should be
displayed in a particularly page and the actual sequence they
should be
rendered in the mark-up. This significantly simplifies the styling
changes
required in the CSS to get the final look-and-feel since the basic
layout
is setup by the DIV-sequencing. This has applied to all of the key
pages.
The Div-Sequences are maintained in the Admin->Tools section of the
Admin
Module.
** Docs: we've loaded up our specifications, useful for getting some
insight into our process and approach
** NEW CLIENTS: We are anticipating announcements for a couple of
our new
clients being launched on the BigFish platform. Getting production
ready
has proven to be quite tricky given the normal integration efforts
that are
involved in going live with an eCommerce site. See the
Product-Loader and
Feeds section above!
Comments, questions always welcome!
Best Regards,
Nick Rosser
[email protected]
O: 516.742.7888 x221
C: 516.901.1720
On 5/3/2012 1:28 PM, Nick Rosser wrote:
OFBiz user community:
A quick update for the BigFish eCommerce project. For more details
please visit http://bigfish.salmonllc.com. The best way to view what
this is all about is to click on the "Demo" link and play around.
The
Fashion House and Electronic Store demos show the majority of
features that
are available.
Significant feature enhancements since the last release are as
follows:
** Many small enhancements and fixes, in both the eCommerce and
Admin
modules
** Rotating Carousel: Fashion House and Electronic Store both have
implementation examples. Content maintained in Admin Module
(Content / Home
page spots).
** QuickLook on Product Listing Page (PLP): prototype available,
still
needs some tweaks to control the transition
** Product "Variant" enhancements. Check out the Fashion House
demo at
http://bigfish.salmonllc.com:**8082/online/control/main<http://bigfish.salmonllc.com:8082/online/control/main>.
Click on Apparel / Blouses. Play with the "swatches", works very
well in
Product Detail Page. Also integrated into the SOLR facets. On the
Fashion
House demo execute a site search for "pink" -- you'll see the
pink variant
image of the "3/4 sleeve button down". Search for "white" and
you'll see
the white version. Works nicely.
** Mega Menu. Both Fashion House and Electronic Store demos have
examples of overriding the standard navigation drop-down with a more
expansive "mega menu". Content managed in Admin Module (Content /
Product
Category Content).
** Under the covers (CSS): we've spent a lot of time
consolidating and
cleaning up the CSS, for both eCommerce and Admin. For adopters
this should
greatly simplify styling for your desired look-and-feel. Tools in
the Admin
Module (Admin / Tools) to store new style sheets and switch CSS
files.
Currently working on alternate styles for the Admin Module (for
some reason
folks don't seem to like our classic "in your face orange"
styling!).
** Admin Module, enhancements to support all additional features,
enhanced Order Status changes (on the Orders tab).
ROAD MAP ...
For a complete list of features, what's coming soon, and our road
map go
to
http://bigfish.salmonllc.com/**bfFeatures.html<http://bigfish.salmonllc.com/bfFeatures.html>
.
There was some previous interest in the multi-site capability of
BigFish. We've made some baseline changes to control the
separation of
Product catalog, and the Admin Module understands this
separation. We have
a clear idea as to how to separate out the other content (home
page, static
pages etc.) and will be implementing this shortly.
NEW CLIENTS ...
The community may be interested to know that we're working on two
client
implementations, both decent mid-sized companies. Our general sales
prospecting efforts are beginning to pick up some momentum and we
typically
have 2 client demos each week ... obviously hoping that we will be
converting some of these into real clients over the coming weeks and
months. We've also found that the BigFish solution stacks up
quite well
when comparing to Magento and other pay-for competitors. We don't
have any
particular "white papers" or similar documentation but obviously
the price
point is a very attractive feature. In terms of integration we are
leveraging our custom software history as a way to ensure
prospects of our
capability and our ability to implement a robust, stable,
expandable and
flexible solution. The rich functionality of the OFBiz baseline
is key here
-- and every BigFish implementation is by nature an OFBiz
implementation so
hopefully this will bring more attention to the OFBiz project
during the
rest of this year.
As always, comments, questions, suggestions are welcome!
