myNicheShop E-Commerce Tools

CafePost Release Delayed…

admin — Tue, 28 Aug 2007 00:03:45 +0000

Due to the way which CafePost was originally written, we have been experiencing intermittent issues which have caused posts of our beta testers to not be displayed. With this in mind, I have started rewriting portions of the code which in the older beta versions went directly to the CafePress API to pull the information for display on the WordPress site. The system is now being written to initially pull the data from the API and store it within custom fields in the WordPress post table of the database. This process has been developed and is in internal testing at the present time. I will soon be releasing the new code to beta testers to test on their sites externally.

If all goes well, there are only a couple of areas in the coding that remain to be finished before release. I had originally planned for a July release, but at this point I’m looking at mid-late September barring any other issues which may be encountered.

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myNicheShop Cafe Post WordPress Plug-in enters beta! (Take Two)

admin — Fri, 01 Jun 2007 23:23:40 +0000

I have made some additions to the CafePost plug-in to do some basic error handling when invalid results are returned from CafePress.com. I am still waiting for error codes from CafePress so I can streamline the handling further. Currently when a product post is attempted to be displayed and there is an error, an error message is displayed in the post and an email sent to the WordPress site administrator with a link to the post and the error. This is the initial system and not necessarily the one that will be in the plug-in at release. I just wanted to get some kind of error handling built into the system now to eliminate the mass error messages I experienced a couple weeks back when a code push at CafePress had a negative effect on the API my plug-in uses.

In addition, I have the initial cache management system in which will automatically delete previous day’s file caches on a daily basis to keep the cache folder from eating up all the space on the host. Currently there is a daily scheduled cleanup which deletes files prior to the current date, creates/updates a log file, and sends an email to the site administration. Also we have created a link within the myNicheShop options framework to purge the cache. Like the error handling, this also is an initial system that has a lot more work planned.

The last thing I am hoping to finish this weekend is an XID option which will allow affiliates who are also CafePress shopkeepers to enter their CafePress Account Number into the options screen so CafePress may properly track their affiliate links. This is important because affiliate sales at CafePress do not qualify towards shopkeeper volume bonuses. With the use of the XID, the sales are counted as shopkeeper sales so volume bonuses are unaffected by your links from your external websites. I plan on having that finished tonight and plan to release the plug-in to beta testers next week.

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myNicheShop cjPost WordPress Plug-in development begins!

admin — Mon, 28 May 2007 15:11:57 +0000

I started initial development of the cjPost plug-in yesterday. The plug-in uses the Commission Junction web services API to pull products into WordPress posts in the same way we have previously done using other APIs from CafePress.com and Amazon.com. The Commission Junction plug-in is a long ways off, but I needed to take a break from a couple portions of the CafePost plug-in that I have been fighting with over the past few days.

Overall, the cjPost search code and reading a post containing the cjpost code was fairly straightforward. Integrating everything and pulling it all together will take a bit more work and testing.

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myNicheShop Cafe Post WordPress Plug-in beta delayed

admin — Sat, 26 May 2007 10:29:53 +0000

I’ve delayed the beta on CafePost while I recode some of the error processing. While at CafePress this past week, a code push on their network broke some of the API functionality causing tons of errors to be returned within CafePost. Instead of releasing the project to beta testers with the prospect of these errors, I want to get the code fixed and streamline cache utilization so that after so many errors are received, the plug-in will revert to the most recent usable cache file.

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myNicheShop Datafeed Manager WordPress Plug-in planned features posted

admin — Wed, 16 May 2007 13:10:32 +0000

As with the ImageKind plug-in, I was also able to add some of the planned features for our datafeed manager plug-in to the Datafeed Manger project page. While this isn’t a “these features are definitely going to be there” list, it is definitely my goal list for the plug-in. I’m hoping to begin digging into coding this addition to the myNicheShop plug-in family soon. Now I just need to find where “soon” is in the timeline!

At the time of this posting, following are the planned features:

Automatic datafeed retrieval using WordPress’ chron feature
Retrieve datafeed via ftp using information configured within plug-in options
Pull posted product information from datafeed cached during the current day
Datafeed retrieval will cache datafeed to standardized XML format. Site admin will map datafeed columns to standard Datafeed Manager field names within datafeed options for that particular feed. Once mapped the only time admin has to worry about their datafeed files is if the format is changed by the advertiser/merchant.
Keyword search to go through all imported datafeeds
Merchant search to search items from a specific merchant’s datafeed
Product search to search for a specific product across all imorted datafeeds
Table in wordpress database to cross reference postings to help notify/prevent duplicate product posts
Price comparison posts when same product found on multiple merchants

To keep up-to-date with features as the plug-in is developed, keep watch on the project page and changelog for the plug-in which are available in our project list.

On a side note, I’ll be meeting with Adam O’Connor (developer of the Instant Cafe feedbuilder for CafePress) and among other things we will be discussing the possibility of being able to pull in Instant Cafe feeds to generate posts within WordPress.

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myNicheShop IK-Post ImageKind WordPress Plug-in planned features posted

admin — Wed, 16 May 2007 12:57:25 +0000

I finally got around to updating the project list this morning and while at it, I took the time to add some of the planned features for our ImageKind plug-in to the IK-Post project page. While this isn’t a “these features are definitely going to be there” list, it is definitely my goal list for the plug-in. I’m hoping to begin digging into coding this addition to the myNicheShop plug-in family soon. Now I just need to find where “soon” is in the timeline!

At the time of this posting, following are the planned features:

Plug-in to utilize ImageKind gallery RSS feeds to list products for posts
Store RSS Feedlist in options
Automatically turn the links within the RSS feed into Share-a-sale affiliate link
When post is displayed, check for cached RSS from gallery for current date, if not found retrieve and cache current RSS
Table in wordpress database for storage of post information and gallery information required for link matching/rss retrieval
Options to store Share-a-sale affiliate ID, default tracking code, link processing options (open in new window/current window), and other static options.

To keep up-to-date with features as the plug-in is developed, keep watch on the project page and changelog for the plug-in which are available in our project list.

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myNicheShop Cafe Post WordPress Plug-in enters beta!

admin — Wed, 16 May 2007 12:53:33 +0000

Earlier this week I released the CafePost plug-in to a couple of the slated beta testers. I will distribute the project to the beta testers on my list one-by-one in hopes to better pinpoint issues faced on different hosts. While there is still much work to be done on the project, I felt it was time to start the beta process so I could hit issues encountered by different administrative preferences and hosting configurations.

Currently I am running the plug-in on 10 sites in addition to those who are already testing. Additional testers from my list will be added to those sites weekly.

At this point my hopes are for beta testers to have tested the current features as well as those not yet in the plug-in and have the plug-in ready for release in mid-June. I will post more information as I have it available. In the meantime, keep an eye on the CafePost project page and changelog available via the Projects link at the top of the page.

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myNicheShop: Framework WordPress Plug-in enters initial development

admin — Sun, 29 Apr 2007 20:28:27 +0000

After getting CafePost and Amazon Post in a semi operational state, I realized many of the functions and processing were common in both of them. With that in mind, I decided to create a framework plug-in where all of our current and future modules could call on common functions. The myNicheShop Framework plug-in will pull all these commonalities together.

In addition to common functions, I will be building a WordPress option submenu which will allow the user to input affiliate codes and other configuration information within the admin interface instead of having to manually edit the config.php files.

Work on the admin panel and the basic framework layout began today. Once I can get a working framework, including the development of several functions for processing API searches (admin panel search interface, results lists, post creations from results, duplicate product checking), I will move CafePost and Amazon Post into a closed beta phase.

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myNicheShop: Cafe-Post WordPress Plug-in enters planning stage

admin — Thu, 26 Apr 2007 02:28:33 +0000

myNicheShop: Cafe-Post will function similarly to the Amazon Post which just entered alpha. Cafe-Post will look for a tag within the post which will include the product number of a CafePress product. Once found, it will query CafePress’ Product Catalog API and create post information including product thumbnail, name, artist’s description, current price, and artist’s store name.

The initial plug-in will require entry of the codes within the post and the manual entry of a post title. Eventually, I plan to have this automated through the plug-in through a search function in which an administrator can execute a search, select which products they would like to add, click a button for ‘write posts’, and have wordpress automagically create a post for each of the selected products containing the Cafe-Post tag as the post and product name as the post title.

Eventually we also plan to have all/most of the planned features of myNicheShop Amazon Post.

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myNicheShop: Amazon Post WordPress Plug-in alpha stage

admin — Thu, 26 Apr 2007 02:22:49 +0000

We are in the process of building a WordPress plug-in which works through Amazon.com’s E-Commerce Services. Amazon Post scans a post for a special code which includes either the ASIN# or the ISBN-10 code. When encountered, the plug-in queries the ECS API for the code and retrieves product information to display in the place of the code.

The plug-in currently displays the default product image, list price, amazon.com price, and product description. It also calculates the savings amount and percent for display and in the off chance there is no list price or no amazon.com price returned, displays the customer price accordingly. Likewise if the query returns no description, the plug-in drops headings for the decription and displays no description information.

In its current state, the plug-in does not have the functionality to poll cart information. This is, however, a planned update which will be included prior to release. Other planned features include site administration configuration page, db table containing ASIN/IBSN-10 code to crosscheck when new posts are entered - admin is warned if a product is being entered that already shows in the table, auto creation of post title based on product name returned by Amazon.com, and more.

The alpha version of this plug-in is currently functioning at our MMORPG Gear website.

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