After struggling with AbanteCart that would not update past 1.2.6, or would export/import, I built a brand new one by hand using the latest 1.2.8 build. I noticed a series of "bugs" or features as some may call them that made the rebuild all the more difficult.

I decided to run a web based security scanner from tinfoilsecurity.com. The scan just finished. The initial headers was Your website is Very Unsafe for both the new and the production site. The new site had 26 problems, the production site, 23.

Here are some of the details from the most severe of the twenty-six vulnerabilities listed on the new site. I do not know if I can caused some, but I haven't done a lot more than adding products/categories and so on. I suggest running your own free scan.

   
Vulnerability Name    URL    Variable    Rescan   Severity       
   
Cross-Site Request Forgery   /index.php   loginFrm            
   
Cross-Site Request Forgery   /index.php   SubscriberFrm            
   
Unencrypted password form   /index.php   password            
   
Clickjacking   /               
   
Directory listing is enabled.   /storefront/view/default/javascript/               

I also ran the scan on the production site using 1.2.6 that has fewer problems that 1.2.8, even though 1.2.6 has been in use for a long time!
   
Vulnerability Name    URL    Variable    Rescan   Severity       
   
Cross-Site Scripting in event attribute of HTML element   /index.php   sort            
   
Cross-Site Scripting in event attribute of HTML element   /index.php   manufacturer_id            

Comments?

I haven't had any luck with importing products using an Excel spreadsheet.

I read this page - http://docs.abantecart.com/pages/tools/import.html and downloaded the sample "tab delimited" file for review.

When I created a simple spreadsheet in Excel and saved as tab delimited. I reopened the file, selected tax delimited and got this -
A   B   C   A   B   C   A   B   C
2   2   2   2   2   2   2   2   2
3   3   3   3   3   3   3   3   3

Very nice

Why does the sample not work the same way?

Excel imported the file, products-insert-example-tab. It looks like garbage.

"action   products.model   products.sku   products.location   products.quantity   products.stock_status_id   products.manufacturer_id   products.shipping   products.ship_individually   products.free_shipping   products.shipping_price   products.price   products.tax_class_id   products.date_available   products.weight   products.weight_class_id   products.length   products.width   products.height   products.length_class_id   products.status   products.viewed   products.sort_order   products.subtract   products.minimum   products.cost   product_descriptions[0].language_id   product_descriptions[0].name   product_descriptions[0].meta_keywords   product_descriptions[0].meta_description   product_descriptions[0].description   product_descriptions[1].language_id   product_descriptions[1].name   product_descriptions[1].meta_keywords   product_descriptions[1].meta_description   product_descriptions[1].description   products_related[0].related_id   products_to_categories[0].category_id   products_to_categories[1].category_id   products_to_categories[2].category_id   products_to_categories[3].category_id   products_to_downloads[0].download_id   products_to_stores[0].store_id   product_options[0].product_option_id   product_options[0].attribute_id   product_options[0].group_id   product_options[0].sort_order   product_options[0].status   product_options[0].element_type   product_options[0].required   product_option_descriptions[0][0].language_id   product_option_descriptions[0][0].name   product_option_descriptions[0][1].language_id   product_option_descriptions[0][1].name   product_option_values[0][0].product_option_value_id   product_option_values[0][0].group_id   product_option_values[0][0].sku   product_option_values[0][0].quantity   product_option_values[0][0].subtract   product_option_values[0][0].price   product_option_values[0][0].prefix   product_option_values[0][0].weight   product_option_values[0][0].weight_type   product_option_values[0][0].attribute_value_id   product_option_values[0][0].grouped_attribute_data   product_option_values[0][0].sort_order   product_option_value_descriptions[0][0][0].language_id   product_option_value_descriptions[0][0][0].name   product_option_value_descriptions[0][0][0].grouped_attribute_names   product_option_value_descriptions[0][0][1].language_id   product_option_value_descriptions[0][0][1].name   product_option_value_descriptions[0][0][1].grouped_attribute_names   product_option_values[0][1].product_option_value_id   product_option_values[0][1].group_id   product_option_values[0][1].sku   product_option_values[0][1].quantity   product_option_values[0][1].subtract   product_option_values[0][1].price   product_option_values[0][1].prefix   product_option_values[0][1].weight   product_option_values[0][1].weight_type   product_option_values[0][1].attribute_value_id   product_option_values[0][1].grouped_attribute_data   product_option_values[0][1].sort_order   product_option_value_descriptions[0][1][0].language_id   product_option_value_descriptions[0][1][0].name   product_option_value_descriptions[0][1][0].grouped_attribute_names   product_option_value_descriptions[0][1][1].language_id   product_option_value_descriptions[0][1][1].name   product_option_value_descriptions[0][1][1].grouped_attribute_names   product_specials[0].product_special_id   product_specials[0].customer_group_id   product_specials[0].priority   product_specials[0].price   product_specials[0].date_start   product_specials[0].date_end   product_tags[0].tag   product_tags[0].language_id   product_tags[1].tag   product_tags[1].language_id   product_tags[2].tag   product_tags[2].language_id   product_tags[3].tag   product_tags[3].language_id   resource_map[0].resource_id   resource_map[0].object_name   resource_map[0].object_id   resource_map[0].default   resource_map[0].sort_order   resource_library[0][0].resource_id   resource_library[0][0].type_id   resource_descriptions[0][0][0].language_id   resource_descriptions[0][0][0].name   resource_descriptions[0][0][0].title   resource_descriptions[0][0][0].description   resource_descriptions[0][0][0].resource_path   resource_descriptions[0][0][0].resource_code   resource_descriptions[0][0][1].language_id   resource_descriptions[0][0][1].name   resource_descriptions[0][0][1].title   resource_descriptions[0][0][1].description   resource_descriptions[0][0][1].resource_path   resource_descriptions[0][0][1].resource_code   resource_map[1].resource_id   resource_map[1].object_name   resource_map[1].object_id   resource_map[1].default   resource_map[1].sort_order   resource_library[1][0].resource_id   resource_library[1][0].type_id   resource_descriptions[1][0][0].language_id   resource_descriptions[1][0][0].name   resource_descriptions[1][0][0].title   resource_descriptions[1][0][0].description   resource_descriptions[1][0][0].resource_path   resource_descriptions[1][0][0].resource_code   resource_descriptions[1][0][1].language_id   resource_descriptions[1][0][1].name   resource_descriptions[1][0][1].title   resource_descriptions[1][0][1].description   resource_descriptions[1][0][1].resource_path   resource_descriptions[1][0][1].resource_code   resource_map[2].resource_id   resource_map[2].object_name   resource_map[2].object_id   resource_map[2].default   resource_map[2].sort_order   resource_library[2][0].resource_id   resource_library[2][0].type_id   resource_descriptions[2][0][0].language_id   resource_descriptions[2][0][0].name   resource_descriptions[2][0][0].title   resource_descriptions[2][0][0].description   resource_descriptions[2][0][0].resource_path   resource_descriptions[2][0][0].resource_code   resource_descriptions[2][0][1].language_id   resource_descriptions[2][0][1].name   resource_descriptions[2][0][1].title   resource_descriptions[2][0][1].description   resource_descriptions[2][0][1].resource_path   resource_descriptions[2][0][1].resource_code"
"insert   558003   testsku      99   1      0   0   0   0.0000   29.5000   1   2011-08-29   75.00   2   40.00   25.00   15.00   0   1   8   1   0   1   0.0000   1   Skinsheen Bronzer Stick         ""<p>"
"   Bronzes"

I setup a new 1.2.8 cart and although selecting not to import sample database, the website has lots of cosmetic images. How do I get rid of them? Nothing that I've tried works and they are not shown under Media Manager.

Is there a way to import just images, and if possible link them automatically with products? Perhaps a csv file. I've tried exporting and importing data but the import fails and nothing is imported.

I know that you can backup AbanteCart, install a newer version and restore the cart... but it isn't complete. Can a person who has done this, move and restore a complete system so that the new installation is exactly the same as the old write a step by step guide. I think that just the bullet points will work.

Everything I've found seems to end with ... then a miracle occurs, and then you're done.

Sadly, steps are missing and a miracle doesn't occur.

Help please. It's the missing link in this really excellent software.

Although AbanteCart is a really good e-commerce software, from my opinion it's weakness is the upgrade system.

Sometimes I can just click through the upgrade button and it upgrades in a few seconds.  "Please click following link this link to start the upgrade." Then for newer upgrades, the system doesn't work as the popup just reappears that had the original upgrade information.

Sadly, the only manual upgrade information is not complete and assumes that the upgrader has done a manual upgrade before and skips details such as "... then a miracle occurs and it all works." The manual installation appears to be just copying the new files over the old, but keeping the original config file and then running a command. How to run the command remains a mystery. Any ideas?

I also installed a 1.2.x (current version) on my Bluehost server and after the install, restored the manual backup of everything (or so I thought) from the files/folders. Although it "worked" the images weren't transferred nor the templates and other details. It became so confusing that I gave up for lack of time.

Does anyone have a long version of how to upgrade AbanteCart?

As I wrote above, it would be nice to make a manual backup, install the current version, restore to it and the new site is identical to the old. It would be nice.

I have been trying to update my site from 1.2.1 to later versions and cannot do it.  I get this message when I looked at the log, referencing lines 74 and 114 in the mysql.php file.

I installed a test 1.2.4 version with an empty data base, exported the entire database from 1.2.1 and tried to import. It failed. I then download each individual data type and tried to import those. Some worked, some failed. In other words it doesn't work.

Any ideas specific to the line 74 and 114 problems, or how to make the data export/import work?


    public function query($sql, $noexcept = false) {
      //echo $this->database_name;
       $time_start = microtime(true);
LINE 74 ->      $resource = mysql_query($sql, $this->connection);
        $time_exec = microtime(true) - $time_start;


      if($noexcept){
            $this->error = 'AbanteCart Error: ' . mysql_error($this->connection) . '<br />Error No: ' . mysql_errno($this->connection) . '<br />' . $sql;
            return FALSE;
         }else{
LINE 114 ->            throw new AException(AC_ERR_MYSQL, 'Error: ' . mysql_error($this->connection) . '<br />Error No: ' . mysql_errno($this->connection) . '<br />' . $sql);
         }
       }
     }
Modify message

I've looked at v1.2 that is a big improvement, but don't see a Call for Price button to avoid listing the price. It's sometimes called a Too low to show, Call for Price or similar.

If you list the price on the Internet, someone else is almost always selling the same product for less so it's a race to the bottom.

The Call for Price, Too low to show gets the prospect to call for the price and engage. That sells products, not click here to order.

Any chance for a paid add-in that provides a variety of ways to do this?

The image display of Specials, Newly Listed and Featured products is really nice, but I don't know how to either sort them away from an alphabetized list or a granular way of only showing the desired products, or having them display randomly.

Why? Because either some products in the Specials will never show, just the first alphabetized items that fits in the space allocated, and there doesn't appear to be a way to change the newly listed date so you can manually force certain products to appear.

Ideas?