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The demo is live and you may purchase items to see how the system works. Items are $0.01 or $0.02 in value.   

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Showcase : To see how customers have used the application, go to the user sites page by clicking here

PayPal buttons ....

There are two methods to construct your shop system : modify your existing web pages by adding buttons and cart displays which is useful if you are only selling a few items, or use the dynamic store front which is based on a template system.

This section explains how to integrate 'buy now' buttons, 'add to cart' buttons, and the 'cart display' into your exisiting web pages. If you wish to use the full shopping cart system then refer to shopping cart page.

Adding buy now buttons

Clicking on a 'Buy now' button immediately takes you to the PayPal checkout where you buy that single item.

Buy now buttons are used where you only have a few items to sell and you do not expect purchasers to buy more than one item at a time. If you think that a purchaser would want to buy more than one item, then use the 'Add to cart buttons' described below.

An example of a buy now button is shown here.

The button or buttons may be placed anywhere on an existing web page which makes it easy to integrate into an existing design. The web page can be of php extension or an ordinary htm page.

<form action="http://www.yourservername/ipnmonitor/ipn/process.php" method="post">
<input type="hidden" name="item_number" value="item1">
<input type="image" src="https://www.paypal.com/en_US/i/btn/x-click-but23.gif" border="0" name="submit" alt="Make payments with PayPal - it's fast, free and secure!">
</form>

The fields that you enter to create the button are :
  • The action url is http://www.yourservername/ipnmonitor/ipn/process.php assuming that you have installed PHP-IPNMonitor at the root of your web site in a folder called 'ipnmonitor'.
  • The value is the item_number for the product you wish to create the button for. This is the value that you gave the item in the Products display of the admin pages.
  • The image can be any of the PayPal images or one of your own.

Click on the following button which shows what happens when someone wants to buy PHP-IPNMonitor script.

When the purchaser clicks on the buy now button, the php script will extract all the relevant data from the database and post it to the PayPal server.

Adding cart buttons

The shopping cart system provides 'Add to cart' buttons and 'View cart' buttons enabling a purchaser to add items to a cart before purchase. Physical goods and digital goods can be added to a cart at the same time and purchased at the same time.

This method enables you to add a button or buttons anywhere to an existing web page. The web page can be of php extension or an ordinary htm page.

An example of a cart button is shown here.

Below, is an example of an 'Add to Cart' button.

<form action="http://www.yourservername/ipnmonitor/cart/viewcart.php" method="post">
<input type="hidden" name="item_number" value="item1">
<input type="hidden" name="from" value="http://www.yourservername/ipnmonitor/cart/button.php">
<input type="hidden" name="action" value="add">
<input type="image" src="https://www.paypal.com/en_US/i/btn/x-click-but22.gif" alt="Add item to cart">
</form>


The fields that you enter to create the button are :
  • The action url is the full url of viewcart.php and will be http://www.yourservername/ipnmonitor/cart/viewcart.php assuming that you have installed PHP-IPNMonitor at the root of your web site in a folder called 'ipnmonitor'.
  • The value of the 'item_number' field is the item number for the product you wish to create the button for. This is the value that you entered in the Products display in the admin pages.
  • The value of the 'from' field is the full url of the page that the button is placed on and is used by the viewcart.php page to know where the to return to.
  • The image can be any of the PayPal images or one of your own.

When you click on the 'Add to Cart' button, you are taken to the viewcart.php page where you may remove items or complete the purchase.

In addition to the 'Add to Cart' button you also need a 'View Cart' button as follows :

<form action="http://www.yourservername/ipnmonitor/cart/viewcart.php" method="post">
<input type="hidden" name="from" value="http://www.yourservername/ipnmonitor/cart/button.php">
<input type="image" src="https://www.paypal.com/en_US/i/btn/view_cart_02.gif" alt="view cart">
</form>

The fields that you enter to create the button are :
  • The action url is the full url of viewcart.php and will be http://www.yourservername/ipnmonitor/cart/viewcart.php assuming that you have installed PHP-IPNMonitor at the root of your web site in a folder called 'ipnmonitor'.
  • The value of the from field is the full url of the page that the button is placed on and is used by the viewcart.php page to know where to return to.
  • The image can be any of the PayPal images or one of your own.

Click the following Add to cart button to show what happens when someone wants to add the PHP-IPNMonitor script to the shopping cart.

Click the following View cart button to show what happens when someone wants to add the PHP-IPNMonitor script to the shopping cart.


The View Cart display

An example on how to use the view cart display is in the file 'viewcart.php' which is located in the cart folder.

This file uses an include file cart.php. The file viewcart.php can be easily modified to fit in to your own site.

To use the veiw cart page, you need to place the following include file onto your web page.

<?php include_once ("includes/cart.php"); ?>

NOTE : you must also put session_start(); at the top of the page.

As a starting point, it may be better to modify the existing viewcart.php file in the cart folder.

Use http links

You can add items to the cart and remove items from the cart using http links rather than buttons.

To add an item use the following in an http link :

viewcart.php?action=add&item_number=prod_a&from=/ipnmonitor/cart/list.php

To remove an item use the following in an http link :

viewcart.php?action=remove&item_number=prod_a&from=/ipnmonitor/cart/list.php

where item_number is the name that you have given the product when it was created and from is the url of the page the link is placed on which is used by the viewcart.php page to know where to return to.

Another method is :

viewcart.php?action=add&id=1&from=/ipnmonitor/cart/list.php

To remove an item use the following in an http link :

viewcart.php?action=remove&id=1&from=/ipnmonitor/cart/list.php

where id is the record id of the item you are adding and from is the url of the page the link is placed on which is used by the viewcart.php page to know where to return to.

Placing your include files onto a page

For those who are not familiar with adding include files to your web page, here is a brief description.

  • First start with a page you have created which matches your layout.
  • Change the file extension to .php The base file name can be anything you want.
  • At the point where you want the display to appear enter :
    <?php include_once("includefilename.php"); ?>
  • Copy your file into the /ipnmonitor/store/ folder.

Files which use PHP-IPNMonitor include files need to be placed into the correct folder because it will using other include files from the application.