Charlie's Blog

A recent e-commerce / ERP project required us to use of Interprise Suite 2007 with AspDotNetStoreFront.

Initially, we were frustrated with the installation of the software package and the quality of the customer support, which is partially based in the Philippines. The support team seemed to be a relatively small group and never returned my calls at the agreed upon times.  Each service call usually involved speaking with multiple representatives that all had to “get back to me later.”

Once you get the software up and running, it is quite robust and impressive.  However, we ran into issues with the software installation that the documentation did not cover, but should have.

Basically, the issue came down to how we have our in-house development server set up.  Our setup was provided to us by professional server specialists and is based on Microsoft standards for efficiency and security.  The catch is that we use Application Pool Isolation to allow our customers to view their sites remotely.  The Interprise Suite 2007 software required that we change the permission settings to the Windows/temp directory on the server.  This was not described in the setup guide.  This simple fix, did the trick, but caused hours of frustration and communication with customer support.

The software also requires setup in a client/server environment.  Doing so was not specifically outlined in the documentation.  The software uses a couple of web services that need to be hooked into the back-end after installation in order for it to communicate with StoreFront. 

The software essentially replaces the "old way" of accessing StoreFront via a web browser and you now get to maintain all of the StoreFront settings from a new interface.  This single interface gives you control over EVERYTHING including website settings, inventory, billing, shipping, etc, etc.

Unfortunately, even after getting everything set up correctly and adjust to the new user interface, the software tends to crash frequently.  A sales representative at StoreFront (not Interprise Suite) informed me that this was not the first time they have encountered a caller describing similar issues.  This representative told me they have had customers flat out switch to something like Great Plains software due to similar frustrations.

Although this software has good intentions and seems like it should be viable ERP software, I would recommend researching the latest version vs. alternatives until they get the kinks worked out.  The latest version or maybe the next version may be more stable and provide better documentation and support.

Good to know: The HttpCookieCollection returns String representations of HttpCookie objects. Meaning, for example, if an HttpCookie is named "myCookie" then "myCookie" is all you get out of the HttpCookieCollection in the form of a key you may use to get the actual HttpCookie object. You can declare and instanciate a HttpCookie object using the key from the HttpCookieCollection. Seems odd that they come out as Strings and not HttpCookies, but that is the deal. 

The example below shows how to check to see if a Cookie exists in the current HttpContext. I am sure the below solution could be abbreviated by just checking for the exsiting key name and not actually creating a HttpCookie object. However, if you need anything more than the name of the HttpCookie, you would need to create an object (e.g. value, expiration date, etc.).

Dim cookieExists As Boolean = False

' Current cookie collection
Dim Cookies As HttpCookieCollection
Cookies = Web.HttpContext.Current.Request.Cookies

' Look for specific cookie
For Each strKey As String In Cookies

    Dim cookie As HttpCookie
    cookie = Cookies.Get(strKey)

    If cookie.Name = "myCookie" Then
        cookieExists = True
    End If

Next

' If the cookie is not found, create a new one
If Not cookieExists Then
    Dim myCookieAs New System.Web.HttpCookie("myCookie")
    Response.Cookies.Add(myCookie)
End If

Deadlines are very common in our line of business.  Clients have varying demands and high expectations.  Our team is always managing multiple clients and projects at the same time.  This is a constant challenge for everyone on the team.  I am happy to report that we constantly meet or exceed our clients expectations which of course is very rewarding for us.

I personally enjoy the challenge of providing our clients with quality, working software  as efficiently as possible.  Recently, our team began to adopt a formal methodology for improving the way we interact internally, as well as how we interact with our clients, to help improve the success rate of our projects.  This formalized process, among other things, also increases client involvement throughout the entire project which has reinforced for us that keeping the client in the loop at all times is a critical element of a successful project.

Recently we launched an e-commerce website for my uncle’s business, Southern Distributors, Inc.  www.southerndistributorsinc.com.  Southern Distributors is a general merchandise wholesale distributor and they carry over 5,000 different products. Based in Richmond, VA, they have been providing distribution services for over 60 years.

For this project, we selected BV Commerce by BV Software www.bvsoftware.com.  This is a Richmond, VA based software company.  I personally worked with the founder and primary developer of this software during college.  It was interesting  to work with the software a few years, and versions, later as a professional web developer. 

The user interface of BV Commerce is intuitive and easy to navigate.  The software, including the source code, was a modest $500 bucks (now closer to $1000).  It has all the fundamentals for running an e-commerce website.  If you are accustomed to .NET 2.0+ programming standards, you will find the source code to be organized and useful. If you do not require a super robust software solution, BV Commerce is very practical and economical.

Sixty years after opening their doors, Southern Distributors, Inc. is now advertising and selling products using an e-commerce website!