CS-Cart is an open source e-commerce shopping cart solution that can be used to setup your free online shopping store such as eBay, Snapdeal and Flipkart etc. CS-Cart is the best shopping cart solution for building an ecommerce website from a small web store to a virtual shopping mall. A ready storefront, support for many payment and shipping options, full inventory control, unlimited products, promotional tools, and other features out of the box.
CS-Cart comes with three editions: Ultimate(Free), Ultimate (Paid), Multi-vendor(Paid). Please visit this page to view the comparison of these three editions. In this tutorial let us build a free online e-store using CS-Cart software.
We already have shown you how to setup online store using Prestashop. In this tutorial, i use CentOS 6.4 to build the store. My test box hostname and IP address are server.unixmen.com and 192.168.1.200/24. Replace the values with your own where it appropriate.
Prerequisites
First you have to install and configure LAMP server. Visit any one of the following links to setup LAMP server.
- Install LAMP (Apache, MariaDB, PHP) Server On CentOS 6.4.
- Install LAMP (Apache, MySQL, PHP) Server On CentOS 6.4.
Now install the following prerequisites too.
Create Database and User for CS-Cart
For instance, here i am going to create a database called “cscartdb” and database user called “cscartuser” for CS-Cart.
Firewall(IP TABLES) and SELinux Settings
Allow the apache default port “80″ through iptables. Edit file /etc/sysconfig/iptables,
Add the following lines.
Now restart the iptables service.
I don’t want to mess up with SELinux, so here i disabled it.
Edit file /etc/selinux/config,
Set the SELINUX value as “disabled”.
Restart the system to take effect the saved changes.
Getting CS-Cart Software
Download the latest version from here. I downloaded it my current directory.
Create a directory called “cscart” in your apache root folder and copy the cs-cart zip file to the cscart folder.
Now go to the cscart directory and extract the cs-cart zip file.
Adjust the following files/folders permissions as shown below.
Run the following commands one by one in your terminal.
Begin CS-Cart Installation
Now navigate to “http://192.168.1.201/cscart/install” from your web browser. The following screen should appear.
Accept the license agreement and click Next.
Enter the database name, database user, password, administration email and password etc. Click Next to continue.
Now select your CS-Cart edition. For testing purpose i select the free edition.
After the installation is done, you will see the Installation Successfully Finished wizard. Click Go to the Settings wizard to make store setup. Click Close to go straight to the dashboard. You will be able to make settings later in the administration panel.
This is how your Administration panel looks.
If you want to further customize your store as per your liking, go to the Administration section by clicking on the Administration link on the top right corner. In the Administration link you can do the following:
- View orders, sales reports, shipment details etc.
- create new products, categories.
- Administer and create users and groups.
- Add contents to your website etc.
Also you can import/export the data’s and upgrade it to Paid version.
Post Installation
After CS-Cart installation, remove the install/ directory.
Change the following folders/files permissions as shown below.
Thats’t. Happy selling with your new e-store.
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Setup Online E-Commerce Shopping Store on CentOS 6.x With CS-Cart