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Netshine Review:
Having written
part of the official documentation for Virtuemart myself (back when it
was known as Mambo-phpShop), I was interested to see how this book
would deal with the challenge of explaining one of the most complicated
components ever written for Joomla!
I'm guessing that English is not the author's first language, not only
by the name, but also because there are few slightly odd phrases and
orthographical errors, but even so, the style is clear and easily
understandable.
The book starts off with a roundup of alternative e-commerce components (including nBill!)
and provides a brief introduction to what Joomla is, what VirtueMart
is, and how they fit together, as well as an overview of features
(nicely done without labouring the point), thus setting the scene for
where VirtueMart is positioned in the grand scheme of things.
We then get a basic, but fairly comprehensive tutorial on installing,
configuring, and using Joomla itself. I would think most readers would
already be familiar with this, but it is a thoughtful gesture for those
who are completely new to Joomla, and is an indication of the
thoroughness manifest throughout the book.
The features of Virtuemart are covered exhaustively, and whilst there
is some repetition (which is hard to avoid), the style is generally
clear and coherent, without too much waffle - even so, at over 400
pages, the coverage is quite comprehensive.
Whilst not particularly difficult (once you understand how it works),
one of the less intuitive aspects of Virtuemart (in my opinion) is that
of setting up product attributes, as well as parent-child product
associations. The explanations given in the book, are clear and
helpful, with real-life examples showing how to add attributes and
properties such as size and colour, as well as custom attributes (for
personalised products) and parent-child relationships. These concepts
are covered in such a way that they not only show you how to set things
up, but also convey an understanding of the reason why the features are
there and how they differ from one another, thus enabling you to choose
the right configuration for your needs (for example, depending on what
kind of stock control information you need to track).
Chapter 7 goes beyond Virtuemart itself, and explains how to install
and configure 2 newsletter components (Acajoom and Vemod), and Chapter
8 deals with localization including the Translation Manger component.
The final chapters deal with writing extensions, maintenance and
troubleshooting (again using more 3rd party components), and apendices
for dealing with specific shipping providers, payment modules, and
useful resources.
All in all, this is a well-planned, thorough, and easy-to-understand
guide to setting up and maintaining an e-commerce site using Joomla and
Virtuemart.
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