Basic configuration of osCommerce, continued - Customer Details
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This is a very straightforward section, and the only setting that is modified for the demonstration site is the Company option, which has been set to false because it slows down customer registration and is not that important for our purposes. If you feel your store will benefit from knowing who your customers work for, then by all means keep it. While it is easy to understand what each setting controls in this case, you still need to think closely about what you do and don't want to store in the way of customer information.
Off the top of your head you may wonder why on earth you really need to store a customer's birthdate. After all, the more information you store about each customer, the more space you are going to use in your database. But what if down the line you decide to implement a marketing strategy that sends out a promotional discount on certain products on your customers' birthdays. Well, this is certainly a plausible marketing strategy, but one that is thoroughly impossible to implement if you haven't been storing customer birthdates from the start. The same type of argument could be made for storing gender, since certain products might be more attractive to one gender than the other, so a marketing strategy based on gender is also plausible.
At this point you should be able to see why it is so important to have a clear picture of where you want your site to go. It's a very easy slip to make saying that you don't need customer birthdates because you don't really need them at the moment. When in doubt, save the details rather than not-this will at least give you the option later on. If you know that you are really never going to use the information (like the Company value for the demo site), then remove it so as to prevent redundant data piling up in your database.
Shipping and Packaging
This section is also a pretty straightforward section, although there are several issues you need to make sure you are aware of before making any decisions here. The first two options, Country of Origin and Postal Code, can be dealt with pretty swiftly, but the next setting requires a bit of research. In order to Enter the Maximum Package Weight you will ship, you need to know the weight-to-cost scale of your shipping service provider, and find out what limits they have on their service.
Most good providers will have a list of all their expenses, and assuming you will actually be using them often will also have special rates and deals available to regular users. For example, http://www.ups.com/content/us/en/shipping/ time/zones/current/select.html provides information regarding UPS' rates as well as information pertaining to their services. Whoever you choose to work with will likely have a solid support and information service to help you find your way. For example you can find out all about costs and charges at the US Postal Service at the following page, which highlights the costs of mailing packages of different weights and sizes: http://pe.usps.gov/text/dmm/R700.htm#Xih82834.
Obviously, it is imperative that you look at a shipping provider of your choice in order to work out what your expenses are going to be, as well as the most cost effective and efficient solution for your business. This is something that should really have been looked at before actual development of the site-somewhere around Chapter 1. Once you know how your shipping service will work (for example, whether you are going to use a daily or weekly pick up service, whether you are going to get a special deal on international shipments, and so on), you can determine what settings are right for you.
Of course, the values you set are in pounds, and you should be aware of how much your packaging itself is going to weigh. The Package Tare Weight allows you to set a minimum value for the packaging (or throw-away) weight. If a package is large, then it is conceivable that you need to set the weight of the packaging as a percentage of the package weight instead of a single value. In such a case, osCommerce uses the percentage value given in the Larger packages - percentage increase option. The default sets the tare weight at 3 pounds and the percentage at 10, which means that for packages heavier than 30 pounds, the percentage value is the one which is used to calculate the package weight.
In the case of the demo site's settings, the Package Tare Weight is set to 2 pounds, and the Larger packages - percentage increase value is changed to 5 with the Maximum Package Weight being left at its default value. This means that for packages of 40 pounds or less, we are confident that only a maximum of two pounds of packaging is required-for anything above 40 pounds, we will use the percentage calculation. This is reasonable in our case since books need very little in the way of specialized packaging.
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 This article is excerpted from Building Online Stores with osCommerce: Professional Edition, written by David Mercer (PACKT, 2005; ISBN: 1904811140). Check it out at your favorite bookstore today. Buy this book now.
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