Modifying i.STAR pages
From i.STAR Help
Contents |
Overview
NOTICE: CAM Commerce Solutions is not responsible for system downtime, crashes, or loss or data due to Customer modifications to web pages or other modifications to the i.STAR server. Customers experiencing difficulty with their web pages after their own modifications can all on their project Manager at CAM for emergency support. You will be billed for time spent troubleshooting the site at a rate of $120 per hour with a one-hour minimum.
Following are the instructions to access your i.STAR site and web pages, located on your i.STAR server. Included is connection information, general tips, and a list of i.STAR-specific pages and their functions for the current i.STAR version. Modifications should not be attempted unless you have previous web experience and are competent in web editing.
General information about accessing i.STAR web pages:
Although you cannot see them visually or through the root FTP directory, there are two other directories -- wwwroot and templates -- that you can access. These are "virtual" FTP directories. They are:
- templates
- wwwroot
templates: Where web pages for i.STAR dynamic pages reside
wwwroot: Where all other web pages and images reside
If you wish to schedule phone training for guidance on modifying i.STAR pages, please call (800) 949-1470, option 8.
Training time is billable at the rate of $120/hour (in half hour increments).
Please read these instructions entirely before attempting to modify your i.STAR site.
Return To Main Page >> General i.STAR Information >> Modifying i.STAR Pages
FTP Connectivity
Discusses how to connect to the server and the server structure.
One easy way access the web directories via FTP through your browser at: ftp://www.yourdomainname.com/templates for dynamic pages and ftp://www.yourdomainname.com/wwwroot for static content
You can also use an FTP program to access your files and configure it as shown below. There are several popular clients for Windows. An easy-to-use and entirely free application is called FileZilla (can be downloaded from http://sourceforge.net/projects/filezilla ) But you could use WS_FTP, SmartFTP, CuteFTP, Total Commander, Fetch, Transmit or the FTP feature built in any of the HTML editors like Dreamweaver, Adobe GoLive, Coffee Cup, etc.
We will illustrate how to set up a new FTP connection with FileZilla. Under the File menu, select the Site Manager option. Then click the New Site button.
The user name and password that is used for overnight polling from your MAIN to your i.STAR server is also used to get into the FTP root folder on your i.STAR server.
NOTE: If you encounter a problem with access being denied, contact your CAM Project Manager. If you want to give your web designer access to your site, please notify your CAM Project Manager who the contact person is and whether you want them to have their own FTP user name and password set up. If at any time you need to delete or change an FTP account, contact your CAM Project Manager.
Return To Main Page >> General i.STAR Information >> Modifying i.STAR Pages
Web Directories
If your FTP software allows you when you put in the connection settings, to specify the host directory you connect to, you should put in wwwroot or templates there, depending on which one you want to access.
In Filezilla there is no option for hos directory, so you have to change into wwwroot or templates after you connect into ftproot (where you will see the StarComm directory).
The ftproot directory is where the virtual directories (that is why you cannot see them) wwwroot and templates are. To access them you have to change directory into them, or if your FTP client allows you to specify the host directory from the beginning you can just type in wwwroot or templates when you set up the connection settings.
What’s in the Templates Directory?
All of the required shopping cart pages reside in the templates folder. Although they are HTML pages, they do not end in .htm. These pages end with a .template extension. These are the pages of your shopping cart and there are two types. Some just contain a one-line tag contain while others have the one-line tag as well as other HTML code. The one-line tag is called a “plugin.” If the page only has a plugin, leave it alone. You should never have to edit the tag. The pages that contain HTML are the ones that make up the visual portion of your shopping cart and will need to be edited if you make changes.
NOTE: These pages may reside in the templates folder, but they behave as if they are in the wwwroot folder. Relative addressing should be written as though you are starting from the wwwroot folder when referencing an image to be used on a .template page or for reference the .template page itself.
Where do I Put Other HTML Pages?
Some i.STAR sites have other pages that are not part of the dynamic shopping cart itself, such as an opening or "splash" page or pages with other information about your company (directions, coupon pages, store locations, or return policy). All of these pages should reside in wwwroot. Relative addressing should be used. You will not be able to link to them if they are in the templates folder because templates is not public. Only the area under wwwroot is public. If it is not a dynamic page required by i.STAR, it goes in wwwroot.
NOTE: Links to off site content that cannot be linked as a * relative * link should start with https:// so that it doesn’t cause security alerts when site goes into secure (https) mode.
What is istar.asp?
It is a processing page that makes the template files appear on the web as if they were in the wwwroot directory. It has no design. Do not modify this page! Also, the page that appears as istar.asp in the URL is not the istar.asp page. That is the department.template page.
Having Trouble Opening the Pages?
If your html editor doesn't want to open the (.template) files, it is probably because it does not recognize the .template extensions. There are two ways around this. The best thing to do is add (.template) to your programs list of recognized extensions. The location of this list will vary from editor to editor, but if you dig around in your preferences and options you should be able to find it.
You are looking for the place that lists all presently recognized extensions such as: (.htm) (.html) (.asp) (.dhtml) and so on. If you add .template to this list, everything should work fine.
The other way is you can re-name all the files to (.htm), edit them normally, the re-name them back to (.template), then upload them. Either way would produce the same result. The first method is recommended because you do it once and then forget about it. There is also less chance of making a mistake when re-naming.
Copy of Site to Modify
Get a copy of your site to modify
You may be used to just saving web pages with your web browser. This method will not work with your i.STAR pages. The actual pages contain code that the shopping cart strips out and replaces with content. If you save the page with the browser, you will not get the shopping cart code that is essential, but instead will get the dynamic content that was specific for the page you were viewing included as static code on the downloaded page. Not good!
You need to download all the .template files. On your PC, put all the templates into a folder. Then from wwwroot download the images folder put the whole images folder in the same place as the .template files.
Download any (.htm) or (.html) file that exists in wwwroot you can put them in the samefolder as the .template files.
You should now have a full copy of the web site on your local machine.
Note: If you click on links they will usually take you back to the live on-line site.
How to Edit the Pages
Keep two copies of your site on your machine. Edit one of them and keep the other as a backup in case something goes wrong and you have to start over.
ALSO KEEP IN MIND: CAM only has our original version and the version on the server. Your copies of the site are going to be the only up-to-date versions so always keep one that you edit and one as a backup. Once you have uploaded your changes and everything works correctly on-line you can back up your up-to-date edited version.
You can edit these pages pretty much as you would any other web page with a few exceptions. You need to use relative addressing on your links and images so there aren’t issues when going from regular (http) mode to secure (https) mode.
Links to Dynamic Content
Discusses how to link to items in Retail STAR database with i.STAR for page design shell navigation.
How to Code Navigation Links
Here are some examples of most widely used link types:
- Department:
<a href="/iStar.asp?a=3&dept=deptcode">
- Class:
<a href="/iStar.asp?a=3&dept=deptcode&class=classcode">
- Subclass:
<a href="/iStar.asp?a=3&dept=deptcode&class=classcode&subclass=subclasscode"">
- Product:
<a href="/iStar.asp?a=6&id=style!vendor_code">
- Search Products - search term (the same fields search as keyword search: short description, extended description, style, i.STAR title):
<a href="/iStar.asp?a=29&search=searchterm">
- Search Products - brand (the manufacturer name/code by default is the vendor/code but can be changed to brand by using Internet Sales Product Setup/Manufacturer tab in Retail STAR):
<a href="/iStar.asp?a=29&manufacturer=manufacturercode">
- Search Products - marked with an icon: see list of Icons under Customizing#Icons
<a href="/iStar.asp?a=29&icon1=8"> this example would bring in items marked with icon NEW
<a href="/iStar.asp?a=29&icon1=8&icon2=1"> this example would bring in items marked with icon NEW and icon Best Seller
<a href="/iStar.asp?a=29&icon1=8&icon2=1&icon3=13"> this example would bring in items marked with icon NEW and icon Best Sellerand icon Web Special
How to Code More Navigation Links and Search Links
Available fields from Product Maintenance that are web fields
- Style
- i.STAR Title (Internet Sales Product Setup)
- Long Description (Internet Sales Product Setup)
- Vendor Code (as part of style's unique ID)
- Manufacturer (Internet Sales Product Setup)
- Dept/Class/Subclass
- Size
- Color
- Fabric
- Season
- Group
- Category
- Model ID
- Price (Compare At, Retail Price, Sale Price)
- Icons (Internet Sales Product Setup)
Browseable fields in i.STAR
The dynamic automatic hierarchy to drill down and browse on the site is by department, class, subclass and/or department/brand. There's a difference between browsing and searching from a couple of different angles, including that there is a category breakdown when browsing, but not when searching. ie. if you browse to a certain department, you'll see available Classes and Subclasses. With all of the searches, you just get one search results list, no further categorization below that.
Browse choices – set on the Directory link in web admin
- Dept, class, subclass
- Dept, manufacturer
NOTE: Cannot combine more than one argument for each type of item. For example, you cannot specify more than one department in a browse link.
Searchable fields in i.STAR
When building a left or top nav, "browseable fields" may be combined with searchable fields for more discrete results.
1. Keyword search: Uses i.STAR’s full text search engine to find relevant matches. Available fields: Style, i.STAR Title, Long Description, Model ID, Vendor Code, and Department, Class, and Subclass names.
i.STAR gives you the ability to put searchable words in the style’s long description, but hide them from the web by putting this tag BEFORE the search text to hide -- <searchterms> and this tag AFTER the search text to hide -- </searchterms>.
NOTE: You can only have one section of hidden searchable text within a long description. Attempting to use this tag more than once in a style’s long description will cause errors with the display of the item’s long description.
2. Code search: Searchable by a code search means that if a navigation item has the code specified, you can get results. The "code" is the Retail STAR code for the field (vs. the description or spelled out name). So, if the manufacturer code is ADI (for Adidas), a left navigation link can be wired up in the design to search for manufacturer = ADI. Available fields: Dept, class, subclass, manufacturer, season, group, category, icons
Return To Main Page >> General i.STAR Information >> Modifying i.STAR Pages
How to Link Product Into Shopping Cart:
If style has subsizes associated with it:
istar.asp?a=7&id=style&csurl=istar.asp?a=3&dept=dept_code&color=color_code&size=size_code&subsize=subsize_code
If style does not have subsizes associated with it:
istar.asp?a=7&id=style&csurl=istar.asp?a=3&dept=dept_code&color=color_code&size=size_code
Return To Main Page >> General i.STAR Information >> Modifying i.STAR Pages
