[kmolchanov]

Hi,

We are very happy to announce a whole new branch in the CS-Cart lineup.

This is big. This is CS-Cart SaaS.

Long story short, CS-Cart SaaS is a cloud-based version of CS-Cart. We will offer it on the monthly subscription basis.

You will not need to install and maintain it—we will do that for you on our servers.

We expect to release CS-Cart SaaS for the general public by the end of this year. Until then, you can try it out for free in your own personal demo. Our personal demos are powered by CS-Cart SaaS already, so it'll give you a good picture of what we are going to offer.

You can find more information about CS-Cart SaaS and the pricing table in the official announcement in our blog.

You are welcome to discuss our new product in this thread.

Thanks!

[jackyboy]

I think that I would have let a little dust settle on 4.02 before i announced the big "surprise"

[jegesmaci]

Great work! I am very excited to see CS-Cart continue to grow.

[TonyK]

Where will the servers be hosted?

[tbirnseth]

Where will the servers be hosted?

Amazon S3 Cloud and CDN I think.
Also, would have expected the pricing to be same as the upgrade licensing (closer to $10/month for one store).

I think that I would have let a little dust settle on 4.02 before i announced the big "surprise"

First you have to get the tornado to stop blowing. Then you can worry about the dust.

This will be great for merchants who want zero customization of functionality or who do not need any back-end integration work. While the API exists, it is somewhat basic and most integrations that I've worked on require details not available via the API.

I'm understanding that addons from 3rd parties will be available after being certified by cs-cart (and probably following their model of releasing with each new version). However, I can't see how they can do this effectively. They can't even support their merchants and have never been able to offer true technical support to developers.

The biggest issue will be merchant support. If relying on helpdesk to solve issues, then the bankers hours and "we're too busy" responses simply won't fly for anyone trying to run a real business. 7X24X365 support with a minimum of 1hr response time is essential.

[hgl]

Amazon S3 Cloud and CDN I think.
Also, would have expected the pricing to be same as the upgrade licensing (closer to $10/month for one store).


First you have to get the tornado to stop blowing. Then you can worry about the dust.

This will be great for merchants who want zero customization of functionality or who do not need any back-end integration work. While the API exists, it is somewhat basic and most integrations that I've worked on require details not available via the API.

I'm understanding that addons from 3rd parties will be available after being certified by cs-cart (and probably following their model of releasing with each new version). However, I can't see how they can do this effectively. They can't even support their merchants and have never been able to offer true technical support to developers.

The biggest issue will be merchant support. If relying on helpdesk to solve issues, then the bankers hours and "we're too busy" responses simply won't fly for anyone trying to run a real business. 7X24X365 support with a minimum of 1hr response time is essential.

I bought an add on from you and it was days before you responded to my emails and your responses were very confusing. I finally ended up cancelling my order. I don't see how you can criticize someone else.

[TonyK]

If amazon then what region center?
USA would be a good guess, but I dont wanna guess.

Amazon S3 Cloud and CDN I think.
Also, would have expected the pricing to be same as the upgrade licensing (closer to $10/month for one store).

[tbirnseth]

I guess I feel I have enough experience on here to give my point of view about cs-cart history and their ability to support developers and merchants.

Edited by tbirnseth, 11 October 2013 - 12:43 AM.

[P-Pharma]

mhm, I really hope that this surprise does not negatively affect cs-cart 4. I'm worried.

[Darius]

It will, can you imagine how many people will like to try for free how this works, will be lazy to read manual and ask support questions that will not cost support credits..

[admin]

Hello everbody!

Thank you for your attention to CS-Cart SaaS.

On support point. It is quite the contrary, actually. Many of those who want to try CS-Cart can do it easily without handling all the installation and server configuration stuff. And most of the supports requests are related to these two areas - software installation and server configuring, this is where the most issues and questions lay.

This was the main reason for starting the personal demo service for our clients - to get rid of the issues which come to our support team periodically because of the huge number of different hosting companies and the same huge variety of possible differences in server-side software and its configurations which all may affect software behavior in result.

And this is one of the reasons to run SaaS and main SaaS benefits - no need to hassle with technical stuff.

Of course many of CS-Cart users need absolute control and have all the technical expertises required to choose a good hosting company, install the software there and manage possible issue. And CS-Cart downloadable is and will be a perfect solution for them.

But for those who do not have ones or who do not want to struggle with non ecommerce related problems we are to run the SaaS version of CS-Cart.

Guys, I want to ask you to keep your further comments related to the service itself: ask questions about it, propose ideas and suggestions. But please avoid repetitive assumptions and personal attacks. This does not bear any value to the forum readers.

If you have true interest in SaaS then it would be very helpful to get a tangible feedback. As mentioned earlier, CS-Cart SaaS is still in testing phase and we have some time to put more attention to the important points and functions before the service is launched officially.

Thank you!

[El Nucli]

Hi Vladimir,

I'd like to know what would be the implications for the resellers, and how will the SaaS model affect the Cs-cart business regarding the sales of licenses.

Regards,

[HappyFruitBat]

Hello kmolchanov and "admin", and thank you for your clearly written messages.

As UK based CS-Cart developers we're interested in the queries regarding data-centre location raised by TonyK, and further discussion of the degree to which customisation is possible.

Presuming it's hosted with Amazon S3 as suggested, then in which data-centre, or will this be an option?

Could you confirm the API will be available and continue to develop, and will it be possible to upload custom add-ons? What about simple my_changes style skin customisations (beyond what can be done in the admin)?

We appreciate that during beta not all details will be finalised, but if you let us know what you thinking then we can start considering how CS-Cart hosted might fit with our customer's requirements.

Best Regards, the Happy Fruit Bat

[admin]

Hi Marc,

Thanks for the good question.

Generally speaking, CS-Cart SaaS will not affect current reselling program anyhow. We are continuing to sign up new resellers and even plan to introduce a new grade of discounted price for bulk purchases of 50+ CS-Cart licenses.

As for SaaS reselling, most probably, we will run an affiliate program later when the service is mature enough to be actively promoted. As far as I know, reselling subscription plans is not a popular model of business for SaaS projects. So the affiliate program is the most probable our choice.

Also, we plan to launch a CS-Cart marketplace in a nearest time where our partners will be able to provide free and paid themes, add-ons, integration extensions for both CS-Cart SaaS and CS-Cart Downloadable users. CS-Cart SaaS is the driving force for the marketplace project.

And in terms of that CS-Cart SaaS brings some benefits to the licensed CS-Cart users and resellers.

[tbirnseth]

Vladimir,

What about availability of support for merchants? Note that for those not in your timezones, we usually experience a minimum of 24hour delay to any helpdesk inquiry.

Will there be real technical support for 3rd party developers? Helpdesk is not effective for development issues/questions/problems.

[ThomH]

This type of ecommerce isn't for serious companies, more for lazy people. See interspire models...
And there are doubts about the privacy... really do not want anyone to follow my or my customers business, even though it says it does not.

[tbirnseth]

Not for real ecommerce sites but it does create a long-term ongoing revenue stream. Look at web.com! They are making a killing by applying templates for small business customers and giving them instructions for how to add content. Same with 1and1 and many others. Don't have to "resell", but "upsell" is always an option (just ask GoDaddy).

[termalert]

Vladimir,
is this free trial ( via the SAAS announcement ) basically 4.0.2
and to confirm, is this the shopping cart we will have under the
cloud hosted scheme ?

[admin]

Hi termalert!

is this free trial ( via the SAAS announcement ) basically 4.0.2
and to confirm, is this the shopping cart we will have under the
cloud hosted scheme ?

Yes, trial personal demos are based on the latest official CS-Cart release which is 4.0.2 at the time.

When the new version of CS-Cart is released, SaaS(personal demos for now) accounts will be upgraded automatically if there are no any template conflicts(a conflict means that the same template was modified by storeowner and was updated in a new version as well).

If there are conflicts then the upgrade system will offer storeowner to work out all the template issues on the automatically created temporary copy of the store.

[tbirnseth]

What about availability of support for merchants? Note that for those not in your timezones, we usually experience a minimum of 24hour delay to any helpdesk inquiry.

Will there be real technical support for 3rd party developers? Helpdesk is not effective for development issues/questions/problems.

These don't require research, they are policy and operations questions. I fail to understand why anyone at cs-cart won't answer these.