Hi Guys,
Ive been working on nop for a while now and im struggleing a little bit with the login system. If i want my users not to have to login at all when they make a purchase how would i go about this. I have managed to reprogram some of it, but every time i manage to remove one aspect of the login to purchess system it keep cropping up in other areas.
Cheers
Joe.
Purchasing without logging in?
MVP
- 751
- 4113
- 1/24/2009
- United Kingdom
Because the login/membership/profiling is such a fundamental part of the web application, as you have found out, it is linked into many different areas.
I'm sure you have a good reason for not requiring a login so I would explain how I would go about a solution.
Rather than reprogramming nop to not require a login, I would leave it how it is. Instead, I would simulate what would happen if a user had logged in before proceeding to the checkout. What you could do is, when the user want's to go to the checkout, you automatically create a "default user" on the fly and log in authenticate as this user. You can use a unique GUID for the username so that every 'anonymous' user is still unique in some way. As it will be the first purchase for the new user they will have to fill out their shipping/billing address as normal before finally submitting their order. Upon order completion you could then logout the user.
Of course this method does have the disadvantage that you are going to end up with lots of users (1 for each purchase) in your database. If you wanted you could always create a helper app that backs up the db then clears down these records every x number of days/weeks/years.
Alternatively, if your aim is to just streamline the purchasing process (by not requiring your users to "sign up" first) you could still use the above method but after their first purchase, automatically create a user account for them and email them the credentials (that they can use for future purchases). This has the advantage that they do not have to go through the "hassle" of registering and gives them the option to log in next time so they don't have to fill out shipping/billing address info (much more hassle) for their next purchase.
Hope that helps....
I'm sure you have a good reason for not requiring a login so I would explain how I would go about a solution.
Rather than reprogramming nop to not require a login, I would leave it how it is. Instead, I would simulate what would happen if a user had logged in before proceeding to the checkout. What you could do is, when the user want's to go to the checkout, you automatically create a "default user" on the fly and log in authenticate as this user. You can use a unique GUID for the username so that every 'anonymous' user is still unique in some way. As it will be the first purchase for the new user they will have to fill out their shipping/billing address as normal before finally submitting their order. Upon order completion you could then logout the user.
Of course this method does have the disadvantage that you are going to end up with lots of users (1 for each purchase) in your database. If you wanted you could always create a helper app that backs up the db then clears down these records every x number of days/weeks/years.
Alternatively, if your aim is to just streamline the purchasing process (by not requiring your users to "sign up" first) you could still use the above method but after their first purchase, automatically create a user account for them and email them the credentials (that they can use for future purchases). This has the advantage that they do not have to go through the "hassle" of registering and gives them the option to log in next time so they don't have to fill out shipping/billing address info (much more hassle) for their next purchase.
Hope that helps....
