[iSenseLabs Weekly 57] New OpenCart Features & Fixes, Video Tutorials and Latest E-Commerce News

This is one of the strongest weeks we’ve had so far, as far as updating OpenCart extensions goes.

Our dev team took their time and made some of the most demanded improvements lately, especially for NitroPack, Promotions, and NotifyWhenAvailable.

The second major highlight is the new version of SEO Backpack, which includes manuals and instructions, among other improvements and fixes.

After all of those updates, we’re looking forward to a relaxing weekend. Hope you have one as well!

NitroPack 1.8.6 & 2.5.6 (OC 1.5.6.x & OC 2.3.x)

Improvement: Better support for optional HTML tags and repeated HTML, HEAD and BODY tags

Improvement: Automatically hide the JavaScript defer option if combine inline JavaScript is set to No, because in that case deferring JavaScript is automatically turned off, regardless of the setting

Improvement: Make the maintenance mode notice globally visible in NitroPack's panel to better inform when page cache will not be active

Improvement: A more reliable way to scan for image dimensions using cookies and handling responses that start with a BOM character

Bug fix: Maintenance mode detection for multi-store was not working - now it is

Bug fix: The image optimizer was not hooking properly in some cases

Bug fix: Resolve an array to string conversion issue when clearing all caches

SEO Backpack 2.0.1 (OC 2.0.1.x - 3.0.x)

Improvement: Added instructions for manual installation of the module

Improvement: Added uninstallation instructions

Improvement: Added upgrade instructions for the Extension Installer and manual upgrade

Improvement: Decreased the max characters for SEO URL from 400 to 200, since some browsers may not be able to load that long URL

Improvement: Added loader when the pagination is used in the Auto-Links view

Improvement: Added loader when the pagination is used in the Custom URLs view

Improvement: Added loader when the pagination is used in the Search Engine Analytics view

Improvement: The module will not rename the image 'no_image.png' in order to avoid errors showing that the image does not exist, but was assigned to a product

Improvement: Added instructions to temporary disable & enable the module in case of unexpected errors

Improvement: Stripping tags and decoding the HTML characters for the description field in the structured data

Bug fix: Fixes for the generation of SEO URLs regarding unexpected/not supported characters by the browsers

Bug fix: Fix for the getSiteName() functionality if you are running multilingual installation on your store

Bug fix: Added `escape` function for the contents in meta title, description and keyword tags for the products

Bug fix: Added `escape` function for the contents in meta title, description and keyword tags for the categories

Bug fix: Added `escape` function for the contents in meta title, description and keyword tags for the information pages

Bug fix: Fixed issue with image renamer when it is showing that the image does not exist if it is located in the base of the 'image' folder

Bug fix: Added checks for categories, products and information pages generation of meta tags when the queries for that specific entity does not return any data (e.g. the product is not correctly saved, some of the data is missing or your table is corrupt)

NotifyWhenAvailable 2.8 (OC 2.0.1.x - 3.0.x)

New feature: Export separately the waiting listing and the notified clients

Bug fix: Created custom method in the catalog for getting the current store

Bug fix: Changed function names for listing and single products

Bug fix: Replaced $this->config->get('config_language') to $this->session->data['language'] in the catalog

Bug fix: Check if $('#button-cart') exists before using it

Improvement: Using config files for better cross-version support

Compatible with OpenCart 3.0.0.0

Promotions 2.2 (OC 2.0.3.x - 3.0.x)

New Feature: Option to skip discounts on products with specials

New Feature: Option to skip discounts on condition products

New Feature: Multilingual promotion name

Bug fix: Order total calculations

Improvement: Admin panel improvements

Compatible with OpenCart 3.0.0.0

iProductVideo 4.1.4 (OC 2.0.1.x - 3.0.x)

Bug fix: Fixed return_bytes method

Bug fix: Renamed the iProductVideo library file to lower case letters due to OpenCart requirements

Bug fix: Selector fixes for the tabs

Bug fix: Select the first local video automatically

Improvement: Stylesheet changes

Improvement: Moved constructors to new methods.

Compatible with OpenCart 3.0.0.0

Compatible with Journal 2.9.3

HowDidYouHearAboutUs 2.3.9 (OC 2.x)

Bug fix: Escaped the text added in the Other Source field.

Bug fix: The Show Other Sources table is shown correctly.

iAnalytics 3.3.2 (OC 2.0.x - 2.3.x)

Improvement: Added multi-lingual support.

Bonus Section: Our Favorite Articles of the Week

The Conversion Funnel: How to Keep the Pipeline Flowing

By KlientBoost

The 5 stages of the conversion funnel all come with certain standards and techniques you need to follow in order to get the most of the traffic your E-Commerce store is generating. In this post, KlientBoost have shared a bit about how to optimize each step of the funnel so you give your users a tempting user experience which will not only make them into customers but also into promoters of your product or service.

How to Improve Mobile UX with Digital Wallets

By ConversionXL

Digital wallets are a simplified method for one-click or expedited mobile checkout by saving consumer credit card information on a device or through a platform. The growth rate of mobile commerce is pushing for serious advancements in security, since this is the #1 fear for consumers - personal & payment information safety while shopping on mobile.

Using Personalization To Increase AOV And Conversion Rates

By VWO

If you know little about personalization then you know how critical it is to the success of E-Commerce stores. One of the first things with personalization is that you have to know your customers and segment them into different groups. Tracking customer activity can give you a perspective on how they interact with your site, what interests them and what actions you can take to improve their experience so they increase their average order size and conversion rates.

What to Expect in OpenCart 3.0

By iSenseLabs

OpenCart 3.0 is about to be released very soon and it comes with some very serious improvements and new features. This time around, the team behind the open-source platform has taken their time and really made a huge step forward in the development of OpenCart. There’s a rich history of store owners from other platforms switching to OpenCart and we believe those numbers are yet to grow significantly.

Pick of the Week

Cupcake is one of the most unique places for free photos we’ve found so far. We’re planning to take advantage of their work in the future and so should you. Check them out!