[iSenseLabs Weekly 58] New OpenCart Features & Fixes, Video Tutorials and Latest E-Commerce News
If you haven’t already heard of the new ProductBundles 4.0 release, we’ll show you all the new features and improvements the extension has to offer now.
The other major updates we released are for SEO Backpack and ExcelPort.
We’re trying to make big progress with those extensions lately as we see the big impact they are making for a lot of OpenCart stores out there.
If you have been using some of those extensions and think something might be missing, feel free to share in the comments down below!
ProductBundles 4.0 (OC 2.0.x to 2.3.x)
New Feature: Redesigned admin panel. Now with new views for adding/editing bundles, with more flexibility and easier management
New Feature: Refactored bundle creation. Now works independently from OpenCart settings table, which provide us the opportunity to add more features without sacrificing the number of bundles that can be stored in the store at once
New Feature: Migrator - Can import your bundles from older versions of ProductBundles to the new release
New Feature: "Discount Type" - Now you can choose between setting discounts by fixed value or by percentage
New Feature: Added "Date Availability" option for each bundle. From now on you can decide on a date, from which the bundle discount to be active
New Feature: Added "Status" option for each bundle. You can enable/disable the bundles, just like the regular products in OpenCart
New Feature: Added "Description" option for each bundle. The option has multi-lingual support
New Feature: Added "Sort Order" field for each bundle
New Feature: Added "Quantity" field when adding a product in a bundle in the admin panel, allowing for easier bundle creation if the given bundle combo contains more than one quantity of the product you are trying to add
New Feature: Added SEO slug field for each bundle. Useful if you use SEO URLs and want the single bundle to have SEO-friendly accessible URL address
New Feature: The module is fully translated and each string is placed in the corresponding language files in `admin` and `catalog` folders for easier translation on any language
New Feature: Shows the name of the bundles which were added in the cart in the total info displayed in the shopping cart
New Feature: A warning in the admin panel which will be displayed if you did not enabled the order total extension, which is responsible for the discount applying in the cart
New Feature: The order total module now shows the name of the bundle(s) if there are such in the shopping cart
New Feature: Added option to show/hide the description of the bundle in the widget
New Feature: Added option to show/hide the description of the bundle in the listing page
New Feature: Added option to show/hide the description of the bundle in the single bundle view page
Improvement: The order total module now has a check for multi-store websites
Improvement: Refactored the helpers in the admin panel for better understanding of the features of the module
Improvement: The "Show Random Bundles" option is now moved to the "Widget" settings, since it is applicable only for the widget on the front-end part of the store
Bug fix: The "Display Type" option in for the widget settings is now working correctly
Bug fix: "Show Random Bundles" feature is working again
Bug fix: When there are 2 widgets on 1 page, two click events occurred
Bug fix: Multi-store-link issue in the admin panel
Bug fix: SEO links compatibility fix for OpenCart 2.3.x
Bug fix: Fixed small issue with the support/activate license page
Bug fix: Minor fixes in the installation instructions
ProductBundles 4.1 (OC 2.0.x to 2.3.x)
New Feature: Added filter in the admin panel for the bundles. You can search by name, products in bundle, discount value or status
Bug fix: Fixed the checking query for the bundle display in the category pages in the front-end
Bug fix: Fixed Summernote (the new ckeditor) description saving for the bundles in the admin panel
SEO Backpack 2.1 (OC 2.0.1.x - 3.x)
New feature: Added new tab, called "Advanced Editor". You can use this to edit all SEO fields (meta title, meta description, meta keywords, SEO keyword) right on the spot. There are also filters included in the page, which you can use to simplify the process
New feature: Added [lang] short-code for the SEO URL generation. Now you can add "en", "fr", "de", "ru" or the code name of your language to the URL string of your products, categories, manufacturers and information pages
New feature: Added ".html" string support in the SEO URLs for the products, categories, manufacturers and information pages
Improvement: The database tables, which SEO Backpack needs, will now be created right after the "Install" button is clicked
Improvement: The module now remembers the current opened tab in the module, so when you refresh the page you will be taken to the same place you were before the refresh action
Improvement: Added checks for when the products are corrupted or are with missing names or descriptions
Improvement: Modified the installation instructions file, which now includes information that you should not use this product alongside other SEO modules
Improvement: Modified the installation instructions file, which now includes information about .htaccess and how you should set it up prior to the installation of the module
Improvement: Small design changes in the admin panel
Bug fix: Fixed minor issue with the percentage calculation for the SEO Score
Bug fix: Added checks for the "Fix"/"Generate" buttons if the store does not have any information pages, manufacturers, categories or products
ExcelPort 2.5.3 (OC 2.0.x to 2.3.x)
Improvement: Invalid product attributes no longer exported.
Improvement: Better option name detection during product import.
Improvement: Better detection of OpenStock product option value names during product import.
Improvement: Better OpenStock option combination detection.
Improvement: Better compatibility with OpenStock.
Improvement: Faster product option import in Bulk mode.
Bug fix: Affiliate ID filter in Orders export is now working.
Bug fix: Meta sheet in product bulk export is no longer mixed up.
ExcelPort 1.11.3 (OC 1.5.1.3 - 1.5.6.4)
Improvement: Invalid product attributes no longer exported.
Improvement: Better option name detection during product import.
Improvement: Better detection of OpenStock product option value names during product import.
Improvement: Faster product option import in Bulk mode.
Bug fix: Affiliate ID filter in Orders export is now working.
Bug fix: Meta sheet in product bulk export is no longer mixed up.
ProductManager 3.1.1 (OC 2.0.x - 2.3.x)
Bug fix: Licensing
WhatsAppShare 2.3.4 (OC 2.x)
Improvement: Escaped the WhatsApp message content.
Bug fix: Added check if the function is_device_mobile exists.
CustomerPhotos 3.3.5 (OC 2.0.x - 2.3.x)
Bug fix: Fixed missing modulePath variable in ocmod file.
Bug fix: FIxed wrong url routes applicable for OpenCart 2.3
CustomPageBackground 2.3 (OC 2.0.x - 2.3.x)
New Feature: Apply backgrounds also on pages where part of their URL matches
Bonus Section: Our Favorite Articles of the Week
Constant Content: The Silver Bullet for Failing Content Marketing Strategy
By Moz
Producing engaging content constantly is what all agencies and companies are struggling with. Being on top all the time requires an endless flow of creativity and unique techniques, which is the marketer’s Utopia. Still, it’s not something we should consider impossible. Moz dig deep into some different ways to establish a constant content strategy that stimulates variety, which is what all consumers want.
Homepage SEO Best Practices (with 16 Examples)
By Green Flag Digital
One of the first things that probably come to your mind when someone says SEO and homepage in one sentence are keywords. Well, it should actually be speed. What users want is to see the website load fast at first, not a bunch of words stuffed together. With that said, we don’t diminish the importance of keywords. View this article to see the smartest practices for using them in your homepage.
How to Use Customer Testimonials to Generate 62% More Revenue From Every Customer, Every Visit
By Bigcommerce
Receiving a positive customer testimonial for one of your products is always a happy moment and you want to experience that as often as possible. Well, there’s a way you can do that by actually using every great review you get to stimulate other customers to purchase more and thus share their positive experiences as well.
iSenseLabs Videos
Discounts vs. Specials in OpenCart 2.x
Pick of the Week
Trello is one of the most popular project management applications named “one of the coolest startups you haven’t heard of yet” by Wired magazine. It’s web-based and extremely easy to use.
