ECommerce – WooCommerce 2.0 is released!

WooCommerce 2.0 (code name Daring Dassie) has been released. According to WooThemes, Version 2.0 is the start of a new era for Woocommerce….

After experiencing issues with several other Shopping Cart plugins, I ‘re discovered’ WooCommerce about 12 months ago and fell in love with it. This doesn’t mean that it’s the ‘be all and end all’ of shopping carts but it’s pretty good and typically works “right out of the box”. One of the features I like best is that there is documentation on hooks and filters which allow developers (like us) to enhance the look and feel of the cart.

WooCommerce 2.0 see’s some pretty major code changes and some visual ones as well including:

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• a redesigned product data panel
• easier email templating – something I’m pretty chuffed over as we often want to edit the emails that go out on purchase
• improved pagination and sorting on the customer product screens
• realtime checkout validation – meaning that purchasers won’t submit the checkout page and then be told there is an issue
• session handling – to address some of the issues experienced using PHP sessions
• code has been optimised to reduce memory usage and improve load time

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Don’t worry if some that went over you head – some of it is for the techies amongst us.

WooCommerce 2.0 is a major update

Now before you head off and click ‘update’ in wp-admin – make sure you are ready for the update and that you’ve tested it on a development site and know what needs to be done to ensure your production site stays working.

Having a sound backup strategy is imperative before upgrading.  We use and recommend Backup Buddy to create the backup and to replicate your site to a development site for testing purposes.

Once you upgrade WooCommerce to Version 2.0, the data in your database will be converted to the new data structure and there is no going back…. so be very sure before clicking the update button on your production site.

We will be testing thoroughly before doing any updates on our own or client sites.

WooThemes offer some excellent advice about preparing your site for WooCommerce 2.0 and, if you aren’t sure, we are able to help you with the WooCommerce update (request help via our helpdesk)

Celebrate the Release of WooCommerce 2.0

[box type=”note” size=”large” style=”rounded” border=”full” icon=”none”]To celebrate the release of WooCommerce 2.0, use coupon code WC2LAUNCH on the purchase of any WooCommerce extension and receive a 25% discount until midnight Friday, 8th March 2013 (UTC)[/box]

Want to see some WooCommerce Shopping Carts in action?

Here are just some sites where we have installed and configured WooCommerce:

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