NopCommerce offers a wide range of plugins, which have been submitted by nopCommerce developers and other nopCommerce teams.
These plugins are all available in the nopCommerce marketplace.
Here are some interesting facts about nopCommerce
We will be introducing some of the most useful features of nopCommerce before we get into more detail about this eCommerce development tool.
NopCommerce is an eCommerce platform that was created by a group of passionate software developers and graphic designers based out Yaroslavl in Russia.
The first version was released in October 2008. NopCommerces first version was released in October 2008.
The many extensions, plug-ins and themes that it offers eCommerce owners allow them to market their site, personalize and update their e-commerce website, and improve the user experience.
Other eCommerce platforms use Perl or PHP, but nopCommerce is written entirely in ASP.Net 4.0. Its back-end is supported with Microsoft SQL Server, an extremely powerful database management platform.
NopCommerce is a combination of commercial and open-source software. Its easy to configure, highly-scalable, and secure.
NopCommerces notable accomplishments include its download of more than 1,700,000.000 times and use by 50,000 online shops in August 2018.
It was also a recipient of prestigious awards such as the PacktPub Open-Source Award and the CMS Critics Award.
Lets now discuss some of the benefits of nopCommerce. These are:
1. Open Source
It is free because nopCommerce is open-source. You dont need to pay anything for the source code. Microsoft SQL Server Express Edition, which is the backend support for nopCommerce, can also be downloaded free of charge.
You can also download the enhanced edition SQL Server to improve your websites performance.
NopCommerce is free to use, which helps to significantly reduce the cost of eCommerce website development.
NopCommerce is free but there are always updates and support for it. The support team, which includes developers, graphic designers, and support staff, is committed to providing assistance to developers and owners of businesses using the platform.
They tirelessly work to uphold the highest standards of nopCommerce, and offer a powerful digital solution for eCommerce owners at no cost.
NopCommerces other advantage is its ease of installation. It doesnt require any technical knowledge or a higher quality computer to install it.
Microsoft Web Platform Installer will help you install it easily.
2. Mobile Commerce Supported
Currently, mobile commerce sales make up more than desktop sales. This is despite the fact that the latter is expected to grow in the future.
This trend is not something eCommerce sellers can afford to ignore.
An eCommerce business owner should have a mobile version. NopCommerce makes it easy to create a mobile version of your website in no time.
Its responsive templates allow you to scale up and adapt easily to different devices and screen sizes. The templates are also able to optimize site content for different browsers.
NopCommerce makes it simple to manage your websites desktop and mobile versions from one admin control. You can quickly increase your business visibility to both desktop and mobile users with NopCommerce.
3. It is easy to customize and manage
NopCommerce uses ASP.NET core, which many developers are familiar with. It is easy to hire nopCommerce developers who have the right expertise to build and customize your eCommerce website.
The nopCommerce administration panel allows for easy website management. You can customize your store with many options that are available through the panel.
NopCommerce supports eCommerce with a custom-designed shopping cart and a catalog-based front-end to list products.
NopCommerces modular pluggable architecture allows developers to add features and elements dynamically in the run-time.
NopCommerce offers many plug-ins to give your website a unique, distinctive and attractive look.
B2B eCommerce shops require product information to be available to enterprises that buy products. NopCommerce allows B2B eCommerce store owners to define up 60 properties per product.
4. SEO Oriented
SEO is essential for eCommerce shops to rank higher in search engine results pages. This will allow for increased site visibility and more traffic.
NopCommerce offers SEO-friendly features such as customized URLs and keyword tags, sitemap support, social meta tags, integration with Google Analytics, and support for custom URLs.
NopCommerce allows business owners to localize URLs. This increases the likelihood of their search results being found in different languages.
Search engines can easily find pages on a site with HTML and XML site support. Integration with Google Analytics allows owners to track and improve the performance of their website.
5. Multiple Store Support
NopCommerce platform allows store owners to manage multiple stores from one nopCommerce installation. Online stores can be hosted on multiple domains and managed from one nopCommerce administration tool.
Each store has its own database that allows customers to log into any of the stores using their credentials. You can also share product attributes, promotional information, and catalogue-centric data between multiple stores.
NopCommerce allows you to set up different features for each store such as products per store and newsletters per shop, graphical themes per site, content per store, and so on.
Multi-store option allows store owners and marketers to quickly set up micro-sites that promote their products and link to the main store.
This feature is particularly useful when you have both B2B or B2C shops.
Plugin Structure for nopCommerce
All plugin projects containing source code must be saved in the Plugins folder within your nopCommerce app folder.
It is best to name plugin projects as "Nop.Plugin.Group". Name".
A compiled plugin must be stored inside \Presentation\Nop.Web\Plugins folder. This folder is where nopCommerce searches for plugins to load into its application at runtime.
Each plugin must contain a "plugin.json" file in its directory. This file is used by nopCommerce to determine if a plugin is compatible.
You can also include a "logo.jpg" file with the plugin. This is used to display a picture of the plugin whenever it is needed.
Take a look at this table to learn more about plugin.json.
Both plugin.json as well logo.jpg files should be marked "Content" to indicate "Build Action", and "Copy Always" to indicate "Copy To Output Directory" properties.
Steps to Create a Basic NopCommerce 4.20 Plugin
Step 1
Double-click on the "NopCommerce.sln" file to open NopCommerce project using Visual Studio.
Step 2
Navigate to the "Solution Explorer" folder and right-click on the "Plugins" folder. Click on "Add > New Project".
Step 3
Select "Class Library (.NET Core")" from the "Add a New Project" window and click "Next".
Step 4
Enter a descriptive project name for your nopCommerce plugin development project.
We will use "Nop.Plugin.Misc.BasicPlugin" for this sample project, as shown in the below image.
NOTE Your plugin project must be in the Plugins directory of your nopCommerce project director.
Step 5
Optional: Right-click your plugin project in Visual Studio to go to Properties. As shown below, you can confirm that Target Framework has been set up to ".NET Core 2.2".
Step 6
Your plugin project.csproj file is now open. Right-click the plugin project that you have just created and click "Edit project file."
Step 7
In your .csproj file, set "OutputPath", "OutDir" and "CopyLocalLockFileAssemblies".
Step 8
Right-click your plugin project and go to Add >New item
Step 9
As shown below, add a plugin.json to the file.
Step 10
Right-click the plugin.json file you have just added, and then go to properties.
Step 11
Visual Studio plugin.json file properties should be set to "Build Action" and "Copy To Output Directory" respectively.
Step 12
Add content to your plugin.json file.
Notification
This article may contain plugin.json files.
Step 13
Right-click your plugin project to go to Add > Classes
Step 14
You have the option to give your new class a meaningful name. We chose to name our class "BasicPlugin.cs", and then click on the Add button.
Step 15
The image below shows how your newly added class should look.
Step 16
Right-click "Dependencies", in your plugin project, and click "Add Reference".
Step 17
Go to Projects > Solution in the "Reference Manager", and choose "Nop.Web.Framework".
Notification
After nopCommerce version 4.10, you dont have to add additional projects. The Nop.Web.Framework includes a reference to all projects that came out of the box.
Step 18
After you have added Nop.Web.Framework to Dependencies, go into its properties and change "Copy Local" to "No" as shown in the below image.
Step 19
Next, inherit the class that you created in step #14 using "BasePlugin" class.
Step 20
Once you have inherit the "BasePlugin" class, add override for Install or Uninstall methods as shown below.
Step 21
Right-click your project to build it as shown below.
Step 22
Start your project module, then log in to the /Admin area. After logging in, navigate to Configuration > Local plugins.
Step 23
Navigate to the local plugins page and click the "Install" button, as shown below.
Step 24
After you click on the "Install" button, youll see buttons at top of your local plugins pages. To complete your plugin installation, click on "Restart mobile Application to Apply Changes" as shown in the below image.
More than 80% of customers conduct online research before purchasing major items. However, B2B eCommerce is different.
An average buyer will go through 12 searches before placing an order. The customers needs are more important when the sales volume is higher. Your B2B website must be different from other websites in order to gain more business.
B2B eCommerce development process involves several stages and may require multiple development team management with different skills.
These websites must have essential components that are specific to each business sector. It is important to receive practical advice before you start the actual work of setting up an eCommerce portal for B2B.
nopCommerce CMS plugin
DP CMS 1.6, the latest nopCommerce CMS release, offers many out-of-the box features.
DP CMS is an affordable and extensible choice for all your nopCommerce projects.
These are the features included as standard in DP CMS we think you will love. The DP CMS is open to all kinds of customizations and extensions.
Flexibility: With the DP CMS, it is possible to create any type website: a photoblog or personal blog, a portfolio website, a business website, a community website, a news website, or a government website.
Simple Theme System: You can make it beautiful using themes
Extension with Plugins: You can extend your site with plugins.
Search Engine Optimized: DPCM is optimized for search engines straight out of the box.
Multilingual Content
Simple Installation and Upgrades
Importers: Are you unhappy with your website or blog software? Your blog is hosted on a service thats closing down.
DP CMS offers Sync plugin for importing data from an external DataSource. We make it easy to move if you are ready.
Search: DP CMS offers a Search plugin that uses the lightning-fast, open-source enterprise search platforms.
DP CMS Smart Search offers relevant results, flexibility and ease-of use.
Developer Features
Developers will find plenty of useful stuff under the hood. You can use these goodies to expand DP CMS in any direction you like.
Plugin System.
Theme system.
Custom Content Types The default content types in DP CMS areHowever, you can add code to create custom taxonomies and types.
You can take DP CMS wherever you want.
Finding a nopCommerce developer can be likened to finding a reliable contractor.
How do you make informed decisions? Here are some tips to help you trace your nopCommerce wizards.
Most people will begin by searching the internet and hire a nopCommerce developer. You will be amazed at the number of companies offering nopCommerce development services or claiming to offer them.
How can you sort through all the results to find the best?
You can first check if the companies youve found on Google are nopCommerce partner. Go to the nopCommerce partners page.
Here you can find a complete list of all current partners. Silver and gold partnerships are paid. Your companies may not be ranked among the top partners but that does not make them less valuable.
Gold partners are placed higher than silver partners. Companies decide whether they will pay more for the gold partnership or the silver one, depending on what benefits they want.
You may be wondering what the benefits include: access to sales leads, dedicated newsletter drops, discounts on premium nopCommerce support etc. Simple answer: paying for nopCommerce partner is proof of a companys dedication over time to the system.
You can also find some very useful information from the profiles of your partners. Here are some things to look out for:
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How long they have been a partner in nopCommerce. No one will pay years of fees if they arent serious about their nopCommerce business.
But dont confuse the number of years that a company has been in partnership with how long they have been in business. We have six years of partnership but have been contributing to the system and developing products since 2011.
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The number of certified developers the company ownsA nopCommerce certified programme requires that a developer take a test to demonstrate their knowledge and skills in the system.
To pass the test and receive the certificate, they must score at least 80%. As a sign that they are proficient with the system, companies offering products or services through nopCommerce often ask their developers to take this test.
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The plugins and themes that a partner has created for nopCommerce. Dont rely on numbers alone. Take a closer look at the products that a company offers in the nopCommerce marketplace.
How many reviews have they received? The quality of its products can give you a good idea about a company.
Conclusion
You now know how to create a plugin in nopCommerce 4.20. A plugin is a great option if you need to upgrade nopcommerce services.
Its also less expensive. However, its more expensive to write a plugin than to customize nopCommerce source code.
