Documentation Home

# Welcome to Zen Cart®

Dear Zen Cart® User,

Zen Cart® is made available to you for your use, addition, changes, modification, etc. without charge, under Version 2 of the GNU General Public License.

While we do not charge for this software, donations are greatly appreciated, each time you install a new version, to help cover the expenses of maintenance, upgrades, updates, the free support forum and the continued development of this software for your online E-Commerce store.

Donations can be made on the Zen Cart® Team Page

We appreciate your support.
The Zen Cart® Team

# About PHP versions

Zen Cart® v1.5.6 is designed for PHP 5.6 to 7.3, with MySQL 5.1 to 5.7 (or MariaDB 10.0-10.2) and Apache 2.2/2.4

While it is compatible with PHP 5.4.9 through PHP 7.3, for backward-compatibility while upgrading your site, you should be using a newer version whenever possible. As of the time of writing this, PHP 5.6 is considered obsolete. and you should be using PHP 7.1 or greater.

# Upgrade Instructions

This document only mentions the actual changes specific to v1.5.6 since v1.5.5.

## From v1.5.5

If you are already using v1.5.5 and *have NOT customized or altered* any of the files listed in the changed_files-v1-5-6.html document, then simply replace those files with the new files as listed.

If you have *have customized or altered* certain files, simply re-do your customizations in the new version of those particular files by making the same changes needed.

If you are using Addons/Plugins that have made alterations to those files, it is best to compare those changed files against the original Zen Cart files for the version those plugins were built for, and see what changes were there ... and then re-build those changes in the v1.5.6 file.

## To v1.5.6 from v1.5.4 or older

If you are upgrading from a version OLDER than v1.5.5, then please do a standard site upgrade. Be sure to review all the links in this article, including tips on staging the upgrade in a separate directory/folder.

# CHANGELOG - List of Changed Files

For a list of files that have been changed since v1.5.5, see the changed_files-v1-5-6.html document.

# A Note About Upgrading to the New Responsive Classic Template Added in v1.5.5

While Zen Cart® v1.5.5/v1.5.6 contains a newer "responsive_classic" template, we STRONGLY recommend that upgraders first upgrade the site using everything (including template_default) EXCEPT the contents of responsive_classic template.

Then once the upgraded site is working properly you can consider what changes you might want to make to your own active template.

(Important notes about template_default are shown below)

AGAIN: The responsive_classic template should NOT be implemented immediately as part of an upgrade; it should be a separate step ... if it is even used at all.

It is not NECESSARY to use responsive_classic ON YOUR EXISTING SITE, and you should UPGRADE THE REST OF YOUR SITE FIRST before attempting to convert/adapt it for use.

# Upgrader Notes About Changes to template_default

Upgraders should make sure they update *BOTH* template_default *AND* their custom templates as described here

In Zen Cart the template_default directory contains the master copy of all storefront page templates.

The normal procedure for customizing template files for use in your own personalized template is to make a copy of the corresponding file from template_default, put it into your own template folder (and matching folder structure), and make your customizations in that copy of the file.

This way the only files you need in your personalized template folder are those that you have altered in some way from template_default.

With that explained, it is important that whenever you upgrade your site, you should also inspect ALL the template_default files to determine which changes in those files need to be replicated in your customized files.

Often a tool like Beyond Compare or Araxis Merge or GnuDiff can be helpful for this.

The process is simple: compare the template_default directory files from your *old* version against the template_default files in the *new* version, and use those results as a reference to copy those updated changes into each of the files you have customized in your custom/personalized template in your store.

Then, and only after you have done all those comparisons and updated your customized files in your custom template folder, you will copy the template_default files from the new version into the template_default directory of your store. This way you will be left with updated personalized files *and* updated template_default files.

This way you will be left with updated personalized files *and* updated template_default files.

# What's New ... Changes from v1.5.5f to v1.5.6

### The most notable improvements and bugfixes in v1.5.6 since v1.5.5 include:

- Core - Updated dozens of files for compatibility with PHP 7.2, and 7.3
- Admin - Sales-Report graphs on Admin dashboard
- Checkout - customer confirmation emails now include customer delivery telephone number
- Checkout - Square Payment support is now built-in. Start taking credit card payments in just 5 minutes! See www.zen-cart.com/partners/square_setup
- Admin - Reworded "in stock"/"out of stock" to "enabled"/"disabled" on product-edit pages due to popular request
- Admin - Most of the Admin pages have received styling updates for consistency and improved support for smaller screens (credits @Zen4All)
- Admin - Admin pages now show their name in browser tabs, instead of generic "Admin"
- Admin - Order pages now have some observer hooks to allow plugins to display "more data" with less code-changes
- Admin - GV Queue indicator in Admin Header bar can be enabled/disabled in GV Module settings
- Coupon new features added: search, export, reactivate, delete duplicates, clone existing coupons
- Coupons can now be restricted to amount of an order or of a specific product
- Coupons can now be restricted to customers having a specified number of previous purchases
- Coupons can now be restricted to products not on sale
- Coupons restrictions can now be bulk-added via manufacturer filter
- Coupon Usage Report added
- Template - CSS spans added around product-qty min/max/unit output, so that these items can be selectively hidden if needed. (Credits @lat9)
- Template - Compatibility updates to accommodate OnePageCheckout plugin integration
- Core: Added language-change notifier hooks
- Enhancement - Updated database to store more order-related data for easier order-reconstruction. This can help allow plugins to do more with completed order details.
- Enhancement - File-Uploading now gives more detailed feedback about failures related to invalid file types.
- Fixed - date display on Admin warning about log data is now formatted with store's default date format
- Mobile - Updated embedded MobileDetect to latest version
- Email - Updated embedded PHPMailer to latest version
- Utility - CurlTester has more links to external diagnostic tools, including TLS Testing verification
- Utility - Plugin version-check utility optimized to allow specific version-comparisons, and adapt to timeouts more quickly.
- DB: Remove unused basket 'final_price' field from database
- Removed old sagepay_form payment module, and old authorizenet_echeck payment module.
- All known v1.5.5 bugfixes and security fixes are included in v1.5.6
- ... and numerous other small improvements to make things work faster, sleeker, smarter and be easier to use

A lengthy detailed list of individual code changes can be viewed on github

^^ Back to Top ^^

# Help and Support

For additional help and support, visit the Zen Cart® FAQ and the Zen Cart® Support Forum.

Zen Cart® is derived from: Copyright 2003 osCommerce
This program is distributed in the hope that it will be useful, but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY;
without even the implied warranty of MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE
and is redistributable under Version 2 of the GNU General Public License.

This software is OSI Certified Open Source Software.
OSI Certified is a certification mark of the Open Source Initiative.

Copyright 2003 - 2018 Zen Ventures, LLC
Zen Cart®
www.zen-cart.com