Below is the compilation of the Best Opensource Shopping cart systems that are available on the web as of 2010 !

osCommerce is a free, open source online shop software. The default installation includes a large number of features that you can easily enable and configure. You can easily install osCommerce on your website with the help of the Fantastico auto-installer. With osCommerce shopping cart you can add multiple products on your site, organize them in categories, set discounts and special promotions. osCommerce allows you to set your prices in different currencies and accept all popular payment methods: PayPal, credit cards, cheques. osCommerce has a built-in shipping and tax functionalities.

website: http://www.oscommerce.com/

CREloaded project is built on the source code of osCommerce but it has extra contributions installed. It offers powerful shopping cart solutions in Standard, Pro and Pro B2B editions. With CREloaded you have the ability to distribute coupon codes, the template system is better, and you have an affiliate manager

Read the rest of this entry »

About
MySQL is currently the most popular open source database server in existence. On top of that, it is very commonly used in conjunction with PHP scripts to create powerful and dynamic server-side applications.

MySQL has been criticized in the past for not supporting all the features of other popular and more expensive DataBase Management Systems. However, MySQL continues to improve with each release (currently version 5), and it has become widely popular with individuals and businesses of many different sizes.

What is a Database?
A database is a structure that comes in two flavors: a flat database and a relational database. A relational database is much more oriented to the human mind and is often preferred over the gabble-de-gook flat database that are just stored on hard drives like a text file. MySQL is a relational database.

In a relational structured database there are tables that store data. The columns define which kinds of information will be stored in the table. An individual column must be created for each type of data you wish to store (i.e. Age, Weight, Height).

Read the rest of this entry »