s2 Pro custom paypal/authorize.net (WANTING TO BUY)

[j1980mac]

Greets S2 Community!

I am looking to purchase the full pro version of the S2 Member plugin only if I can figure out if I can make a custom payment system for (1) product, and (2) ways to pay. The (2) payment methods of choice are Paypal and Authorize.

The product is a script reading service. I am wanting to charge ($1.00) per page, and set a way for the end user to specify the pages that they want to purchase. After they theoretically add this service to the cart, they need to be directed to the payment service of their choice. I have the main functionality of this site already set up throughout the website. If someone can answer this, I'll gladly purchase the plugin and will have no issue assisting someone in the future after I learn S2 Member Pro.

Thanks,

Josh

[Cristián Lávaque]

Hi Josh.

s2Member is not a store with a cart, you don't sell numbers of a membership. In this case you'll need a shopping cart to sell those, which probably has a delivery system for digital things. If the delivery part is not available, s2Member can assist you to manage access to the pages meant for those that bought, though with a little customization to integrate the cart with s2Member.

[j1980mac]

Hello, I really appreciate your quick reply! However, I'm not sure what you are saying exactly. I hope that you can help me, and if you need more information as to understand what I am trying to do, I'll provide it for you. If you want to walk through it, I'll post the link below so you can see what I've already done. I'll show you the website:

http://dollarapagescriptreading.com/?page_id=263

All it needs to do is be able to take a custom payment entry, and go strait to paypal and or authorize.net. I've already got it linked to paypal, and it goes back to my website just like I want. Can you see what I am trying to achieve?

[Cristián Lávaque]

You could probably just sell the number of pages with a PayPal generated button, and have a custom script update in the user's account the number of paid pages he has left. But s2Member doesn't handle this really. I'd be happy if you bought s2Member Pro, but I don't see how it'd help you in this case, unless you wanted to use one of its features.

[j1980mac]

I actually do think S2 member will serve me well. I NEED Authorize.net, and this is the only one that has it. So I am unsure as to what you are meaning about the custom script. How much customer support are you guys willing to offer if I purchase the plugin?

By the way, ALL I need is to be able to type in a custom payment into a shopping cart with (1) service; that's it. It can be in the form of a blank text field or a spin box type. Just as long as the amount specified goes to Paypal and Autorize.net, it will be ok.

Do you honestly see what I am trying to achieve?

[Cristián Lávaque]

I think I do see it, and I honestly thought maybe there was another plugin that'd do what you want without need for customization, that I'd be doing you a disservice making you purchase s2Member Pro if there was something that'd be easier to adjust to what you need. Now, if you've searched and decided s2Member is for you, I'll be happy to help you figure out how to adjust it to your model.

OK, so you want to have members and sell them pages of your script reading service. I see the users may have some credit they bought and should be able to add more. You could let them register a free account to which they'd add the page credits with their purchases.

For the page credits you could have a custom registration field. It should be set so they can't edit it or they'd be able to add pages they didn't pay for. The problem is that there isn't a visibility/edits setting that'd work well in this case, you need one that doesn't show during registration and is not editable afterwards. WP Admin -> s2Member -> General Options -> Custom Registration Fields/Options -> New Custom Field -> Allow Profile Edits

Another option would be to save it as a new field in the usermeta table, and you'd provide your own interface to display and edit it. The display could be somewhere in the theme, maybe the header, or edit the profile page to have it there.

You will need a custom script to add the new purchased credit to the user's field. The credits could be sold with the pro-forms. You need a way to change the quantity/amount and have that come back to s2Member after checkout.

In the pro-form's page you could have another smaller form with a quantity field, which would call the same page on submission and this quantity value would dynamically change the pro-form's shortcode attribute for the amount. viewtopic.php?f=36&t=1604

After payment you could use the Notification API to fire your script that'll add the new credits to the user's account. Knowing how much a single page costs, from the amount paid you can tell how many pages he bought. WP Admin -> s2Member -> API /Notifications

As you can see, it needs some customization, but it can be done.

Does that help?

[ckhicks]

If I may: would this method allow you to accept payments of various amounts through any of the s2Member Pro payment systems? Basically the users could purchase as many "credits" as they like, then use whichever method of payment they like best?

[Cristián Lávaque]

Yeah, you could work with any of the payment gateways, you'd be using the payment notification to update the credits.

[j1980mac]

I don't necessarily understand what you are referring to as "credits". Wouldn't a simple input field work?

<input type="hidden" name="quantity" value="1">

[Cristián Lávaque]

Yes, that will work in the PayPal button to sell the pages, but you have to store that value somehow, somewhere, be able to substract pages that were delivered, add new ones when paying for more. That's what I tried to explain earlier. You can't just put that in a form and expect the rest of the stuff to happen on its own.

I suggest you hire a freelance developer to help you implement this. I can't develop it for you, but I already gave you an idea of how to achieve it.

[j1980mac]

Thanks, but I don't think you understand, all I NEED to have is a way to enter an amount, pay, go back to this website and upload the file, all while putting an expiration on the page access or login/membership.

By the way, I'm a new freelance developer... obviously it doesn't show! haha

[Cristián Lávaque]

I didn't mean to offend. I guess I just am misunderstanding how you want to do that. Sorry.

[j1980mac]

Oh no no it's quite ok. I admit I don't have a great level of experience. I just wish there was a simpler way to the solution here. I don't like the idea for having (1-500) of these buttons on one payment page. It sounds a bit silly. If you hear or other ways, I'd be glad to know what you may find.

Thanks again,

j1980mac

[ckhicks]

I think that's what he's saying - there's no need for more than one field with a variable input value. They can purchase tokens (or in your case, pages) at any increment and use any payment system to finish the transaction. Great info!

[j1980mac]

Well if that's the case CK, I'd love to know the nuts and bolts of this... Maybe I should just get the plugin eh? By the way, you look very familiar... perhaps I've seen you somewhere in the past?

[j1980mac]

Ok, so I purchased S2 Member Pro, got the PayPal configured only for users to pay offsite. I now want users to be able to pay onsite, but it has to be a secure page. How do I make this happen?

[Cristián Lávaque]

You need SSL and in the page where you'll have the pro-form, add a custom field named s2member_force_ssl with value yes.

You can skip the SSL certificate during Development/Sandbox testing. SSL is not required until you officially go live. Once you're live, you can add the Custom Field s2member_force_ssl -> yes to any Post/Page. s2Member will buffer output on those special Posts/Pages, converting everything over to https:// for you automatically, and forcing those specific Posts/Pages to be viewed over a secure SSL connection; so long as your server supports the https protocol. This will help you eliminate the dreaded Secure/Insecure errors in Internet Explorer®. If your server runs SSL over a special port number, or your server requires the port number to actually be in the URL ( i.e. HOST:port ), you can set s2member_force_ssl -> 443; or to whatever port you need.

[j1980mac]

Appreciate the quick reply, but can you speak a little simper on what I need to do?

[Cristián Lávaque]

In the page edit form you'll see te custom field panel (if you don't you have to make it visible in Screen Options, the tab in the top-right corner), there you'll create a new field, give it the name s2member_force_ssl and value yes.

[j1980mac]

Well I did everything that you said, and the page is still unsecured and the payment boxes aren't lit up at all. What do I need to do from this point?

[j1980mac]

Also, why I was questioning these issues, can you tell me how and where I need to go in order to specify what page I want the user to see directly after payment on site and paying offsite and redirecting back to the site? I am needing this page to be a hidden page, only visible to users.

I appreciate your detailed help. Thanks a bunch!

[j1980mac]

I had some other thoughts about the previous questions... If I have a redirect URL specified on paypal and or google checkout account, will this affect the redirect back to the site (after user pays) if I have a (redirect) or a (thank you) page already set up with S2 Member Pro?

I've also tried to make Google Checkout work with the shortcodes, however I am unsuccessful. All I get is a little spinning box that doesn't go anywhere after I click the button.

Also, at the present time, I am not worried about the SSL and paying onsite. It seems as if it would cause potential flac for the client. Way to risky.

[Cristián Lávaque]

Could you show me a screenshot of your custom field for the page you need secured with SSL? And could you post the URL to the page with the form?

About the return URL, try the success attribute for the shortcode. WP Admin -> s2Member -> PayPal Buttons -> Shortcode Attributes (Explained) -> success

[j1980mac]

Thanks for the quick reply;

Here is the URL:

http://dollarapagescriptreading.com/pay ... fpages=.01

Screen shot attached too.

[j1980mac]

If I could add: I am more concerned with paying offsite with PayPal and Google Checkout. I've got the PayPal part set up, and the "purchase" is a variable text box that states the amount of an item which costs $1 dollar. It's as simple as that.

Now the question is how to get both these payment systems to carry the payment amount offsite? I've got the code set up in the PayPal, but I can't get Google Checkout to act "right" from the start of setting it up. I'm not sure what's wrong, but I'd love it if someone could possibly look at it from the inside?

Thanks,

Josh