Checkout as Guest

[choccy]

Currently, a customer is required to be registered to purchase. Purchasing items as a guest is also a common feature of other e-commerce systems. I predict that this might be have to be implemented in core though, as opposed to a package.

[aaronjudd]

Yes, agree. Not much to modify, we can just create the account without a password. User still needs to use an email though (same as most other guest systems). Most other "guest" checkouts work the same, they still store the email, and usually create an account. You really can't have physical goods ecommerce without an account, so its just a user perception. For digital goods checkout we'd want to not collect address, so that might be a different checkout module - no account, no address, just cart and payment.

[aaronjudd]

@prinzdezibel since you mentioned you are working on a guest checkout, and volunteered - I'm assigning to you.

[prinzdezibel]

I propose to integrate it into the core package, but hide the functionality behind a settings.json flag. Core would depend on another package, namely artwells:meteor-guest-account (but I wait for the package owner to integrate a PR from me.)

[aaronjudd]

I agree, I think that makes the most sense. I think it would be useful to enabled/disable in the shop settings UI as well.

[prinzdezibel]

That would be even better as next improvement. Then the settings should go to a fixture data file (we talked about that already..)

[prinzdezibel]

https://github.com/reactioncommerce/reaction-core/pull/76
https://github.com/reactioncommerce/reaction-core-theme/pull/5

These changes are a first shot on the feature.

Not working yet is the conversion of a guest account into a real account. For that I need more changes in prinzdezibel:guest-accounts. Use-case would be that a logged in guest uses the sign-up dialogs to register a real user account. But then Meteor would probably complain, because of the duplicated email address.

[prinzdezibel]

Would be happy to get some feedback. Please tell me if there are things that you guys want to have done in a different way. Thanks.

[aaronjudd]

I'll wait for you to publish your accounts-guest package, -or- you could add to the packages directory, -or- I can fork the repo and take responsibility for publishing.

The workflow is that a user must supply an email for the order, and that creates a Meteor user record? if so, maybe https://github.com/splendido/meteor-accounts-meld would help with that workflow.

[prinzdezibel]

The workflow is that a user must supply an email for the order, and that creates a Meteor user record?

That's correct.

if so, maybe https://github.com/splendido/meteor-accounts-meld would help with that workflow.

I'll have a look into it.

[aaronjudd]

@aldeed I'm sort of wondering if this even needs the accounts-guest package, wouldn't it be just as easy to create a new temporary user when we create the reaction sessions? Also not sure how this is going to play with the session merging...

[prinzdezibel]

@aaronjudd Package is published.

[aaronjudd]

See #271 for discussion on guest account security.

[aaronjudd]

Updated in branch so that canCheckoutAsGuest is a variable returned by app.coffee (ReactionCore.init), and moved into the shops schema, as well as added to admin 'shop settings' template. Updated shops.json, and removed as public.settings variable.

[aaronjudd]

work in progress with the following approach:

Session management

if there is neither a sessionCart nor a userCart, create a sessionCart
if sessionCart is a not a userCart return sessionCart
if sessionCart just authenticated, add userId + email
   then copy existing userCart(s) into sessionCart and remove userCart(s)
if sessionCart just logged out, remove sessionId from sessionCart and create new sessionCart

Cart

add email as identifier
auto insert/update userId, email if authenticated

Checkout

change default step to guest checkout or login:
store email for order
add option to set password "create account" on order completion

Accounts

use new Accounts collection (previously: customers)
on account creation / login  with password, 
  if confirmed account creation email 
    create a customer collection record with this userId
    update all orders with matching email to match this userId
    copy all order addresses into Accounts.profile.addressBook
    copy all social / email info to Accounts.
    users collection locked down, nothing exposed to client, used for authentication only

  else
    if there are more orders with this email
    display on order view "Confirm email to link orders..."

Order view

add message for confirmation of email
authenticated user can see all orders where userId in list view
userAccountsDropdown icon for orders

Related issues @aldeed @prinzdezibel

#271
#16
#318
#76

Remove packages introduced in reactioncommerce/reaction-core#76

[aldeed]

if sessionCart just logged out, remove sessionId from sessionCart and create new sessionCart

Wouldn't you want to delete the sessionCart and create a new blank one?

[aaronjudd]

Yes, correct. that's what I've ended up doing.