Open Source Solutions for Small Business Problems

Open Source Book cover Hi! You've found a page that was previously published on OpenSourceSmall.biz, a web site associated with the book John wrote called Open Source Solutions for Small Business Problems. This book is available for purchase at Amazon (affiliate link), but we've rolled all the web site content into John's business site.

Don't hesitate to drop us a line if you need anything!

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Chapter 12. Sharing information with your partners

Accepting Credit Cards Online

Submitted by John Locke on Thu, 07/06/2006 - 22:50

Sitepoint has a nice summary of when to get a merchant account, versus when to use a third-party payer such as Paypal, complete with detailed example total costs for different types of businesses. Required reading for those thinking about accepting credit cards over the web, who do not already have a merchant account.

Solve the Payment Processing Problem [eCommerce]

Open source start-up updates its ERP suite for SMBs

Submitted by John Locke on Fri, 09/30/2005 - 01:28

New Open Source ERP vendor in Belgium. Interview with the founder here: Open source start-up updates its ERP suite for SMBs

Data Theft: How to Fix the Mess

Submitted by John Locke on Sun, 07/10/2005 - 04:19

The New York Times has an interesting editorial running today by Joseph Nocera, about solving the identity theft problem. Nocera proposes making the banking industry completely responsible for identity fraud, the same way Senator William Proxmire held them accountable for credit card fraud in the early 1970s.

OSCommerce in action

Submitted by John Locke on Fri, 06/03/2005 - 02:43

Newsforge is running a story about the realities of using OS Commerce, the open source shopping cart/e-commerce package. It describes the pluses and minuses fairly well: NewsForge | OSCommerce in action

Make sure you read the comments at the bottom of the page. At Freelock Computing, we've done half a dozen test deployments for various customers, and haven't put any into production quite yet. We've found that if all you need is a basic shopping cart, it's great.

The CMS Matrix

Submitted by John Locke on Fri, 03/18/2005 - 09:47

Just found a site that provides a feature comparison for several dozen content management systems of various types, both proprietary and open source. Search for the features you need, and this will show what's available. Not found on this list are some wiki engines, ERP systems, CRM systems, or document management--but these are some of the features you can select from the list to narrow down on a content management system. The CMS Matrix - Content Management Comparison Tool.

OS Commerce featured in Linux Magazine

Submitted by John Locke on Sun, 10/17/2004 - 15:13

12. Extranet

The July 2004 online version of Linux Magazine has a great overview of OS Commerce in E-Commerce Made Easy. OS Commerce is one of the applications described in the book, and it's a great way to get an online storefront.