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Show HN: Moltin – eCommerce Back End as a Service

by AJSturrock on 3/16/15, 7:16 PM with 49 comments

  • by jordanlev on 3/17/15, 12:01 AM

    2 questions: How does this compare to existing eCommerce back-ends like SnipCart, Ecwid, Foxycart?

    And: I presume your service requires javascript to function (as all of the similar services do)... any chance of providing a non-javascript fallback such as a generic-looking checkout page hosted on your own servers (like when you use a paypal button to send users to their site to complete the final step of the transaction)? Please don't tell me that "everyone uses javascript yay" or that I shouldn't be concerned -- I know who my clients and their users are and I know what their accessibility requirements are :) (I always have to say this when I ask eCommerce services this question because usually they dismiss it out of hand and it's very frustrating when you have requirements that sites work even without javascript).

    Thanks, and best of luck!

  • by ngoel36 on 3/17/15, 12:52 AM

    The pricing confuses me a bit - as a user, I would have very little sense as to how many API requests or how much storage I would need for an eCommerce app. Why not price simply as a percentage of all processed transactions (in addition to the payment gateway commission, of course)

  • by karambahh on 3/16/15, 10:11 PM

    Nice!

    Do you plan on adding modules? Would you be willing to add features via partnerships? Your "full" ecommerce stack lacks a few things that could be added either into your core or via external tools.

  • by bsbechtel on 3/16/15, 9:23 PM

    Interesting. Don't most of the ecommerce-as-a-service companies offer an API these days, or am I mistaken? How would this be different if they do? The pricing model?

  • by kposehn on 3/16/15, 10:03 PM

    Question - are you planning on making a ruby gem for it?

  • by cyri on 3/17/15, 2:55 AM

    How do you compare to: http://www.commercetools.com/en/pricing/ (I'm not affiliated with them.) They are expensive ... but why should I choose you?

  • by Immortalin on 3/17/15, 5:37 AM

    What benefit does Moltin offer over CMS backed ecommerce service such as Drupal commerce and Woocommerce? Your website seem to emphasize rapid application development yet this is not too different from the CMS backed alternatives.

  • by base on 3/16/15, 9:59 PM

    If someone is going to integrate with your API in PHP as an example, why not use a full open source shopping cart where they have more control?

  • by bikamonki on 3/17/15, 2:46 AM

    Do you support non-US businesses? Payments in particular. For example: send all collected payments to a Paypal account.

  • by jtchang on 3/16/15, 10:45 PM

    How do you handle the case of a product that you get to select different options? I don't see it in the API.

  • by thecatspaw on 3/16/15, 10:21 PM

    This looks nice, but very limited.

    Is there any support for:

    - Vouchers

    - Promotions

    - Categories

    - Classifications

    ?

    These all are features a successfull webshop needs. I have to admit I only took a brief look at the API, but all this seems to be missing. Am I mistaken?

    edit: seems like Categories at least exist. I didnt find the docs at first. I suggest putting the Documentation link into the "more" dropdown in the navigation

  • by krmmalik on 3/16/15, 10:41 PM

    Is this for inventory based sites inky or would it work for digital products too?

  • by bsbechtel on 3/16/15, 9:26 PM

    Also, your close button on the signup popup doesn't seem to work on Firefox.

  • by Svenstaro on 3/17/15, 1:32 AM

    How about a Python SDK? :D

  • by curiously on 3/17/15, 3:25 AM

    so why should a developer use this vs building their own? if open source back end tools exist why not self host those?

    looks like a great product, curious to know what stack you are running, are each backend hosted on amazon?