Problem: Solved!

If you're reading this Web page, most likely you're a businessperson who  wants to sell products or services on the Internet.  You're not a programmer or a Web designer, and you don't want to have to become one.  My specialty is keeping it human; I bring the software into your world, not the other way around.   We will tailor the site to your needs, and add 3rd-party or custom software as needed, so that everything becomes simple, convenient, and even fun to use.

Miva Script is a language developed by the Miva Corporation for use in writing server-side programs and "active documents."  Miva Merchant is an e-commerce or "shopping cart" software package, which has become extremely popular for small and medium-sized business that sell their products or services on the Web.  It allows a basic on-line store to be set up quickly, and it is easy to enhance and customize  for special needs:  more features, improved store layout & design, etc.  As a Miva Technology Partner, I provide all kinds of services for Miva software, from basic setup to custom programming.

The Official Miva Web Scripting Book is an introduction to Miva Script programming.  Published in 2000, it is now slightly out of date.   However, it still offers a good introduction to the language and plenty of useful reference information.  It is available from Amazon.com; their "look inside" feature allows you to read some sections.

Currency Magic is a Miva Merchant module that allows your Miva store to display prices in international currencies.  Visitors to your site simply pick the desired currency from a menu, and your entire Miva store will instantly start displaying all prices in that form!

Exchange rates can be entered manually, or retrieved automatically from an on-line server. You can configure the module to retrieve exchange rates from many different servers.  Upon installation, the module is preset to use Yahoo.com. The documentation includes settings for several other public currency-converter sites, and explains how to create your own settings for other servers.

Flexible formatting includes international punctuation selectable for each currency, and customized display of negative numbers. Advanced HTML and CSS formatting can be used, with plain text provided for emails and other unformatted displays.

This module is available from Viking Coders.

Special Order Instructions is a Miva Merchant module that allows a Miva site to display up to five additional text boxes or checkboxes on the checkout screens, which can be used to collect information from the customer, such as delivery instructions, greeting card messages, etc. 

The customer's information is saved in a database, and is also included in the notification email to the merchant, and in the confirmation email to the customer. 

This module is available from Viking Coders.

Checkout This displays information to your customers during checkout. You define one or more messages that can be triggered by various conditions: shipping, payment, specific products in basket, customized conditions using OpenUI tokens, or combinations of all the above. The messages are displayed on a separate page, and the user must click the Continue button to proceed with checkout. You can optionally remove the Continue button to create "dead end" pages that prevent the customer from completing their purchase.

By combining thus module with Special Order Instructions (described above), you can collect additional information from your customers, by displaying a text box, checkbox, or drop-down menu with any message. 

This module is available from Viking Coders.

Upsale Magic provides a discount function that allows you to set up many different variations on the idea of, "buy X, get a special price on Y." It overcomes a major limitation of Miva's built-in upsale feature, since you can inform customers of the discount while they are shopping, instead of waiting till they check out. You can set up different types of discounts for various products or categories, and you can customize the text and HTML formatting of the discount messages. 

This module is available from Viking Coders.