The Year 2023 News Digest

news digest
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Happy Holidays from Virto Commerce!

Happy holidays
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The Virto Commerce team wishes you a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year 2024. We hope you have a wonderful holiday season and look forward to exciting new projects built on the Virto Commerce platform.

We want to express our gratitude for your feedback, suggestions, and contributions. Your support has been invaluable.

While we have accomplished a lot this year, the Virto Commerce team has even bigger plans for 2024. Here’s a glimpse of what’s to come:

  • We will kick off the year with the release of a new stable version on .NET 8. .NET 8 brings many exciting performance improvements.
  • Closer integration with CMS: Page Builder and Builder.Io.
  • VC Theme B2B will be able to work with the platform without vc-storefront.
  • AI Capabilities and Semantic Search.
  • New and revamped Business Features such as Quotes, Switch between multiple organizations, etc.

:christmas_tree: The year 2023 was marked by significant enhancements to Virto Commerce solutions. More than 450 releases (including fixes and new features) have been introduced for the platform and and other products. Let’s recall the most important ones!

:snowflake: Storefront :snowflake:

Shopping

  • Digital products purchasing option.
  • Wishlist and cart items grouped by vendors.
  • List privacy configuration added to share lists with other users.
  • Headers, footers, and main menu editable via XApi.
  • See more/See less buttons added to expand/collapse facet lists.

Checkout

  • Multistep checkout.
  • GA events for tracking Clear Cart and Place Order.
  • Improved checkout process for selected items.
  • Orders printable directly from the order list.
  • Notification for failed payment and option to retry.
  • Autosuggest for adding addresses.

Registration and Signing In

  • Email verification link request feature.
  • Login on Behalf function enhanced.
  • Password expiration notifications.
  • Improved handling of blocked user accounts.
  • Enhanced error alerts for login issues.
  • Password creation tips added.
  • Password change reminder and forced password change.

UI

  • Language and currency selectors added.
  • Product images now zoomable.
  • Pagination enhancements for improved user experience.
  • Updated popup menus in the Company info and Company members sections.
  • UI kit and Storybook have been extended and updated.

View the enhancements on public demo site

Read more and install Storefront

:snowflake: Platform :snowflake:

Platform Updates

  • Stable Bundles 5 and 6 have been released.
  • The Platform has been updated to AngularJS 1.8.3 without breaking changes for custom modules.
  • Azure Active Directory Single-Sign-On Provider Module is now a separate module, providing an improved flexibility and customization options for users who wish to use SSO with Active Directory.
  • Virto Commerce Platform and Modules now support NodeJS 18 LTS and WebPack 5.
  • The Platform and all the Virto Commerce modules support WebPackBuild on NodeJS 18 LTS and WebPack 5.
  • Virto Commerce has full DB Agnostic support for Ecommerce modules. Users can choose between Microsoft SQL Server, MySql, and PostgreSql.
  • An option to integrate via CSV file has been added. Integration via the Payment or Refund Capturing API is also possible. Once integrated, the ability to capture and refund payments appears in the Virto Commerce Back Office.
  • Health checkpoint is now available at https://vcst-demo-storefront.paas.govirto.com/storefrontapi/health to check platform availability and connection.
  • The ability to create and edit a store home page is no longer limited to developers. Authorized users can use the Page Builder to create and edit home page and catalog.
  • Semantic Search option has been added.

Download and install Platform

Integrations

Serilog

This is useful to track and debug events that occur within an e-commerce store. By logging information such as user actions, errors, and performance metrics, developers can gain insights into how the system is performing and identify areas for improvement.

Hotjar

This integration enables you to assign a Hotjar Site ID to a store and gain valuable insights into the shopping behavior of your users. With features such as Heatmaps, Recordings, Feedback, and more, you can better understand and analyze user interactions on your site.

Seq log

The Seq lg module allows you to centralize and analyze log data generated by various logging libraries and frameworks. Seq provides a web-based interface for searching, filtering, and visualizing log events, making it easier to monitor and troubleshoot applications.

Builder.io

Now you can create landing pages for Virto Commerce in Builder.io.

Modules Updates

Numerous modules features have been added and enhanced. Let’s see most significat ones:

xAPI

  • Retrieves child categories for a given parent category, providing information like name, id, and URL for custom user interfaces or other applications.
  • Retrieves stock quantities for a specific product across fulfillment centers, aiding inventory tracking and informed decisions on shipping.
  • Ensures hidden properties are not accessible by default, enhancing security and privacy.
  • Introduces the option to request line item statuses for orders, offering detailed information on individual line items for better order fulfillment tracking.
  • Adds support for a pages query to enhance provider page search functionality.
  • Adds a product filter to the childCategories query, allowing users to filter based on product existence.
  • Introduces the ProductSuggestions query for enhanced search suggestions supporting multiple search providers.
  • Adds mutations for improved cart management, including selecting, unselecting, and selecting all or specific items in the cart.
  • Extends the Product schema with GTIN (Global Trade Item Number).
  • Extends the Shipping method with name and description for improved data presentation.
  • Blocks customer access to the storefront automatically when their account is locked in the backend, enhancing security.
  • Introduces mutations to streamline customer experience, reducing clicks and utilizing the cart as a wish list.
  • Adds a mutation to display the lowest price of the main product and its variations.
  • Modifies Virto Start configuration for simplicity, adding sections and setting options for security and search.
  • Adds a switch in the Stores module settings to enable anonymous users to create orders.
  • Implements changes to simplify user registration during order creation, including optional organizationId and additional fields for inviteUser and registerByInvitation mutations.

Download and install the xAPI module

Marketing

Enhancements to the Virto Commerce Marketing module include advanced search queries for dynamic content, facilitating dynamic evaluation of banners and slideshows based on user conditions. The XMarketing module now supports personalized experiences through dynamic content evaluation, considering factors like customer behavior and time of day. Additionally, users can now assign coupons to specific organizations, allowing for the issuance of gift cards.

Download and install the Marketing module

Contracts

The Contract module introduces a new Attachments feature, enabling users to link files like images and PDFs to contracts. Integrated with the Assets module, it streamlines file access and management. This enhancement enhances contract management for businesses by improving efficiency and reducing errors.

Additionally:

  • The contracts details page now includes a status field for easy tracking.
  • Efficient filtering options aid in locating specific contracts.
  • Contracts can now be associated with specific vendors and customers.
  • A scalable indexation feature improves catalog division and indexing efficiency.
  • Expanded contract queries provide comprehensive information on concluded

Download and install the Contracts module

Profile

  • A verification email option for authorized users using ‘userId’ and ‘email’ values.
  • A new email confirmation mutation.
  • User notification for impending password expiration, improving password management and security.

Download and install the Profile module

Order

  • Notifies users of conflicts when multiple attempts to update the same order concurrently occur.
  • Added VirtoCommerce:Playground:Enable setting in appsettings.json to disable Playground UI in production mode for improved security.
  • Option to use the same transaction ID for both capture and refund operations in case of a failed transaction.
  • Enables keyword-based search for orders.
  • Customizable order line item statuses in the Settings section.
  • Added functionality for processing refund documents.
  • Introduces a new document for capturing payments, providing benefits for integration developers, sales reps, and store owners.
  • Allows hosting multiple sites within one Virto Storefront 6.x and vue b2b theme.
  • Includes last login date and time in user information.
  • Displays progress information during Virto Commerce loading for a better user experience.
  • Enables role assignment for users using Active Directory Single Sign-On.
  • Enhances security by automatically locking inactive user accounts after a specified period.
  • Integration for efficient BulkSave operations, improving data storage and retrieval performance (paid feature).

Download and install the Orders module

Tasks

  • Users can now assign specific order tasks to any employee.
  • Option to notify users of assigned tasks.
  • Module designed to work independently of specific database systems.
  • Improved error handling, addressing DbUpdateConcurrencyException.
  • Expands contract module features, incorporating contract status and vendorId.
  • Updates Crud and Search services for more efficient catalog data management.
  • Optimizes payment processing, supporting capture and refund operations.
  • Improvements in asset editor styles, DateTime handling, CRUD services, and security for a more reliable, efficient e-commerce platform.
  • Enabled localization settings for dictionary items, enhancing access to localized content.

Download and install the Tasks module

Elastic Search

  • Index creation is now a standalone operation, no longer performed automatically with each query.
  • Added option to search and delete active index duplicates in ElasticSearch settings.
  • Supports the semantic search, implementing ISearchProvider from the Virto Commerce Search module. Supports Standalone Elasticsearch 8.x and Elastic Cloud 8.x deployment options.

Download and install the Elastic Search 8 module

Catalog

  • Allows users to prioritize languages via drag-and-drop, setting the first as the default.
  • Added the option to partially update product properties using the Virto Commerce Rest API.
  • Deactivating parent categories now hides both categories and associated products, streamlining the process and excluding them from xAPI queries.
  • Products variations can now be queried like regular products, enabling a comprehensive variation catalog experience with facets, filters, pagination, and sorting on the product page.
  • Supporting the sale of products in different units of measure, new product types, and more.

Download and install the Catalog module

:snowflake: Marketplace :snowflake:

  • Marketplace first release introduced.
  • Marketplace made DB agnostic, allowing seamless operation with different databases.
  • Vendor blades revised, enabling customization of visible fields, adding and hiding fields.
  • Unlimited product description in the Vendor’s product blade, removing the previous 1024-character limit.
  • Bulk delete option for products and offers reworked.
  • Progress notifications added for bulk delete operations.
  • Option to include digital products added.
  • Import improvements introduced, including editing and adding options.
  • Input of product properties in multiple languages now possible.
  • Offers and Products modules redesigned as dynamic custom modules.
  • Ability to enable/disable vendor users added.
  • Configurable product types introduced.
  • Multi-language version released.
  • Offers import extended with additional fields.
  • Staged offers stored privately in the Vendor’s catalog.
  • Image upload enabled with special symbols in their names.
  • Import functionality included as a standalone application in the Operator portal’s apps menu.
  • Videos widget added on the product card for easy access to multimedia content.

For more information, request a demo.

:snowflake:Furthermore, we continuously enhance the quality of our technical documentation, ensuring it remains up-to-date, concise, and illustrative.

:snowflake:Don’t forget to explore our latest video tutorials, released on a regular basis. Subscribe to our YouTube channel to not miss new videos.

These were the highlights of our achievements for the year 2023. You can find the detailed information about new features per month here:

As you can see, it has been a very productive year for our company, but we are aiming for more! Our doors are always open to your suggestions. Let’s build the B2B innovation platform together.

Happy New Year!

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