After reading a few Packt books, which I really liked, I was looking forward to reading a new book on osCommerce. This one is Deep Inside osCommerce - The Cookbook.

The first thing I noticed was the price $49.99 which is too steep according to me. (Disclosure: I got a review copy FREE, but that won't change my opinion.) Personally I would not spend that kind of money (at least for a technology book) unless I wanted to keep it in my personal library for a long time.

Anyway, I am feeling so hungry looking at this cookbook, let me start the review immediately.

The book is arranged in the form of different recipes. Each recipe has presentation section, ingredients section and cooking section. Unfortunately a lot of recipes turn out to be just appetizers. There are very few good recipes.

Most of the recipes focus on the 'decoration' not the 'flavor' or 'taste' of the recipe. e.g. recipe 5) specific colors for each level 7) move infobox header closer 8) make header taller 15) show manufacturer's logos in inbox 16) add borders to boxes 37) Add manufacturer's page to manufacturer's infobox.

Having said that, let me also say that a few recipes do have nice features. Although we are programmers and like to do nice little tricks, the main purpose of a shopping cart as a store owner is to make money. Honestly these recipes do not have any value addition in that context.

Let me give you my free recipe (which is equally worthless). Default osCommerce setup shows 2 breadcrums as Top >> Catalog.
1. Open /includes/languages/english.php
Change
define('HEADER_TITLE_TOP', 'Home');

2. Open /includes/application_top.php
comment following line.
// $breadcrumb->add(HEADER_TITLE_CATALOG, tep_href_link(FILENAME_DEFAULT));

Now your store will show breadcrums as "Home" >> "Category"

Conclusion: I find that the book is way too expensive and definitely not worth the money. (Disclosure: I got a review copy FREE.) If you can borrow the book or get it from a library, go ahead and read it. But you won't miss anything even if you don't.

For viewers of Food Network, this book will give you an experience of "Emeril Show", but if you want real cuisine, go for "Iron Chef" David Mercer's book (reviewed earlier).

Overall, I would rate it as 5.5 (or 6) stars out of 10.