The quote service is located in the main config.json file. Open the file and locate the line, which designates the endpoint that will handle the quote

"getQuoteUrl": "http://localhost/services/getQuote.php",

Since you would prefer to obtain a quote dynamically, based on selections of the user, you would place some sort of dynamic script into getting Quote service. Referring to a static file, for example, would always return the same price and totals no matter what the selections are and you would not want that.

Once the endpoint is set, use the Fiddler tool, Inspector, or Firebug to see what is being sent to the endpoint when the quote is requested. You would typically get the following JSON structure in the POST request as a “data” variable.

{
  "product":{ "id":"11", "color":"#FFF", "colorName":"White" },
  "locations":[
    {
      "name":"Front",
      "colors":2,
      "colorsList":["#4682b4","#000"],
      "designedArea": 384.60,
      "designedAreaRect": 480.50,
      "objects":[
        {
          "type":"txt",
          "designedArea":126.97,
          "colors":1,
          "colorsList":[
            "#4682b4"
          ]
        },
        {
          "type":"svg",
          "designedArea":258.63,
          "colors":1,
          "colorsList":["#000"]
        }
      ],
      "objectCount":2,
      "letterings":1,
      "images":1
    }
  ],
  "quantities":[{"size":"XS","quantity":1}],
  "namesNumbers":[]
}

While the product ID, color, or location name would be an obvious variable, some of them require explanation, as below:

   - colors - the number of colors used in design; this value is very usable for screen printing quotes. A “-1” value would mean the design contains a photo or too many colors;

   - colorsList - is a list of hex values for each used colors;

    - designedArea - area in units (inches, feet, any kind you designate as part of Product JSON), occupied by design. The designArea is a sum of designAreas for each of the elements.

   - designedAreaRect - an area of a rectangle, in units, occupied by all design elements;

Now once you obtain all these variables, LiveArt HTML5 would expect the following reply from you, the example goes below:

{
  "prices":[
    {"label":"Item Price", "price":"$29"},
    {"label":"Decoration", "price":"$15"},
    {"label":"Discount 0.25%", "price":"-$0.11"},
    {"label":"Total", "price":"$43.89", "isTotal":true}
  ]
}

All in all, you have just got little into Get Quote request, it’s structure, and the way it’s expected to work with LiveArt HTML5. Make sure to check our PHP sample code including reading variables and calculating color-based decoration fees.

Template-based printing may also prevent users from placing design elements in an unlikely position than can be close or in safe or trim areas. While implementing the least is also important for online web to print design tools, a fixed elements template would guarantee that the output would be fine to print without going back to the customer for additional approval.

Variable Data Printing is extremely helpful for business card companies, where users can simply create a batch order by simply selecting a template, uploading company logo, and sheet with people information. The sheet would contain variables such as name, second name, address and email and so on that will immediately populate on design. Implementing VDP benefits easiness to both customer and business owners as it makes the whole process faster, cheaper, and bullet-proof valid.

LiveArt HTML5 Product Designer supports both template-based and variable data printing. While integrating, a business owner may set specific user flow rules and setup both normal and VDP products. Additionally, there is no need for learning specific software for creating such templates — everything is done within the same simple product designer.

To apply for VDP or Template-based printing please supply the following information:

   1. Product type you are going to print on.

   2. Pricing rules that are associated with user choices.

   3. How many and which variables will be required in each template.

   4. Applicable examples per each template and product type.

Our team will quickly get back with the applicable package and assist with the setup. In the future, you will be able to prepare own new templates and lists for VDP printing.

— First and foremost, we’ve finally raised standards for an online product designer that is totally cross-platform and compatible by releasing LiveArt HTML5 Online Product Designer. After almost half of the year development and refinements, we gave users the ability to smoothly design their product from various tablets as well as desktop PCs. Yet still, our Flash-based products would please desktop users who prefer solid experience and quick integration.

— Our components started to get integrated into a greater variety of platforms like Magento, WooCommerce, OpenCart, and many others. Hosted shopping carts like BigCommerce or Shopify can now embed LiveArt HTML5 as a hosted option too!

— As the custom decoration industry grows, so do our variety of products that can be customized by our tool. A recent project involving bottle opener customizer, online flag designer and do it yourself flask website proved that a design tool can be used to customize any printable or engravable product.

— Finally, our integration partners Peexl.com can now handle a number of eCommerce shopping cart integrations involving an outstanding Magento Community Edition as well as other popular PHP-based platforms.

We look forward to “unlock” new achievements in 2014 and would like to thank to all our clients and partners who stay with us and enjoy our online design products. Wishing everyone a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year 2014!

Basically, a 3D design preview applies design onto a product model, allowing the user to rotate it in a 360 degree while realizing how the end printed one would look like. A 3D product preview can be implemented for all types of LiveArt software, including  LiveArt HTML5 version. Upon additional request, our team can build custom scenes for a product rather than allowing preview float in a space, which is the most simple implementation.

A realistic touch can be made for phone cases 3d previews, t-shirt 3d previews, mugs, cups, USB drives, and a number of various products one can imagine.

Want a 3D Product Preview implemented for your project? Gather up a bit of information and let us know:

- A version of a product you are already using or planning to use. Applicable versions are LiveArt HTML5, LiveArt Shop and LiveArt Lite;

- A product type you would like to enable 3D preview for - t-shirt, cup, mug, banner, notebook, jewelry, etc.

- Any additional preferences to controls or scene itself.

Today the personalization comes out of 2-dimensional into complete 3D, where one can 3D print small applicable things like phone cases. A 3D Product Preview or designer would benefit much to further augmented the feeling of designing and engagement as well as customer love. Happy online designing!

Most eCommerce websites support product options that are available to the user. These could be the color of the product, a particular variation of it, or extra support or service. The options may also affect pricing depending on the choice, provide discounts, and such. Related pricing changes may render online, giving the customer a precise quote for the custom product they are going to order.

While LiveArt HTML5 primary function is being an all-in-one product designer, it can be also used for product configuration along with putting decorations like text and artwork. While the state of the art eCommerce product configuration forms normally don’t allow the user to preview the custom product, LiveArt HTML5 preview may change depending on the options chosen.

One of the prominent examples is a uniform configurator, where normally the customer’s goal is to select the colors of their team, upload the logo, and add some texts like team names. LiveArt HTML5 Product Designer provides shop owners with the ability to build configurable products that can change their look as the user tries various options. Coupled with the live quote system, the product configurator gives users transparent and quick quotes making ordering simple and robust.

Not only uniforms but also other popular products like phone cases can be loaded into LiveArt HTML5 Product Designer for live configuration and decoration. Having a live configuration of the product would eliminate the necessity to have heavy forms on your website and make the process easy and fun for your customers.

Fortunately, HTML5 has shown its drawbacks immediately after first admirations subsided. HTML5 proved to be an expensive development for enterprise-level applications (like Facebook, who switched to native app development), although the internet is full of simple yet glamorous mashups and small utility apps.

When we first started development of HTML5 online product designer application, the QA and tests part of development started to take much more time than it was anticipated. Numerous browsers, platforms, mobile devices, at least 90% of them had to checked against each of LiveArt HTML5 feature. Aside of the touch functionality to work on tablet and smartphone devices, our developers had to continuously verify the look and feel to appear consistently across different resolutions. All of the above took much more resources than required for similar Flash application development.

No doubts, the obvious conclusion everyone will be able to make is that HTML5 development is much more expensive. Add responsive layout here and you will get at least twice as big budget for HTML5 than you would for Flash.

Another challenge is that unlike Flash player updates, which rarely affects much on the existing application, a release of new browser or iOS version may really ruin a day for your HTML5 application or website. While Flash player runs application in a “sandbox”, independent from other elements on your website, the HTML5 application consists of numerous components that work together to let end users feel a Flash-quality application.

In Flash application, it’s responsibility of the Flash player to run your application in a correct way. In HTML5 application, it’s browsers responsibility to implement the web standards in a way to make the application work. Standards (like Javascript, CSS and HTML elements) are the ones that differ much in implementation in various browsers and platforms. What may work perfectly in iOS Safari would completely hang up your desktop PC under Firefox, a behavior you will never meet with Flash.

We are not advocating Flash here. As we all know, HTML5 is good because it works on mobile. You want to stay in business, you do the HTML5. It’s expensive, it’s painful in development, but in the end it will pay off in increased audience, become your love mark and keep you in the market.

Costs involved and expected ROI

The first thing to consider would be the budget, required to have an online design software enhancement. Study the market and get an idea of what it would cost to get the software deployed for your website. A lot of forums are discussing the available solutions that may or may not work for your particular business.

Another helpful thing would be to gather the necessary requirements for the custom user scenarios you might require for your web to print system. Comparing these against available features of online product design software would help in making the right decisions.

Whether you have an existing website or just plan to have one, defining a budget depending on planned ROI would help in looking for a solution that will fit. We assume you already have printing equipment and learned already about existing eCommerce platforms available on the market.

Users of the future system

Looking at the available tools on the market, it is best to envision your average customer using such tools to customize and buy a personalized product from you. Learning about common questions, patterns of behavior, and problems is crucial for implementing the web to print technology successfully. It may be also helpful in running a survey across the existing website or polling users. The survey results will answer questions like whether designing their product online would be more convenient than using the traditional methods. If you are using a phone operator or in house artist that works on customers’ designs, think whether your customers would feel better with a self-service online design application instead.

Streamline factor - will orders be processed faster?

One of the main benefits you get with web to print system is lowering the costs for each received order. Rather than having a person talk to a customer and prepare a design according to the customer’s vision, an online product designer allows users to place an order personally without applying for service or talking to anyone. Before implementing a web to print system, think of your present business process and whether deploying an online design tool along with an eCommerce website would help to streamline existing orders thus lowering the costs and allowing the business to scale.

Bear in mind that you would still require personnel to run the system, accept and process orders, and troubleshoot possible questions coming from customers. Make sure to provide adequate training for them when the system is in place and ready for launch.

Products compliance

Some of the most popular promotional items that can be easily deployed for online design software are t-shirts, jerseys, mugs, and such. You can find lots of blank images across the Internet, either worn by models or seen plain, and prepare a catalog easily. The customizations such as gallery artwork, text, or user uploaded image are seen clearly and perfectly work as live proof. However, certain products require more complex customization and modification of the web to print software itself. Such products may concern printing business that produces signs and banners, business cards (including Variable Data Printing), and complex items requiring 3-dimensional visualization as shoes or gift boxes.

Prepare a plan

Taking the available budget, existing customers, streamline factor, and products you sell into account is important in order to make some final decisions. Despite having an online product design system for a printing business becomes a firm trend for over 10 years already, one should clearly evaluate and plan such advance ahead.

Accurate budgeting, planning, and overall readiness for the web to print system implementation would help your business make a solid step forward and get to the next level, acquire new markets and make your customers happy.

1. No research

While it is common for any beginning, a lack of preliminary research may result in unexpected results after deployment of the web to the print system. Each business has its own specifics, own eCommerce platform, products, customers audience, and so on, which means that you should look for a particular vendor and solution that would fit your business and guarantee ROI after implementation. We recommend checking these posts for more information and brief checklists that would be helpful.

• Start Your Own Custom Product Printing Business with LiveArt. Part 1
• Start Your Own Custom Product Printing Business with LiveArt. Part 2

2. No personnel to fulfill orders

Implementing a web to print solution to your website without being ready with personnel that will accept and process orders is equal to failure. While online product design solutions will simplify the process they would still require someone to keep an eye on how the orders are processed and delivered for fulfillment. Make sure you have hired the right person to do this job, report on possible problems, and run the web to print system.

3. Poor products selection

Sometimes the personalized products just don’t fit the concept of the web to print system. One should consider and ask themselves questions regarding the personalized product:

   - Is my product personalization clean and visible to my customers?

   - Would the product personalization become easier to customers than it was earlier (by phone/email)?

  - Are there any options of the product that might confuse my customers?

   - Are the proofs, given by web to print studio, sufficiently clear, and understandable?

Lack of product preparation is a common mistake when implementing a design studio as part of the web to print system. Make sure you have checked out our post on effective proofing and product preparation for your web to print system.

4. Lack of resources and patience to launch the project

Although launching a web to print system can be really instant fast with hosted solutions, it is often a mistake to expect immediate positive results, customer appreciation and sales boost. Launching a system is not an end in itself, but rather a beginning of lifetime journey your business would board on. Product images support, unique and nice fonts, ready-made design templates, available gallery clip art - all of the above requires resources to be gathered, prepared, checked, uploaded into the system, and maintained on a regular basis. It is common that lack of patience often makes customers turn off the logo designer studio and navigate away from your website if they suspect the job not done. Getting resources ready for your online product designer part of the web to print system would prevent user confusion and frustration from the new tools on your website.

5. Failing to count in resistance to change

While not fully a mistake, a business owner should always think of loyal and frequent customers and the way they are used to order their personalized goods. Think of a friend of yours, who would come into your website one day and see everything changed - will they be disappointed or would like the change on your website? Will they like the new way they personalize a product, assess proof and checkout? Since there is always room for change resistance, make sure you inform users well and provide sufficient instructing materials to make the transition as smooth as possible and convert change resistance into satisfaction, wow effect, and sales boost.

While SVG is supported by the majority of the browsers and mobile platforms, it is often necessary to produce lower resolution images as design previews or proofs. The most common scenario is a small thumbnail in a shopping cart that will assure the user he has ordered the exact design. For other production purposes, other different images and formats might be required.

Since most of the backends are Unix or Linux based, our team recommends the following tools to do best for SVG conversion job:

• ImageMagick - the most popular and very powerful conversion tool. The convert command is widely used for different conversion and can do simple SVG conversions as well.
• rsvg - a highly-specialized library for SVG processing. Recommended for use if you have complex designs, uploaded images, and custom fonts (see also note on custom fonts below). rsvg is also a common delegate tool for ImageMagick convert as well.
• Inkscape - a popular free SVG editor. While we recommend using it as an editing tool to convert LiveArt output into different printing formats, it also available for usage as a command-line tool for conversion.

If custom fonts are used inside SVG design, make sure to have them installed into the backend system BEFORE you are running the conversion tool. This would ensure your converted output would keep the original fonts inside the designer.

If you are planning to use SVG in a traditional graphic software like Illustrator or Coreldraw, make sure you also run a short checklist to get your output prepared for that:

• Copy all externally referenced images locally. Ideally, place them into the same folder as your original design;
• Install the custom font used on your system;
• Since SVG is an open and understandable text formatted file, open it with a text editor. Replace all absolute xlink:href references to local files you have prepared in previous steps;
• While the design would look exactly as you have designed it in the browser, be prepared that professional software may displace certain elements like text. Looks like software grands are still learning to support web standards.

Let us know if the above pieces of advice were helpful to you. Good luck and happy online designing!

1. Mobile users will be able to order your personalized products. Finally.

Visitors that are coming to your website and not seeing immediate ability to personalize their product would be likely to quit it within a split second. Providing ability to open product personalization tool from ipad is essential to retain such users and converting them to your customers. If your present product designer is based on Adobe Flash technology, ipad users will not be able to load it.

2. Mobile users are more likely to checkout.

The more simple, the better. Our iPad compliant designer is made with simplicity in mind leaving only the most basic and required features for website visitors. Using the tool users can quickly select personalization products, add text, modify its options, upload or add artwork images from the gallery, review the order details, and save the order. Saving user design takes just a few seconds and they will be ready to checkout and pay!

3. Mobile is the new sexy.

Paraphrasing the popular meme “smart is the new sexy”, mobile users nowadays constitute over 20% of overall visitors of the common eCommerce website. It becomes up to shop owners whether to gain access to this audience making them part of their customers. According to Gartner 2013 prediction reports, the audience of mobile users will continue to rise up to 40% in the next few years.

Taking into account the above reasons and additional concerns we hear from our customers, we have designed a product that is open source and customizable than ever. For instance, you can easily change labels to a different language, hide features if you don’t need them at the moment, and integrate easily with sample PHP code. Don’t waste your time on custom development, grab a demo from us, and learn how you can reach your mobile users easily.