[mv] Newbie questions relating to SQL please help

[Roger Arnold <rbarnold@a-dream.com.au>]

******    message to minivend-users from Roger Arnold <rbarnold@a-dream.com.au>     ******

Roger Arnold wrote:

I apologise in advance if these statements and questions seem absolutely
stupid, but I am stumbling around at the moment and can't seem to see
which way is up.

I have spent some time reading and re-reading the MiniVend docs and the
MySQL docs, and would be grateful if someone could give me a little
guidance please

Where I seem to be coming unstuck is in the configuration file of
MiniVend and the set-up of the database section, but first I will
describe what I want to do, and then perhaps someone could answer some
questions please.

I am trying to set-up MiniVend to only use an SQL database, as a catalog
only, and no E-Commerce, where on the user typing in the search criteria
MiniVend will return a list of short descriptions using only 3 fields
(sku, description, link) and if they click the link of one of the
displayed items, minivend will rebuild the frame with a web page
depicting the item chosen.
I want to set-up the necessary fields in a MySQL database (no problem
there as I am familiar with various SQL databases) and now I will ask
the questions to hopefully clarify my thoughts.

In the catalog.cfg file there is reference to the ProductDir which has a
default of  "products" which is located in the /home/catalogs/simple
directory, if I only wanted to use a SQL database, what should that be
set to?

Under the section "Database" it is stated that the default database is
"products products.asc 1" which I take to mean the file "products.asc"
in the "products" directory. Now, if I want to use only an SQL database,
do I need to still have a "products.asc" file in the products directory
to define the first 3 fields or can I just use the first 3 fields in my
SQL database?
If so, what do I set "products products.asc 1" to?

In the section:
"Database             products products.asc
dbi:mysql:minivend:localhost:3306"
I assume that MiniVend first looks at the directory "products" and the
file "products.asc" before accessing the MySQL database, but if all the
products and fields are only in the SQL database what does MiniVend need
to look in that file for?
More importantly what needs to be in the "products.asc" file?

Thanks in advance for any help that someone can give me to understand
how MiniVend works in relation to the above.

Roger

-
To unsubscribe from the list, DO NOT REPLY to this message.  Instead, send
email with 'UNSUBSCRIBE minivend-users' in the body to Majordomo@minivend.com.
Archive of past messages: http://www.minivend.com/minivend/minivend-list