1. Overview
Kartris is a free ASP.NET web application for running online stores. The system is fully featured e-commerce CMS (content management system) that can store and display product and other data to customers, and has the e-commerce elements that allow items to be selected and purchased, and orders to be processed.
Kartris is written in VB.NET 'web forms' with an MS SQL 2008+ database, and as such must be hosted on an MS Windows Server running the Microsoft IIS web server for production deployment, although it can be run for development and test purposes on a variety of Windows installations. The software consists of three main elements:
- The pages, controls, business logic, templates and other files (including full source code) that run the site
- The database, which stores all product, customer and other data, and the associated code (including stored procedures and the data access layer)
- Other product specific files such as uploaded product images, downloadable files, etc.
Kartris has a modern, user-friendly interface that makes use of AJAX to deliver a fast, feature-rich experience that works on all modern browsers.
Certain sections of this manual are highlighted either for importance, or because they refer to more technical information that is intended largely for developers. We have marked such sections in colour as follows:
Sections marked like this contain technical information intended primarily for developers and IT specialists who are setting up Kartris systems. A general user can normally ignore these sections.
Sections containing important security or other warnings are highlighted in red. All users should pay special attention to these sections.
2. Setup
There are two main scenarios for setup – local and remote. 'Local' means installation on a computer you have full access to such as your desktop or laptop computer, or a server if you have full admin rights. 'Remote' means a computer you can only access via FTP and MS SQL.
2.1. Download the software
Our site downloads page has links to download the latest zip:
https://www.kartris.com/t-Downloads.aspx
The software itself comes as a zipped file.
If you want to obtain the very latest up-to-date code, you can go to the source repository on Github (this may contain development code, unfinished work, bugs and other issues, so the version zips on our downloads page are strongly recommended).
Don't forget to unblock any zip files you download before you unzip them. More information...
You can also download Kartris from Microsoft's web app gallery and install it using the Web Platform Installer:
2.2. Prerequisites
You must have the following software installed in order to run Kartris.
- IIS7.x (Windows Server 2008 or Vista) or IIS8 (Windows Server 2012 or Windows 8 or above)
- MS SQL 2008 Express or above (available free from Microsoft's web site) or one of the full versions of MS SQL 2008 or above
- ASP.NET 4.5+
For best performance, a modern browser such as Firefox, Chrome, Safari or IE9+ for the back end.
