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Make sure you are maintaining your user profile up-to-date, especially the email address, so you will be able to receive our notifications regarding support and updates! Profile information is accessible when logged in, by clicking on my profile, available at the user menu on top of the page or the logout menu. After you perform the needed changes, press the "Save Profile" button to update your profile information.

Navigation

  1. Ticket System Proceedings for Customer Support and Update Requests
  2. Updates & Downloads
  3. Forum Guidelines
  4. Quotes & Custom Work
  5. Involving 3rd party Developers
  6. Further Extension Development
  7. License Renewal
  8. Compatibility Chart
  9. Installation, Testing (extension environment) and Maintenance
  10. Language Files
  11. Templates and CSS files

Ticket System Proceedings for Customer Support and Update Requests

1For any questions, customer support concerns or update requests, fill out one of the forms available under Contact Us. In case of Customer Support requests, please limit to a single Ticket, since this will speed up the reply. Please DO NOT post any duplicates, choose either opening a Ticket or a Forum post!

To submit a "Support Ticket" or an "Update Request" LOG IN to our site. When submitting the ticket you will be easily able to retrieve your existing order number, click on it and it will automatically fill in certain required fields, speeding up the submission process. Provide an exact description of the encountered issue, NOT a simple "it does not work", since like this we won't be able to help you. After filing up the submit form, a confirmation email will be received (check your SPAM folder too), that the ticket was submitted and your request will be shortly processed.

2DO NOT SEND ANY EMAILS OR REPLIES TO ANY RECEIVED NOTIFICATION containing your answers, since through other methods like email, Facebook or other social media, your request may not reach us, due to spam filters. ONLY use the forms available under the Contact Us pages, then just track the opened tickets under My Tickets!

3Please wait until we are providing you with an answer, before tracking a ticket with further issues or submitting other support tickets which might me related. We are trying to answer as soon as possible, but this depends also on our working schedule, the issue itself, existing workload or other factors. A member of our staff will reply to the ticket providing the requested information or support. When a reply is made you will receive an email notification, so that you will have to login to our site and check the ticket.

4If we consider that the ticket does no longer require a correspondence, then it will be closed directly after our answer. If the ticket will be open after our reply and you still have any issues left, you can leave us further feedback within the next 24 hours. After 24 hours of non-activity from the customer or just after providing a solution, tickets are closed. For a certain period of time you have the possibility to re-open an older ticket. If this option is not available anymore, meaning that the ticket is too old (might contain older data like component version, which is relevant for debugging), then just submit a new one.

5In case you were requested by our team to provide site credentials, always perform first a complete site Back-up before any debugging session or any other kind of intervention from our part, since we are not responsible for any kind of data loss! In such situations, please create a new super administrator account for that session and when our intervention is finalized just erase that account. Note that we can fix only issues regarding our components, NOT issues involving system configuration or corrupted Joomla! installations, issues caused by third party extensions, scripts or plugins.


Updates & Downloads

Updates are included in the licensing package, for a period of one year, for customers who are registering the product on a single domain (one live site and URL). The customer will receive then the updates upon request, after a validation of the site URL. Please note that if any updates will be released, they will come as they are and only in special cases an upgrade script will be released. We are making available for download ONLY the latest available version, NOT older product versions! Bonus downloads, free distributed licenses and customized versions (which are usually built on the latest available versions) are NOT subject to any update. Non-commercial products are also distributed as presented and are not the subject of updates.

To submit a request and later download the update, please log in to our site, then go to ONLY to the Update Request form. After submitting a ticket you will receive an email notification that a ticket has been opened. Another email will notify you at a later point, when the new download link was validated and issued. Depending on our working schedule displayed under the Contact Us page, we will try to validate your update request as soon as possible! After the download link was validated and issued, update downloads can be made via email-Token, or by just accessing My Orders & Downloads. On update requests, DO NOT reply to any EMAIL notifications or other emails issued by the ticket system! If any issue, then please open a "Customer Support" ticket.

Please provide a Licensed URL, even if it's temporary, else the update request cannot be validated. After you either finalize the tests and move to the live site or simply decided to change the domain to another one, just send us a "Customer Support" ticket as notification, that you've changed the Licensed URL.

Most of our extensions are compatible with the Joomla updater, so you can easily update them in order to benefit from the latest features and code improvements. In order to avoid any possible issues, we always recommend to stay up-to-date with latest versions of Joomla! and used extensions. Note of course that by performing an update, any added code, template tweaks, as well modifications to the configuration- and language files will be lost, so do not forget to always perform a BACKUP first before doing any changes! Save all extra added code modifications, template changes, configuration- and language files separately, so you can add them after the update is completed. We strongly recommend that any update, as well as any added code or template tweaks, should be first implemented and tested on a test environment, not on a running (live) site and only after everything is tested, to implement it also on the live site.


Forum Guidelines

Forum Support does not include questions regarding the code, how to customize it or further development! Only for commercial products, if the time will allow it, only then we may answer on short tweaks, but not longer than just a couple of code lines. For heavier customizations we recommend hiring a developer. If there is no answer yet, do not re-post it or bump the topic up, since this will be seen as impertinent behavior and it may lead to canceling your membership (in some cases without any previous notice).

Support for FREE products covers only the latest available version for download,
NOT older versions and ONLY product issues, NOT further customizations, tweaks or code questions!

When submitting a potential issue, first make sure that you are able to replicate it under the following conditions:

  1. using the latest available build from our servers
  2. using the latest available Joomla! version for that products
  3. using the default Joomla! template
IF after A, B and C you can still replicate any issue on your server, send us your feedback in the following format for each possible issue:
  1. Issue description (please write a detailed description of that issue)
  2. Replicate steps (clearly mention the steps to replicate the issue)
  3. Expected results
  4. Actual results
  5. Specify also the following:
    • PHP version running on your server/hosting
    • used browser under which this is replicated
    • in case of any blank pages, enable error reporting (http://forum.joomla.org/viewtopic.php?t=154552) and let us know also the displayed messages.

In order to avoid any trouble, please do not use improper language, insults, or have an impertinent behavior regarding matters like repetitive questions regarding development plans, code explaining, code development, company policies and prices). We hope that members will understand and see it in a positive manner, as it is meant to increase productivity and to maintain the same quality level at a very reasonable price.

Any forum user, customer or non-customer, may be banned without any previous notice for posting commercial advertising. Personal Signature Links or any other posted URL, are permitted only to pages or domains using one of our extensions.


Quotes & Custom Work

Please provide a detailed and complete project description, containing the desired workflow for each page or functionality. This should include a step-by-step description for each new feature, as well as for each modification of an existing functionality! If available and possible, attach also any visual representations like screenshots, which might explain in detail what is expected. Please note, that we can ONLY quote for direct and explicit mentioned features or modifications, and not for ones that might be somehow implied.

Issued quotes are valid for 48 hours if there is no other agreement made, due to constant price-offer optimization and available resources. Time-frames are approximate, since they may vary due to the clients feedback. Offers are not transmittable. Offers are having a private and confidential character and cannot be published in any form. If involving our products, the custom work will be realized only on the latest available version, and if possible also integrated in the product, else it will be a one-time customized kit (*terms are applying). The quote does not include the price of the product which will be customized. If you decide at a later point (after 3 days) to accept the quote, then kindly ask again for a price and delivery term confirmation.

If you agree on our quote and decide to start the project with us, then we will send you a payment link. After the payment is honored, we can start working on the project as agreed.  Please follow the same ticket used for the quote to track the project activity and feedback (DO NOT open several tickets for the same project).

Brief overview of the usual project steps:
1. sending Quote Request
2. establishing all needed Details and exact Work-flow
3. Quote issued => Quote acceptance => Payment made
4. working on Project and delivering to Client
5. receiving Feedback and solving it, if so the case
6. final Feedback and Project closure.

Involving 3rd party Developers

License holder guidelines for involving other 3rd parties in further developing or deploying thePHPfactory applications. This guidelines are meant to help license holders to avoid any issues with the license and to protect themselves against any fraud attempts, caused by a 3rd party developer which does not respect the Terms & Conditions under which our products are distributed. We will mention here some of the most encountered cases, along with our advises for proceedings in order to avoid any licensing issues. By 3rd party developers we are referring to any developer, software house, software company or freelancer.

1stSite owner acquires the license and involves a 3rd party in further development
(implementation, layout and templates, site deploying, etc.).

Our advice: Site owner and 3rd party should sign an NDA before starting any project, where both parties are clearly identified and where the 3rd party is stating that they agree to our Terms & Conditions.

2ndSite owner delegates a 3rd party to create his new site and acquire for him some of our licensed applications.
Our advice: Site owner and 3rd party should sign an NDA before starting any project, where both parties are clearly identified and where the 3rd party is committing to acquire all products under the identification data of the client, agreeing also to respect our Terms & Conditions. It's mandatory that the product is acquired under the site owner's name, since if the site does not have a signed agreement with the 3rd party and, at a later point, a dispute will arise between site owner and 3rd party, the legal holder can be identified as the person which holds the order information and member login on our site, in order to benefit from customer support and product updates.

3rdAcquiring a ready made website containing one or several licensed PHPfactory products.
Our advice: Before finalizing any deal, please contact us in order to validate the license owner exchange for any of our extensions which are used on the site; this will require our explicit and written consent.

Please note also the following cases and try to avoid them in order to honor our Terms & Conditions.
  • If a 3rd party is breaching our licensing terms, for example by sharing the product on warez sites, installing it on multiple sites, etc., the license will be immediately revoked without any previous notice.
  • If a 3rd party is acting inappropriate on the forum, the account can be suspended without any previous notice, not being able to retrieve further updates or to benefit from customer support.
  • Update requests are processed and sent to the email from thePHPfactory account that made the purchase, regardless if this is a 3rd party or the directly licensed site owner.

Please note that if a 3rd party is customizing any extension, according to our terms&conditions we cannot offer any support on altered code. Also it's up to the third party to implement any changes properly, so that you will still be able to update the extension, without loosing the 3rd party changes.


Further Extension Development

Further Development. Most of our products, if not all, will still be developed and will offer compatibility to the latest platforms, as you may see under the "version info" tab of each product page. Surely, this is a process which takes time, because sometimes the changes are substantial and our goal is to always offer professional solutions. Therefore, the newly added features and fixed issues will be available only on the latest version of our products.

Browser compatibility is offered in order to cover up only the most widely used ones such as the latest versions of Internet Explorer, Mozilla Firefox and Google Chrome.

Joomla! Templates compatibility. We can guarantee compatibility with the Joomla! default templates and any other template which is developed 100% according to the Joomla! standards. Please note that any issues you may encounter with a 3rd party template, are NOT part of our product support, since this depends only on code and development of the 3rd party templates.

ETA (Estimated time of arrival). We will make ETA's public at a certain time. If no ETA are announced for the product you are interested in, then please don't ask for further details, since it means that at this point due to company policies we cannot reveal it. We are sorry for the inconvenience.


License RenewalProduct Support

If your license expired, you can acquire a new one anytime, by visiting the product page. Most of our products are still running with very significant discounts, so the buying price actually reflects the product support and updates for a period of one year, it does NOT represent a repurchase of the product!
Our prices are lowered as much as possible, going beyond that would only have a negative influence on the continuity, support and quality of the project. Other discounts than the ones already displayed on our product pages, are available when purchasing license packages of at least 20 licenses per product.
Thank you for your trust in our products and services!


Compatibility Chart

Since our days, there are several Joomla! versions in use, so we want to make more transparent the compatibility of our products with the Joomla! versions. Please make sure you are using the needed Joomla! version, depending on the product version you have (you can also check the product description for our exact product requirements). Below you will find a Joomla! compatibility chart for thePHPfactory product versions (please note that support for older product versions on J!1.0, 1.5, 1.6, 1.7, 2.5 is discontinued):

auction Joomla! 3.x Joomla! 2.5 Joomla! 1.7 Joomla! 1.5 Joomla! 1.0
Auction Factory
sinceAugust 2007
4.6.4 3.6.3 3.0.0 2.6.5 1.7.5
Reverse Auction Factory
sinceAugust 2008
4.4.0 3.5.2 3.0.0 2.0.0 1.4.4
Dutch Auction Factory
sinceAugust 2014
2.0.6 - - - -
Penny Auction Factory
sinceSeptember 2016
2.0.4 - - - -
Raffle Factory
sinceApril 2009
3.5.2 2.1.1 2.0.0 1.3.7 1.3.7
eCommerce Joomla! 3.x Joomla! 2.5 Joomla! 1.7 Joomla! 1.5 Joomla! 1.0
Ads Factory
sinceJanuary 2009
4.6.1 3.5.0 3.2.1 1.8.8 -
Swap Factory
sinceMarch 2014
3.0.0 - - - -
Media Mall Factory
sinceApril 2009
4.3.2 3.3.5 3.0.0 1.2.1 1.2.1
Micro Deal Factory
sinceOctober 2011
2.4.1 1.8.3 1.1.0 - -
Collection Factory
sinceSeptember 2011
4.2.4 3.1.0 3.0.0 1.0.1 -
social Community Joomla! 3.x Joomla! 2.5 Joomla! 1.7 Joomla! 1.5 Joomla! 1.0
Social Factory
sinceMay 2012
3.8.8 2.0.2 1.0.0 - -
Love Factory
sinceJune 2009
4.6.8 3.5.6 3.0.1 1.7.9 -
Chat Factory
sinceMay 2010
4.5.4 3.1.1 3.0.0 1.2.4 -
Blog Factory
sinceNovember 2009
4.4.6 3.1.1 3.0.0 1.3.5 -
Events Factory
sinceOctober 2016
1.1.2
Jobs Factory
sinceApril 2013
2.0.7 - - - -
jAnswers Factory
sinceApril 2009
4.2.6 3.2.0 3.0.0 1.3.2 -
Wall Factory
sinceDecember 2010
4.1.8 2.3.0 2.2.0 1.1.6 -
Feedback Factory
sinceMarch 2011
3.1.3 1.3.0 1.2.0 - -
Hot or Not Factory
sinceOctober 2009
4.2.4 3.1.1 3.0.1 1.0.8 -
Photo Battle Factory
sinceAugust 2010
4.2.4 3.1.0 3.0.2 1.2.5 -
Music Battle Factory
sinceJuly 2012
4.2.4 1.1.2 1.0.0 - -
content Management Joomla! 3.x Joomla! 2.5 Joomla! 1.7 Joomla! 1.5 Joomla! 1.0
Briefcase Factory
sinceJune 2007
4.2.1 3.5.1 3.0.1 1.6.1 1.4.0
eBook Factory
sinceMay 2007
4.3.9 3.2.5 3.0.0 1.6.5 1.3.3
Article Factory Manager
sinceJanuary 2008
4.4.2 3.2.2 3.0.0 1.9.1 1.3.1
Content Image Factory
sinceNovember 2007
4.2.5 3.2.0 3.1.0 2.5.0 1.0.0
Advertisement Factory
sinceMarch 2011
3.1.8 2.5.3 2.0.0 - -
SEO Keyword Factory
sinceFebruary 2010
3.4.3 2.2.0 2.1.0 1.1.1 -
Spam Protect Factory
sinceSeptember 2013
1.2.3 - - - -
RSS Joomla! 3.x Joomla! 2.5 Joomla! 1.7 Joomla! 1.5 Joomla! 1.0
RSS Factory PRO
sinceAugust 2008
4.3.6 3.2.3 3.0.1 1.8.5 -
RSS Factory
sinceApril 2007
4.3.6 3.1.1 3.0.0 1.6.2 1.1.1
RSS 2 Image Factory
sinceApril 2008
4.1.5 3.1.3 3.0.0 1.5.5 -
RSS Context Factory
sinceMay 2007
4.1.5 3.1.0 3.0.0 1.5.3 1.0.0

Installation, Testing (extension environment) and Maintenance

Installation. When performing any installation and setting up an extension, follow the provided Documentation, where all available features and settings are described. If a newcomer to Joomla then it's mandatory to check first the Joomla! Documentation, in order to understand the basics of working under the Joomla! CMS environment. 

Testing. Always create a test installation environment, where you first install any extension, adjust the needed changes or any minor code tweaks, test the updates, etc. Only after a complete testing cycle, integrate the changes at the live-site. Maintain the live-site as clean as possible, do not install here any extension to test them, and uninstall them later; for this you have the test-site! Even if uninstalled, some 3rd parties might cause issues if not properly developed! Perform a clean Joomla installation on the live-site, without any kind of leftovers from previous installations and keep it simple only with the necessary components which are tested previously on the test-site.

Maintenance. Always backup your website and verify the integrity of the backup files, because it's easier to restore, rather than recreate. For security reasons, try to update each extension of your website each time a new release is available, as well as the Joomla! CMS (as mentioned above, do not forget first to test those updates); it might also bring several code improvements, making your website faster and more reliable. Perform any custom coding or layout changes in separate files, so that you can re-apply it easily after each update, thus allowing your site to be kept up to date, as well as maintaining any customization.


Language Files

Since we decided to focus more on the product features and to release new versions as soon as possible, in order for our customers to benefit much faster from new features, we decided to only maintain the English language files up-to-date (available directly with the extension download), thus leaving the other languages to be community based on our forums. If you want to translate or simply edit the language files, here are the needed instructions:

Languages files are stored as *.INI files under the /language/.. folders of the Joomla site.
[Joomla dir]/administrator/language
and
[Joomla dir]/language
You want to create a new language file for other language?
Just rename one of the existing INI-files (ex. en-GB.com_articleman.ini) with the specific suffix (ex. de-DE for German, etc.),
in the desired language folder of Joomla! (ex. language/de-DE/),
NOT extension folder!!! and translate the content text from the renamed file.

If there are language strings which you do not find in the standard language ini files, then please check also under the following path:
[root]\administrator\components\com_[component name like for example "rbids"]\thefactory\language\en-GB\
(this is valid for major extensions developed in our software house, which are using our own theFactory framework)
where depending on the used extension you might find the following language files:

  • en-GB.thefactory.about.ini
  • en-GB.thefactory.category.ini
  • en-GB.thefactory.config.ini
  • en-GB.thefactory.fields.ini
  • en-GB.thefactory.installer.ini
  • en-GB.thefactory.integration.ini
  • en-GB.thefactory.mailman.ini
  • en-GB.thefactory.payments.ini
  • en-GB.thefactory.positions.ini
  • en-GB.thefactory.themes.ini

At certain extensions, there are also plugins like the payment gateways, where the language file location is different than the other extension language files.
For example at Love Factory, the path is:
[Joomla dir]/administrator/components/com_lovefactory/payment/language/en-GB

Attention! File names are case-sensitive!
Also please note to follow the standard language suffix, in order to obtain compatibility (where is required) with extensions like Joomfish, etc.

When editing the language files, make sure that there are no syntax mistakes, else the files won't be parsed by Joomla!
You can verify the language files by using the Joomla Language Debug function in the Joomla backend. For example:
WRONG SYNTAX: COM_LOVEFACTORY_BATCH_ACTIONS_LABEL=""Batch"
CORRECT SYNTAX: COM_LOVEFACTORY_BATCH_ACTIONS_LABEL="Batch"

Attention! When editing the language files make sure you DO NOT change the *.INI file extension and the file encoding,
which should be UTF-8 without BOM (meaning UNICODE not ANSI).

You can also use certain tools to debug your language files for syntax errors, here a link to a fork of com_localise which runs directly from the Joomla backend.


Templates and CSS files

Joomla! Templates compatibility. Any Joomla! template is compatible to our Joomla! extensions, as long as it's been 100% developed according to the Joomla! standards! Unfortunately, we cannot make any specifications regarding a certain template, since they are millions out there. After installing and configuring a component, you can install on your site several Joomla! templates to test which one does it fit more to your requirements and purpose. There are hundreds of thousands of free Joomla! templates out there to choose from, which with the proper knowledge you can modify further if needed on your site.

Product Templates versus Joomla! Templates. Most of the newcomers to Joomla! are mistaken those two kind of templates, which are actually working together, as long both are developed to the required standards. The Joomla! templates are for the entire website and are influencing also the product display, while the product templates are responsible only for the product itself. For major products like Auction, Reverse, Dutch, Raffle, Ads, Swap, Love, Jobs -Factory etc., we are providing a product template solution based on SMARTY template framework, which offers extra flexibility for each webmaster, in order to adapt the look and layout to their special requirements. Editing the SMARTY based templates, it's easier then editing a Joomla! extension which comes without such implementation, since it does not involve also PHP knowledge. Generally, we provide the mandatory information regarding the extensions SMARTY templates under our Documentation section.

Look & Layout changes. Testing, debugging and implementation of any kind of changes to the Joomla! templates, product Smarty based templates or just normal extensions which are coming without a template system, are exclusively up to each webmaster, and naturally, are NOT part of the product support. If the extension does not require any template system, it will surely come with CSS files, which are very easy to edit and modify.

A very common question on our forum and ticket system is:
"How do I change the color?"
Nowadays, almost all browsers have Web Developer Tools integrated. Usually, you can activate this set of tools using F12 button or by accessing the browser menu. Once the web developer windows is available on the page, use the INSPECT function: click on Inspect to activate this mode, then hover over the page and click on the element you wish to change. After selecting the needed element on the page, in the Web Developer window you will see all the information about it, including such as where the code is coming from and which CSS definitions are involved. After identifying the needed code you can start altering the CSS file.

For web beginners, who never edited a CSS file before, we suggest first to "google" a little bit to see exactly what a CSS file is and what kind of definitions are stored inside it. Multiple tutorials are available on the web as documentation format, but also as videos, which might offer a good understanding of what happens on the site, outside the extension. To gain the bigger picture and to understand the complete process in order to work with any extension, it's very important to check also the documentation regarding Joomla! administration, hosting/server, CRON configuration (if the case), FTP proceedings, etc. Before performing any changes, never forget the first rule: ALWAYS PERFORM A BACKUP!


We hope that you will find this material useful, along with the available product Documentation and our Forum,

which serves as an important knowledge base and contains also a lot of helpful tweaks.

If there are still unanswered questions or untouched topics, do not hesitate to Contact Us.

Best Regards,

thePHPfactory Team