How to Send Order to Google Checkout (classic ASP)

This guide is aimed at anyone who wishes to use the Google Checkout to process transactions from their website. This section will concentrate passsing your order into Google using an on page form.

We will make use of the provided code by the Google Team, as they have done all the leg work, so make use of it.

Prerequisite

Before we begin please make sure that you have the following be going on.

1. An understanding of Classic ASP and how XML works
   


2. Both a Google Checkout Account and Google Checkout Sandbox Account
   


3. A Copy of the Classic ASP Sample Code - Get a Copy Here
   


4. Your website should already be at the point where all product information is able to be passed to Google.

The Process

Step 1 - Setup your environment

Once you have downloaded the sample code, extract the complete contents of the Zip file into the location you are going to run the code from. What I would suggest is that you keep the Google code in its own folder within your website, thsi will make using it alot easier.

Step 2 - Get your Merchant ID and Key

Login to your Google Checkout Sandbox Account - https://sandbox.google.com/checkout/

Click on the settings tab at the top of the screen, then click on the integration option from the left menu.

Make a note of your Gooogle Merchant ID and Google Merchant Key from the right of the screen.

NOTE - Your Sandbox Merchant ID and Merchant Key are different to your Live / Production details.

Step 3 - Setup the details for your call back page.

1. Make sure that the For Extra security... tick box is unchecked (if you leave this checked you will get URL errors when posting your order form to Google)



2. Make sue the XML option is selected for the Callback Method (this means Google will send XML to your callback page and not name/value pairs)



3. Enter your url of where your callback.asp page will be hosted. (when testing in sandbox this URL does not have to be SSL secured and can use the normal HTTP protocol

Step 4 - Setup Testing Details

Ok once you have made a note of your merchant id and key, you need to enter these in the correct locations in order to process your orders and receive stuff back from Google.

We also need to setup the sample code to work as test code, so all transactions can be done against out test environment.

Open the file googleglobal.asp and do the following

1. Change the values of the two contstants MerchantId and MerchantKey. These should match your testing, sandbox details for testing.


2. Change the variable EnvType to SANDBOX


3. Change the variable MerchantCurrency to match your country currency, GBP, USD, etc.

Note - Make sure all of the files contained in the code sample Zip file are location in the same folder

Step 5 - Create your page form

Now go into the page which you wish to submit to GoogleCheckout. This page is the one which will be passed directly to Google containing the order details.

On this page you need to create a form with a series of hidden fields

The basic fields are

1. item_price_1 - the price of the item


2. item_currency_1 - the currency for this item


3. item_quantity_1 - the amount of this item


4. item_description_1 - the description of this item


5. item_name_1 - the name of this item

If you are passing more item you can do so by incrementing the number for example, iten_price_1, item_price_2 and so on.

In addition to the fields above you can additionally specific.

1. ship_method_name_1 - this is the carrier or delivery method


2. ship_method_price_1 - this is the cost of delivery for this item

Again for multiple items you can just increment the item number for example, ship_method_name_1, ship_method_name_2 and so on.

Now in addition to the item specific fields you can additionally specify any tax details, such as VAT or trade taxes you wish to apply to this order. Google will automatically add this on to your total for you at the checkout.

These fields are

1. tax_rate - this is the actual rate of tax as a decimal i.e 17.5% would be 0.175


2. tax_use_state - if in the US you must specify which state you are paying tax to.


3. continue-shopping-url - if you specify this the link the shopper clicks on the purchase complete page in the checkout will take them to this url.

Form Target URL

Whilst in testing your form needs to post to
https://sandbox.google.com/checkout/cws/v2/Merchant/YOUR-MERCHANT_ID/checkoutForm

Note - Replace YOUR-MERCHANT_ID with the merchant ID for your Sandbox account.

Form Sample

<form name="googleform" action="https://sandbox.google.com/checkout/cws/v2/Merchant/YOUR-MERCHANT-ID/checkoutForm" method="post" charset="utf-8">
<input type="hidden" value="Product_Name" name="item_name_1">
<input type="hidden" value="Product Description" name="item_description_1">
<input type="hidden" value="1" name="item_quantity_1">
<input type="hidden" value="99" name="item_price_1">
<input type="hidden" value="GBP" name="item_currency_1">
<input type="hidden" value="DHL" name="ship_method_name_1">
<input type="hidden" value="3.99" name="ship_method_price_1">
<input type="hidden" value="0.175" name="tax_rate">
<input type="hidden" value="NY" name="tax_us_state"></form>

Once you have passed all your information into this form, you can now post this form directly to Google Checkout. All you need to do is submit this form, by which ever means you like.

In my next post I will look at what to do this the details you have passed into Google.

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Sean J Connolly - AJAX and GIS Specialist
http://www.potissimus.co.uk
http://www.buzzproperties.co.uk/

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