PayPal PDTId

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5/22/2009 10:52:51 AM
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PayPal PDTId

I was going to post this question but remembered a cool tool called google.  I got the answer.  Figured I'd post it here for others.

-------------------------

I'm trying to integrate the paypal standard payment functionality into my site.  Never used PayPal before, but I just signed up for an account.  I have a question.

In the settings below:

<add key="Site1-PayPalStandardSandboxEmail" value="" />
<add key="Site1-PayPalStandardSandboxPDTId" value="" />

<add key="Site1-PayPalStandardProductionEmail" value="" />
<add key="Site1-PayPalStandardProductionPDTId" value="" />
 

What is the PDTId and where do I find it on PayPal?

 

The Answer:

How to get your paypal PDT ID

Set up a paypal standard account if you don't already have one

1. Login to paypal

2. click the [My account] tab

3. click the [Profile] tab

4. click the [Web site payment preferences] link

5. click the payment data transfer on button

6 make sure Auto Return is turned on

7. Click Save

8. The next screen returns a long PDT ID. Copy and paste the PDT ID into DashCommerce under the payment and configuration screen.

Hope it Helps

 

7/1/2009 11:52:54 AM
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Re: PayPal PDTId

the instructions says:

and you specify your IPN url in the format:
http://yoursiteroot/Services/PayPalIPNHandler.aspx

What is the ipn?

7/1/2009 11:59:29 AM
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Re: PayPal PDTId

IPN stands for Instant Payment Notification. Its a secondary way that PayPal can notify the site that payment has occurred. Typically when the user completes the payment he will be redirected back to the site to the PDT handler url which also gives us notification of payment. But if for some reason the user does not get redirected back to the site like if they close the browser then we would never receive the PDT notification. So its important to also have IPN configured as a redundant notification so there is no chance of not being notified. IPN is a server to server web request from PayPal to our site so it is independant of user behavior.

Hope it helps,

Joe 

7/1/2009 12:01:31 PM
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Re: PayPal PDTId

Its also needed if the payment is not immediately available like if there is a delay in clearing an e-check. So it possible that the pdt response will indicate pending status of payment. In that case when the payment finally clears the IPN will tell us.

7/1/2009 12:10:48 PM
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Re: PayPal PDTId

thank you for the hint; my paypal account is in italian, i don't know how to select english, and follow the instructions is kinda difficult (because of the translation, different menus, and text)

8/1/2010 9:49:57 AM
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Re: PayPal PDTId

Ok, what about when you're using the sandbox, to test out the Paypal Website Payments Standard?  What do you use for the return URL, when you setup Auto Return in the sandbox seller profile?  I'm guessing you have to setup SOMETHING in order to get the "PDTID" for the sandbox setting in web.config?  Do you just use the REAL return URL?  And in the spot for "Site1-PayPalStandardSandboxEmail" -- do you use the seller email as defined by Paypal in the sandbox, even though it's not a "real" email?

I've tried using the sandbox before, and never could get it to work properly, because in every other venue, CMS, or what-have-you, I never could get anyone to actually give me pertinent clues or instructions or even speak english in some cases.  I'm hoping, based on the splendid responses I've had here on other topics, that this place will be different, and might actually lead me in the right direction to figure this thing out, AT LAST!

Thx much!!

Andria

 

8/2/2010 5:47:44 AM
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Re: PayPal PDTId

Hi Andria,

Unfortunately the PayPal sandbox is a nightmare to work with even for experienced developers. I wrote a rant post about it back when I first implemented PayPal support in the WebStore. To be honest it may save you lots of time and frustration to use production settings and run a few small payments through it to test instead of fighting the battle against the sandbox.

This page has my notes about configuring PayPal standard:

http://www.mojoportal.com/ecommerce-configuration.aspx

Hope it helps,

Joe

8/2/2010 3:16:01 PM
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Re: PayPal PDTId

Well, I already read that page about configuring e-commerce, which was very helpful, but didn't answer the questions I have:

  1. What do you use for the return URL, when you setup Auto Return in the sandbox seller profile?
  2. In the spot for "Site1-PayPalStandardSandboxEmail" -- do you use the seller email as defined by Paypal in the sandbox, even though it's not a "real" email?

As for your suggestion that I make small purchases in order to test it, no can do -- we're down to selling off some of our old books to a used book store, to try and keep body and soul together around here, and I sold an old piece of dental gold for a much-needed $33 -- I might even sell my wedding ring, but it's small, only worth $16 for its gold. Our son has been looking for a job for 4 months now, with no luck at all, and feeding a 22 yr old is about equal to feeding a 40-something and a 50-something, COMBINED. We're planning a yard sale as soon as the heat index comes out of the 110-degree range, maybe around Labor Day weekend. To make a long story short, we don't have zero money, we have NEGATIVE money; there is no money for many of the purchases we actually NEED to make (like groceries!), nevermind blowing anything on testing out paypal -- hence coming up with some special-purpose skins that I might be able to sell.

I'm not trying to use their "Pro" or "express" thingie; I don't have an SSL and can't afford one, so if I sell anything, it has to be via Paypal's website payments standard; frankly I can't really see the sense in paying extra for an SSL, when Paypal can handle the payment right on their site, obviating any need for me to have an SSL.  But, that means that Paypal standard is the only means of payment I can use.

I guess I will just set it up and hope it works, and if it doesn't, well they can fuss at me about it then.  I hope it works at least enough for me to receive payment?  In the past year I sold a custom Joomla template, and all I did was direct the lady to send the funds to me at my email address at Paypal, since I had no payment method setup -- it worked, but it's not very elegant, and it's certainly not suitable for the commerce of downloadable products.

And I totally agree with your rant about Paypal.  I tried and tried and tried to get support via their forum; most of 'em don't even speak english, and the ones that do apparently have a serious case of either aphasia, illiteracy, or just plain stupidity; when you ask them anything at all, their only response is usually to tell you to get some other product.  ARGHHH!!!

I think that's the sort of problem you run into when the originator of a thing sells it to someone else who really doesn't give a rip about supporting it properly.

Thx,

Andria

 

8/2/2010 4:50:54 PM
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Re: PayPal PDTId

Actually, on further thought, I might indeed have some kind of SSL; on the page where my host lists all the features in the plan in which I'm enrolled, it says "Shared 128-bit SSL" -- do you think that would be suitable, and if so, is it really simpler to setup Google checkout than Paypal?  Frankly I've found a lot of the google-merchant stuff to be completely inexplicable, but maybe I just haven't found the right documentation.  I really like Paypal, as a customer, because I feel secure with my personal info going to them rather than to every tom dick and harry with something to peddle; that's one of the reasons I've wanted to use paypal, and to use their payments-standard method, since I'm sure a lot of other net consumers feel the same about sharing their personal, financial info -- and if they don't, they SHOULD!  But that level of trust is what I'm aiming at, and since I can't hope to equal that kind of rep, I want to hitch my wagon to that star, if I'm not mangling the metaphor horribly.

But maybe I do have recourse to SSL, and if so, I'm certainly willing to entertain anything that might help me make some financial headway.

Thx!

Andria

8/3/2010 7:30:38 AM
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Re: PayPal PDTId

Hi Andria,

1. Yes, you would use the test merchant email and the test account PDT Id

2. I'm not sure it needs to be configured because I think we pass the return url to paypal, but you could enter it as http://yoursiteroot/Services/PayPalReturnHandler.ashx

3. Shared SSL typically uses a different host name than the main site and will therefore probably will not work with mojoPortal's google checkout integration, however, for PayPal Standard SSL isn't needed.

If you test with PayPal production and use your own account and process the smallest possible order ($1 I think), the only cost to you is the paypal transaction fees for the test transactions, the rest of the money goes into your own account so the cost of testing is like 35 cents per transaction. I realize these are hard times, but if you factor the time and frustration saved into the equation it may be worth it for most people. Just saying if you have no luck with the sandbox, my experience is that production works as expected and the sandbox is a royal pain. Ultimately I think one should at least run one real transaction through the production side to make sure it works before having a real customer come along and have it not work.

Hope it helps,

Joe

8/3/2010 8:38:02 AM
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Re: PayPal PDTId

Hi all,

I generally use the production setup for testing because the PayPal Sandbox is a real pain in the rear. After verifying that everything works properly, I simply use PayPal to refund the payments I made during testing. This means I don't lose any money except for a day or two.

HTH,
Joe D.

8/4/2010 11:55:13 PM
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Re: PayPal PDTId

I should probably slap myself in the head and holler "DOH!" about where the money goes if I use the production-paypal link for testing -- of course, it goes to me! I'm such a doofus sometimes.  Thanks for pointing that out so my doofus status is somewhat relieved.  And since I prefer to use paypal-standard anyway, no great loss on giving SSL/google-checkout a miss -- paypal's trustworthy rep is well deserved, and if more people used it exclusively, I'm thinking there'd be a lot less of this identity theft nonsense.  However every bit of your rant RE: paypal is right on target -- at least, the parts I could understand (the non-programming bits -- I really wouldn't know an API if it bit me someplace uncomfortable).  It's too bad there is really no developer/webmaster-support for such an otherwise-excellent product, but maybe if more of us make enough noise about it, they'll fix it -- hey, it worked with Alltel. wink

I'm working with the WebStore bit of Mojo now, and I'm pondering the Primary Sort Rank and Secondary Sort Rank, but, strangely, there aren't any of those handy "help" graphics to explain what that's about, and the only docs about the store seem to be about setting up the ecommerce stuff.

Thx!

Andria

8/5/2010 6:35:23 AM
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Re: PayPal PDTId

WebStore feature is pretty much an alpha stage feature, it has a long way to go to be a polished ecommerce solution. It is mainly driven by my own need to sell add on products and isn't really up to the job of general purpose user friendly ecommerce yet but I make it available since it can be useful to others with similar needs for selling download products. Eventually it will evolve into a more complete solution with help files and a lot more functionality but it is going to take a while to get there.

The items are sorted first by primary then by secondary sort which makes it possible to group things together and change the sort within the group. There is a setting in "Settings" link of WebStore for Product List Grouping which controls whether the product list is grouped by product or by offer and this also affects what you see, so sort rank for offers may come into play if grouping by offers and sort rank for products if grouping by products.

Best,

Joe

8/7/2010 4:27:53 PM
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Re: PayPal PDTId

Well, for an alpha, it's remarkable -- none of that "internal server error" stuff happens, nor any other errors that I've seen, which is really outstanding for a pre-production release.  I don't really need the sorting thing at this point anyway, I haven't that much to add to the Webstore.  I was just surprised at the lack of the blue question marks, since so much of the rest does have that very nifty feature.

I was thinking just yesterday, while working on a reorganization of my site, how absolutely spectacular this program is -- it does so many things, and does them so well, and so transparently.  After 2+ yrs of working with Joomla!, I figured I had that stuff right down pat, but this is even easier, after just a few weeks of working with it.  You, and whoever else had a hand in its creation, have built a truly marvelous piece of software.  Hats off, 2 thumbs up, etc etc.

I'm also wondering if there are other open source applications for it, other than the vast array included in the installation already?  I'd be really interested to see what kinds of things people (enterprising geeks) have come up with, to work with Mojo.

I'm just about to start testing the Paypal stuff (and yes, procrastinating; what better way than to visit a forum or two), and setting up the store stuff was just as easy as the rest of it -- I guess I can see what you mean about it not being a fully-realized application yet, because obviously it has potential far beyond what it does already -- but what it does already, it does beautifully.  Definitely the easiest store-thing I've ever setup.  yes

Thx!

Andria

8/9/2010 10:54:40 AM
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Re: PayPal PDTId

Glad you like it Andria! The main reason I call it alpha is because it has limited features and isn't feature complete for general purpose commerce, but for the existing features it is stable because I have been running my business on WebStore for a few years now, so I depend on it and have to make sure it works.

Best,

Joe

8/29/2010 8:55:49 PM
EM
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Re: PayPal PDTId

Hi, I need help because I either going blind and I can see, or Paypal has changed.

When I went to paypal, I did not see the [Web Site Preferences] 4 in the instructions:

1. Login to paypal

2. click the [My account] tab

3. click the [Profile] tab

4. click the [Web site payment preferences] link

5. click the payment data transfer on button

6 make sure Auto Return is turned on

7. Click Save

8. The next screen returns a long PDT ID. Copy and paste the PDT ID into DashCommerce under the payment and configuration screen.
 

Thanks

EM

8/29/2010 9:57:10 PM
EM
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Re: PayPal PDTId

Never mind, I found it: I had to upgrade my Paypal account from personal to premier.

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