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phpMyAdmin

First, we must begin with your database. Most people aren’t aware of a neat little tool that comes with most databases called “phpMyAdmin” – or if they are, they have no clue what it’s for. I’m not going to explain what each section is for, but I will show you what you need to do to accomplish this.

So, first, you need to log into your control panel under your hosting account. Look for anything that says “MySQL” (hopefully, you’ll also see a link for “phpMyAdmin” – but some hosts have the phpMyAdmin under the MySQL administration – so it depends on your host.). Once you find phpMyAdmin, get in there. Some places will automatically log you in – others will want you to log in again – usually you only have to use the username and password that you use to log into your hosting control panel.

Once you’re in there, you’ll need to look to the left, in the dropdown box that says “Databases”. Click the dropdown and look for your zencart database – whatever it’s named. Once you click that, you will see a list of tables in your zencart database. Scroll down – you can use the frame on the left or right, it doesn’t really matter – and look for the “zencart_products_description” table. (Your prefix could be different – “zencart_” is whatever you named your tables – but the “product_description” part will be the same – that’s the table you want.) Click on it, and a new screen will open in the right frame that lists the fields for your products description.

At the bottom of the short list of fields, you’ll see a little section that says “Print View”, “Relation View” – stuff like that. You want to find the “Add [input box] fields”. You need to enter in as many new fields as you want to appear in your products description area. For this example, we’re only gonna add one – but you can add more if you like.

So type in “1″, and at the end of that row, click the radio button next to “after”, and in the dropdown box, select “products_description”. Click “Go”, and you’ll be taken to a new screen, where you want to name the field and edit its values.

1. Name the field “products_description2″.
2. Type should be “TEXT”
3. Collation should be “latin1_swedish_ci” (unless you’re using another language – check the other fields to see what *your* default language is for your tables, but this setting is for English.)
4. Under “null”, select “null”.
5. Under “Default2″, type in “null”.
6. all other fields should be blank.

Click “Save”, and look at your new field. Be sure the little icons at the end (“Browse”, “Edit”, etc.) are all the same. Some of the icons will be grayed out – so you want to be sure the same grayed-out icons are the same for your new field as they are for “products_description”.

And thus, you are finished with phpMyAdmin, and you may exit, stage left.