Okay, I have a couple other threads throughout this forum the past day or two and I think I have figured out the direction I want to go...

Im wanting to build an ecommerce type website. I have a business site that I did myself for the past couple years. I bought a template online and just used Dreamweaver to change images, text, hyperlinks, etc... Since i do not know code, I used the deisgn view to drag/drop basically.

Now Id like to implement a shopping cart and give my site an overhaul to bring up to date. I looked into oscommerce, magento, etc but there seems to be a huge learning curve of knowing code that simply, I do not have time for.

So here was my thought...

buy a template that is entirely HTML, no php, etc... but I was the "look, feel" of the site to resemble the ecommerce sites of oscommerce/magento. But again strickly be HTML. Then as far as the shopping cart goes, do something like this site:

http://www.engraversnetwork.com/store/shears.html

they have an HTML site, but still have use of a shopping cart. Im assuming I would have to pay the americart people a monthly charge, but Im okay with that. Im even okay with it directing the customer to another site to do the shopping cart stuff....

the thing I like about this is that its fully HTML and I can edit the pages in Dreamweaver design view...

am I on the right track here? Does this sound possible?

It's certainly possible and sounds like just what you need. Many carts can be made to match your designs so it doesn't even look like you're not exactly on your main site.

Simply No. If you want a e-commerce site with HTML pages, it's indeed possible. You can use Apache modrewrite for this purpose. But if you need to implement secure transaction and instant payment notification like features, you must know some coding. Here is a list, which you cannot do, I suspect...
1. Cannot track sales data into database
2. Cannot notify buyer instantly by email
3. Cannot Deliver digital product (if your products are) instantly
4. Cannot customize everything, worst thing is your users will be redirected to a 3rd party cart provider's website. This is truely un-professional.

So, my suggestion is, if you have money to rent a cart provider website, then employ a coder for single term and he'll create a complete and custom cart script. You may ask him to implement some content management system, so that, you can update cart items, prices etc with few clicks.

This is just a suggestion. Now, you have to choose your way, friend.

I'd recommend something like romancart.com to get you started.

edit your template as needed and then all you have to do is link the "buy" button to your romancart shop using a normal link.

You can edit the look of the basket to match your site so it all looks the same.

Should be enough until you need to upgrade to something more advanced.

Instead of paying a monthly fee for a shopping cart service, why don't you just pay a coder once to set up zencart for you? Or to just design the site completely?

if you make ecommerce site in html, it would be hard for you to update it since you're not using a CMS (content management system)... you need to update it manually since its only html. so, I don't think ecommerce site in html is not really recommended.

I'd check into Ecommerce Templates http://www.ecommercetemplates.com. I'm currenty using them for my site. They have a bunch of formats and I know the back site shopping cart software is html. They have a shoppping cart that can be utilized with a front that you design or already have. It's about $149, the support is excellent and they have an upgrade program for security patches and fixes that runs about $30 every six months.