Magento Extension Roundup - December 2016

An interesting extension for developers that adds the ability to inject functionality before, around and after any existing module/extension methods. This is an entirely new system that is separate from the event and rewrite system and can be considered when a Magento event is not available. This process will not create any conflicts that will usually happen when more then one extension/module is trying to provide existing functionality to the same location using a rewrite.

This extension will however need to generate new classes in the Magento cache folder based on plugins that have been loaded, so if you already have some extensions that do something similar you may encounter conflicts with the generated files.

Brainacts's Restriction Checkout extension gives merchants the ability to hide the Add To Cart and Checkout buttons displayed on the frontend. Restrictions can be applied based on the following configurable settings:

• Permanent Restriction (Everyone)
• Guest Restriction
• Block By Website
• Block by IP Zone (IP Address ranges)
• Block by Country

This extension is particularly useful for merchants who run catalog only Magento stores or would only like to take orders from registered customers.

Additional changes will be required in your website theme to make this extension work if the Add To Cart and Checkout buttons have been added in a non-standard way.

The Homepage Slider extension is a responsive carousel designed to be used on the home page. Last month we looked at the MageEvol Responsive Slider extension which provided an extensive amount of slider customisation, where as the Homepage Slider extension provides a much simpler interface that allows direct HTML and CSS input. This style of interface is usually preferred by content editors who have HTML and CSS knowledge and would like the ability to apply advanced effects to a slide such as embedding videos.

This extension is only able to manage banners for a single carousel. If you want to display multiple carousels on your site, the MageEvol Responsive Slider extension mentioned last month might be a better choice.