Open Source Point-of-Sale - What's Out There?

aztektum asks: "I have taken on the task of designing a building a networked Point-of-Sale system for a friends new restaurant/club. We have looked at out of the box solutions, but their upfront costs are a bit staggering, so I suggested a DIY approach. We are going to buy hardware outright, probably using Elo touch-screens and basic white boxes. It's the software that we're coming up short on. We are looking for a system that has good back-end management (running reports for end of day, from a central location and other such features), has a flexible/customizable UI, and as a bonus doesn't suffer from too much proprietary lock-in. Since Elo's screens have Linux support, I wanted to see if anyone on Slashdot has worked on similar projects and has experience with open source POS solutions. I have Google'd a bit and found some options, but I cannot spend a lot time testing out multiple setups because of a firm deadline. Quite bluntly, what's the best but least expensive option that you know of?" This is not the first time this particular issue has appeared on Ask Slashdot. The last discussion on this particular issue was way back in 2003. What has changed since then?

Re:OSS, Free or a Few Dollars?

[KarMax]

Totally agree, with what you say.
BTW is possible to search in Source Forge [sf.net], where you can filter your search as web, or whateveryouwant. But in the parent post you can see the best choices.

Most importantly, change the system based on feedback from the workers.

This is the most important thing you say, because the developers tend to think like "ohh what an amazing app we develop" and then the user doesnt have the little button that does "ping" (As the "machine that does ping") where he wants, and... as a developer maybe its a little difficult to understand some of them, but is mandatory to know that "before we start the development", we must take (at least) 1 month (after we "finish" the app) to add all the changes they need.

Last time I looked into this

[petard]

(which *was* around 2003 or so) jPOS [jpos.org] looked to be the best avaiable OSS solution. We were looking at a big custom development job anyway, though, and that appeared to be the best (open or closed) platform for custom development. If you're looking for something a bit more "out of the box", we never found anything open that went that direction. This looks promising, though [linuxcanada.com].

Re:OSS, Free or a Few Dollars?

[sumdumass]

I know of a store who uses quickbooks POS. They had me fix the sound card because the machine didn't make the ding noise or chaching noise when a sale was completed.

So yes, It is very likley that some users will go nutz if it doesn't act as they think it should. To me, sound on a cash register is anoying but the little clerk running the thing finds it neccesary. I though it might have been to monitor the till opening but they used a key for that so i guess it was just asthetics.

Suse Linux POS

[Anonymous Coward]

My family owns a large chain of retail stores in the Northeast, about 75 stores. We just started a pilot using Suse Linux Enterprise Desktop's Point of Sale implementation and so far I can say we are loving it. We had a Novell partner come in and do the implementation (still with all beta software, mind you) and are piloting the product in three stores...one small, two large. The implementation was simple and the integration with our current system went without a hitch. Hopefully by the end of the year with the final product out we'll have the entire set of stores moved over. This was not what I expected out of the Novell I studied in college (15 years ago) and I am pleasantly surprised.

Good luck.

Re:Buy a real restaurant POS

[Anonymous Coward]

Thank you. I will be sure to avoid allsoftware. I do not care for those that FUD. As to the support, Linux and much of the oss world has done a better job of support than has the closed source.