SuiteCommerce Site Builder and Themes
SuiteCommerce Site Builder and Themes
This domain covers the merchandising side of the storefront: how pages and content get edited, and how the theme layer (templates plus compiled Sass) is changed without breaking the build.
Two editing models - do not mix them
- Site Builder is the tab-based administration UI of SuiteCommerce Standard / Site Builder sites: Home, Category, Search and similar tabs, where non-developers add custom content, images and HTML, and choose layout and theme options.
- SuiteCommerce Advanced sites are not edited through Site Builder tabs. Content is edited in context with Site Management Tools (SMT) in the storefront; structural change happens in theme and extension code.
- Theme work in SCA means Sass variables and template overrides inside an extension module, compiled to
distro/and deployed - never editing the compiled CSS. - Feature switches that shape the theme (facets, search behavior, ratings, cross-sell) are data: fields on the SuiteCommerce Configuration record.
Worked example
A marketer wants a promo banner on category pages only, on an SCA site. Reasoning: Site Builder tabs are unavailable, so the real choice is SMT custom content (fast, per-page, no deploy) or a template override in a child theme extension (repeatable and rule-driven). Because the requirement is "category pages only," the durable answer is a partial added to the category template and styled in the extension's Sass, then deployed and published; SMT is reserved for the one-off campaign copy.
Traps
- Promising Site Builder tab editing on an SCA site.
- Changing Sass inside
distro/; the next build overwrites it. - Editing a core module instead of overriding from your own extension, so an upgrade erases the work.
- Skipping publish or CDN invalidation, then concluding the theme "didn't compile."