[thelist] Homemade Shopping Cart Question

[Rob Smith]

Some time later a Wally-World associate notes the abandoned cart with
the G.I. Joe in it. Dutifully the associate carefully removes Joe from
the cart and places him upon the shelf, thus returning him to
inventory--making him visible to other shoppers once again.
....

Ok. Now that I've got the Wally-World Idea down. At what point to you have
checks and balances to confirm that this G.I. Joe retro toy was actually
sold, and not abandoned? Do you have intermittent states of information?

Example: Abandoned Product
Stock Status :: Available
 - Customer puts into basket
Stock Status :: NULL or IN TRANSIT
 - Customer bolts out of the door to buy a G5
Stock Status :: remains in current state until some time later when employee
reassignes status to "Available" 
Q: How punctual is the employee at checking for emptied baskets? 12-hours,
24-hours, 48-hours, 1-month?

Example: Purchased Product
Stock Status :: Available
 - Customer puts into basket
Stock Status :: NULL or IN TRANSIT
 - Customer purchases figurine
Stock Status :: Order#
 - product is no longer available

So now the question is, do you timestamp your products as they enter the
basket, and every time you insert reels into this temporary table, do you do
a check for expired products? do you set triggers? 

Thanks again,

Rob