swguy:
What I'm asking for is: if I update the value of the order total dollar amount, can you use this instead of using what the OT Module returns? Like an override capability.
Some thoughts based on this question... Feel free to add to the list...
Stop relying on the Order Total modules and have Edit Orders do the math?
The answer is no.
Doing so would be going backwards to the way Edit Orders 4.0.x operated.
Edit Orders 4.0.x did it's own math, calculations, etc (to allow overrides)... Order Total Modules were not loaded (and the code completely ignored including: settings, tax handling, and other behaviors)... The value (dollar amount) of order totals were always "added" (resulting in third party "discount" modules adding to the total instead of subtracting)... And in general leading to admin users needing to double check everything or risk wrong pricing (and the wrath of upset customers).
Product and attribute pricing was manually calculated instead of using the existing Zen Cart code (and some of the calculation rules were ignored). When adding a product to an existing order, the pricing did not always match the price shown to customers on the website. Again forcing admin users to spend valuable time double check everything or risk wrong pricing (and the wrath of upset customers).
Invalid data was sometimes injected into the database relating to orders (adding shipping to an existing order always failed to result in correctly normalized data). This could cause issues with core portions of Zen Cart as well as third party modules and code (for example code synchronization with other inventory / accounting software).
I'd be surprised if there were not other issues as well, but those are the ones I remember (off the top of my head).
End users manually override the value (dollar amount) of third party order totals?
The problem is: the Order Total system in Zen Cart was not designed to allow end users to "override" dollar amounts (and the API does not include methods to allow overrides). As such, 90% of the Order Totals are not written to take into account they may be overridden.
So if we want to allow overriding the value (dollar amount) of an order total... Until all third party Order Total modules are coded to check for and use an override (and adjust $order->info as appropriate)... Problems with the "Total" (ot_total) and "Tax" (ot_tax) will ensue.
I've thought about adding a "Mock Order Total Module" to better support overriding the value (dollar amount) of an order total... But at a glance I forsee problems with this approach... For example: how does the mock know how tax should be handled? How does the mock know when to add to total vs. subtract from total?
Another thought was to disable editing / overriding the value (dollar amount) of an order total unless the module defines a public variable such as "$override_allowed" (and implements the necessary functionality)... Ugly, but could lead into being added to the core API, so a potential route...
The above are some (of the many reasons) I've been tempted many times to switch Edit Orders 4.1.x back to "automatic calculation only" (no overrides allowed) for all order total modules... Prior to the first public release this was added back in due to OVERWHELMING DEMAND by alpha test participants (along with special handling for most of the "core" order total modules included with Zen Cart).
End user to manually override the value (dollar amount) of all order totals?
I am planning to add this functionality into a future release. Once certain items are overridden, the user will be forced to manually override "Tax" (ot_tax) and "Total" (ot_total). This should help by allowing people to manually update the values.
Long term, I suspect it would be better to just enforce "automatic calculations only" for the value (dollar amount) of all order totals. Or make changes to the Zen Cart API and the core Zen Cart code handling orders and order totals.