shopping cart for non registered users

Question

I am in the process of making a website that involves a shopping cart. There are two major requirements:

1. The user experience guys want login/authentication

Answer 1

I think you have some expectations to manage, or maybe you weren't clear on requirements.

1. The user experience guys want login/authentication to be the very last step in the entire work flow. The user gets to do all the shopping and is asked to login only at the time of checking out.
2. The shopping cart shouldn't expire(not even on browser close) unless the user (registered or not) does check-out.

Specifically, an anonymous, not logged-in user's cart being saved? That's madness. Ensure that's not an expectation and clarify it in your design documents.