Open Source Auction Web Site software on Linux

[Dan Jenkins]

A client of mine asked me this morning to create a new domain and web 
site for on-line auctions of their items &, eventually, consignments 
(they are in the collectibles/antiques business, primarily weaponry). 
They are not trying to reinvent eBay; they only want to list their own 
items and not the general public's. Rather than write my own, I searched 
for some existing solutions, but haven't found anything which jumps out 
as "good," let alone, "best." Does anyone have any suggestions for 
on-line auction software, preferably open source, though commercial is 
acceptable, if source is available (Perl, PHP, or Ruby, preferable)?

Running on Linux is mandatory (the distro started out as a RedHat 
variant years ago, but has been heavily customized since). We host with 
ICDSoft. They have the usual LAMP setup, as well as PostgreSQL, or other 
options, as needed.

Any package likely will need us to customize it some, presumably nothing 
onerous, as there are a few oddities of this business (governmental 
regulations) that off-the-shelf software might not provide. Plus I 
really prefer to be able to modify anything as needed.

So far I've seen the names of phpAuction, AuctionFactory (a module for 
Joomla), iLance, E-Z Auction, and a smattering of others which appear to 
be phpAuction-forks. I have only briefly looked at any of these, as I 
hope someone in the group has some experience with something reliable 
and, preferably, easy to work with.

Any thoughts?
TIA.

--
Dan Jenkins, Rastech Inc., Bedford, NH, USA - 1-603-206-9951
+++ Excellence in IT Services for four decades.