Easy Populate Advanced

[notageek]

I am hoping this question is applicable to the free Zen Cart although it has come up in relation to the results of an Easy Populate Advanced product import:

When I upload a music type product through EP Advanced 3.0.3, the description does not appear in the Admin editable screen, although the description shows up in the shopping cart itself, and is in the products_description table seen in PHPMyAdmin.

What is the best way to get the product name and description into the admin product description and name fields for a music-type product? I believe there is also a free Easy Populate version that uploads music type products, so maybe that is a similar situation.

Is the product_types_to_category table in the MySQL database, visible in PHPMyAdmin, relevant?

Would limiting categories to music type at the bottom of the product description screen in the admin be relevant?

Since the descriptions do appear in the Admin screens for general product types, would uploading the product twice--once for each product type--and copying through the "c" icon work--i.e., can products in different product types be copied that way?

Thanks for any insights. I will let you know if I find out anything in this regard.

Notageek

[notageek]

I limited a test category to music type, and it shows on the bottom of the Admin screen that its default is music type.

However, when I import a music-type product via Easy Populate Advanced 3.0.3, it says there is a partial error, and the product type is changed to the "default product type" of general product type.

It appears therefore that Easy Populate Advanced 3.0.3 is entering the product as product general, and while the description and name of the product now show, there is no choice of genre, artist, record company, so it is a product - general.

The converse was true when the music-type product was entered into a general category. In that case, the music-product Admin screen came up with the artist, genre, and record company choices.

This seems to explain that the Easy Populate Advanced 3.0.3 enters everything as general, but somehow has a workaround that allows the description to come up in the cart but not in the admin screen, but gives the option in the admin screen of choosing genre, artist, and record company.

If I cannot discuss this since I am referring to the paid version, please let me know and feel free to delete this post. This is only an observation and theory that I find helpful in reference to my prior post.

Notageek

[notageek]

Well, the results are in, with not very extensive testing.

Here is how Easy Populate Advanced 3.0.3 operates as far as the music type product goes.

Because it has a column to specify music product type, I felt obliged to test it out to see if my CDs should be changed from the general product type to the music product type. I have so many CDs that I really need to use Easy Populate, and 1.2.5.4 only does general product type.

In the above posts, I established that if one selects the music product type for an upload using EP Advanced 3.0.3:

1. The product description and name do not show in the admin-editable screen.

2. If one limits the category (in the admin-editable description screen at the bottom)(no sub cats were involved) to product type music, the program will force it back to product general and will not upload in music product type, but gives the general product type admin-editable screen only.

Further tests reveal the following.

3. Next step: What would happen if I actually entered a description into the blank admin-editable screen?

Everything went blank and the product stated it had zero in stock and lost its picture. The way to fix this was to enter something into ALL of the blank places (except genre, artist, and record company) in the music-type product admin-editable screen.

This even occurred if I solely entered the genre, record company, or artist boxes which work only with the music-type product. In other words, if you press "update" all data is lost unless all editable boxes are filled in.

4. However, I was able to add a media clip to the listing.

Obviously, it would save absolutely no time to upload all the products and then enter everything manually.

The results of this testing are that if one wishes to have a blank admin-editable screen and not choose genre, artist, or record company, one could have lots of music products with media clips, and would need to make any description or name changes only in PHPMyAdmin, unless one wanted to fill in all of the screens in the admin-editable screen, one-by-one.

One last vagary: Whereas I believe I was successful previously in uploading an English and Spanish name and description as a music product type, after I entered a product in a single language the test category stopped allowing the two-language entry to be accepted as a music product type, so I had to perform a final test without the second language, which did then save as a music product type.

This experimentation took me a long time. I performed the experimentation as I felt since I probably need Easy Populate Advanced for my two-language site, I should really check out the music product type capability before I made a site that was all in the general product type.

So, while I have no audio clips and do not know where I would find them for my products, if I ever add them in the future it will be by HTML and an embedded player. That would not be any less work than using the music product type for a mass download of products using Easy Populate Advanced 3.0.3.

I really hope someone appreciates this information. I am for unknown reasons locked out of the Easy Populate Advanced forum as a posting participant, and can only read postings and the knowledge bank articles. I really see nothing about the music product type operation of Easy Populate Advanced anywhere, and would certainly have benefited from this information in terms of time-savings had it been available, so I hope this is a pertinent post of some value to others exploring their music-audio options and possible use of 3.0.3.

Notageek

[swinton]

Does 3.0.3 work with ZC 1.3.9 ?
My objective is to export from ZC 1.3.8a1 and import into 1.3.9

Is this straightforward or what hoops are required to jump through ?

Is Easy Populate the only import app for ZC ?

[notageek]

Swinton,

Does 3.0.3 work with ZC 1.3.9 ?

I was using 1.3.9g and now have updated to 1.3.9h. The reason I tried Easy Populate Advanced 3.0.3, which is the paid version that has no support on this forum or on its own forum, because I read that it worked with a second language, and my second language files had categories problems, where the Spanish category names were not showing up. Since I have 172 categories this was important for me. I tried it out of desperation, and it fixed all of the categories, and gave me a wonderful spreadsheet with everything in it.

However, it had several problems. There was a problem with the program suddenly throwing in a min/max statement and not showing the quantity-changeable box in the shopping cart page. These problems were fixed by adding extra columns to the spreadsheet which showed those quantity-related items (which also could be changed by hand in the editable product page in Admin).

There were instructions in the password-protected knowledge base to simply add the columns to correct the error. As the columns were already in the products_description table in PHPMyAdmin, it was a simple column addition in Excel.

Not in the instructions was the fact that an additional column had to be added to render the quantity box on the cart page able to change quantities; that column was v_qty_box_status.

Not easily seen in the download was the fact that the categories had to be uploaded separately, and the format to do this is a bit complicated compared to the method of separate columns in Easy Populate 1.2.5.4, which is the stable version of Easy Populate.

Well, once I solved the above problems, and went through the testing to see if it added the music product type, as explained above, I have just prepared my file for download of products in the general product type.

Unfortunately, the download behaved just as it did for the Music Product Type. It actually removed all of my descriptions from the Admin-editable product screen, so that the descriptions are visible in my cart but not editable.

As occurred with the Music Product Type testing, I suspect that if I enter a single thing into the Admin-editable product screen, I will have to enter every blank space by hand and the products will disappear from the cart until I do that.

Thus, I am going back to Easy Populate 1.2.5.4, which I found will actually export a file with the appropriate columns for the second language categories and descriptions, once the language pack is added to the cart. It was imperfect, but maybe I will have more luck now that I understand more about the Zen Cart and Easy Populate structures.

So, that is my experience with the paid Easy Populate Advanced 3.0.3, which I hear is a great program. I would certainly like to use it, if I could find a solution for the products not appearing in the admin-editable screen.

Notageek

[notageek]

Swinton,

Is Easy Populate the only import app for ZC ?

I keep seeing Dr. Byte recommend Easy Populate 1.2.5.4 as a stable version of Easy Populate, and I have really found it to be pretty stable, although I am uncertain if it is up to the demands of a second language addition.

Torvista, in the newest Spanish language pack thread, recommended Apsona. It appears to be pretty menu-driven, so one might not learn as much with such a program as with Easy Populate.

I have also read there is a program that works well called Store Manager.

Both Apsona and Store Manager appear to be commercial programs not supported on this forum, but the seller seems to provide support for those programs.

Notageek

[notageek]

I would appreciate any feedback as to whether there is any solution to the product editing pages in Admin being blank with an Easy Populate Advanced 3.0.3 upload.

It would seem manageable by just editing descriptions and titles directly in PHPMyAdmin. But changing only one thing in the Zen Cart Admin makes everything go blank, so using PHPMyAdmin for editions is too awkward.

This is not a problem with the categories upload with 3.0.3. The categories and product titles do appear in the Admin-editable screen.

It seems like an obvious thing to discuss on the 3.0.3 forums or knowledge base off this site, but I see not a word about it. Am I missing something obvious? As people on this site are using it successfully (see post #5 here)

http://www.zen-cart.com/forum/showth...count+mismatch

there must be a fix for it, but in what direction do I look?

Notageek

[DrByte]

I keep seeing Dr. Byte recommend Easy Populate 1.2.5.4

Me?
I might have recommended "EasyPopulate", but I doubt I mentioned a specific version. Or, if I did then it was likely because it was the newest version available at the time.

I have also read there is a program that works well called Store Manager.

Not a fan of that one.

Both Apsona and Store Manager appear to be commercial programs not supported on this forum, but the seller seems to provide support for those programs.

Apsona is not a commercial program. It's completely free. And yes it's well-supported on their website.

[notageek]

Dr. Byte,

Thanks for correcting my imprecise statement. In the interest of completeness, I meant to report that 1.2.5.4 has been described as the most stable version of Easy Populate.

Notageek

[notageek]

Thank you, Dr. Byte, for the PHP patch discussed here:

http://www.zen-cart.com/forum/showth...otageek&page=2

This patch restored the ability to edit product names and descriptions in Admin which was lost when I updated to 1.3.9h. Easy Populate Advanced 3.0.3 now populates products properly with product names and descriptions, English and Spanish, visible in the Admin-editable product screen.

The patch also restored ability to edit category names in admin, by downloading categories in the separate file of Easy Populate Advanced 3.0.3.

However, the category descriptions now are overwritten with just a blank box.

With 1.3.9g both names and descriptions updated correctly with Easy Populate Advanced 3.0.3.

With 1.3.9h, before the patch was applied, category names and descriptions were updating in the MySQL database only and showed correctly to the consumer, but the admin-editable screen just remained as it was and did not update.

Now, the admin-editable category screen description areas for English and Spanish just go blank.

I checked in admin/includes/modules to see if there was a place to change the collect_info.php file for categories, but found no PHP file relating to categories which contained "CHARSET."

I will post again if I find something that brings back the category description in Admin.