EasyPopulate 4.0 Support Thread

[VideoStan]

Congrats Chadd on your success with EP4.

I had an indirect exposure to your work about a year ago when checking in with JRobeson on his project.

I am testing EP4 in a new install of ZC1.5 that must use attributes. Basic import of standard products/descriptions using EP4 seems to work fine.

My tests with attributes are not successful, until I change the filename beginning to your sample name: Attrib-EP-xxxx

I also used the file structure in the sample (single line per product, only the 4 columns, desired attributes in one column, separate by commas).

The results info at the bottom of the screen shows no updates/no adds, but the items do in fact update.

Adding price is critical. I'll test some of the other attrib options. Any other filename beginnings that should be used with other columns added?

Stan

[chadderuski]

Congrats Chadd on your success with EP4.

I had an indirect exposure to your work about a year ago when checking in with JRobeson on his project.

I am testing EP4 in a new install of ZC1.5 that must use attributes. Basic import of standard products/descriptions using EP4 seems to work fine.

My tests with attributes are not successful, until I change the filename beginning to your sample name: Attrib-EP-xxxx

I also used the file structure in the sample (single line per product, only the 4 columns, desired attributes in one column, separate by commas).

The results info at the bottom of the screen shows no updates/no adds, but the items do in fact update.

Adding price is critical. I'll test some of the other attrib options. Any other filename beginnings that should be used with other columns added?

Stan

Hi Stan! How have ya been?

Yeah, Johnny has some awesome stuff in his code. Haven't been in touch for some time. I don't know what he thinks of 1.5. I think zenmagik will have to catchup before he considers supporting 1.5. When I complete attributes for EP4 I'll give him another poke to see if he interested in the code. We had different ideas on how to solve the issue. His were more along the lines of what langer does in his 3.03 version. I have a rant about that somewhere :) ....

You are correct. I do NOT have any nice stats to the attribute import yet. I added the stats so you could turn off "verbose" output for better performance, but since I'm still working hard on the import code so I haven't added stats yet. What "price" are you referring to?

Yes, for Attribute import to work you need to follow naming convention of the file.

I am going to be back on attributes very soon. I got sidetracked fixing the UTF8 multi-byte character handling for multi-lingual categories which I'm going to try to push to github tonight. Then it's back to giving myself monster headaches with attributes!

-chadd

[VideoStan]

I need to price by attribute. Adding the attributes is good, but have to edit each one to add pricing. All the other attribute issues (default, etc) would be the same, so could set as global (I think).

Looking at your full export, I think it is v_options_values_price.

[chadderuski]

I need to price by attribute. Adding the attributes is good, but have to edit each one to add pricing. All the other attribute issues (default, etc) would be the same, so could set as global (I think).

Looking at your full export, I think it is v_options_values_price.

Yes. My plan is to allow simple and complex attribute creation. Simple to create the basic entries and assign to products, complex to make fine adjustments and settings. Trying to do everything at once is very complicated when you take error checking and multiple languages into consideration.

[stepgr]

Chadd

is there a way to move products from one category to the other ? I don't want to have
double items in the catalog and I haven't figure out if there is way to do so ?

[chadderuski]

is there a way to move products from one category to the other ? I don't want to have
double items in the catalog and I haven't figure out if there is way to do so ?

There is currently no built-in support to achieve this. If you add the product with a new category, it will get added as a linked product.

Also note that because of the way the EP4 works, there is no support for DUPLICATE products (i.e. two products with the same model number) or Products missing a Model number...

Having said that, it may be possible to do, but would have wait unfil after I finished attributes.

So you will need to do this from within the admin.

WORK-AROUND: If you are not running a store with order history, you could perform a "move" by creating your sheet with the products listed first with status "9" (delete) and then again below with the new category with status 1. Remember, this will be a "new" product and products_id in the products table will be different. I don't know how this would affect orders, order history, or other mods that may use the products_id instead of the products_model. For a new installation this should be fine. However, you will need to re-upload the images for these files as the zencart function for deleting a product also deletes the associated image if not used by another product.

[chadderuski]

Update v.4.0.18 - Beta 1-27-2012 Posted on Github

This update fixes several issues with UTF8 multi-byte characters, and adds a new configuration variable for dealing with "curly quotes" (aka smart quotes), En-Dash, Em-Dash and the Ellipsis (three dots like ...). Also added support for products_msrp mod.

To Update:
1. First make note of your settings under Configuration -> Easy Populate 4
2. Uploading the new files to your website's admin folder maintaining directory structure
3. Navigate to Tools -> Easy Populate 4 and select "Un-Install EP4" (this will remove the configuration variables)
4. You will now have 2 warnings at the top. Click the "[ here ]" to install new configuration variables.
5. Navigate to Configuration -> Easy Populate 4. At the bottom is a new setting: Convert Curly Quotes, etc. Choose one of the following:

0 = No Change (will not convert your characters)
1 = Replace with Basic Characters (will replace a curly quote with simple quote, etc.)
2 = Replace with HTML (will replace with HTML equivalants)

As always, please be sure to backup your data before doing imports. Test first with just a couple rows of data.

I'm also looking for sample data for Greek, Russian, Simplified Chinese, etc. or people that can test and verify these language are being handles correctly.

NOTE: I've made every effort to correctly support zen 1.5's UTF-8 character set. This should not affect 1.38/39 users who have not converted to UTF-8. If you find an issue, please post sample data (I only need a few lines showing the problem), and specify which version of zencart you are using, and the character set (UTF-8 vs ISSO-8859-1) you are using on your website. If you have other languages installed, also include those.

When installing multiple languages, it's best to leave english as the first installed language. Remember, the 1, 2, 3, etc. under Installed Languages refers to THAT language.
Example: 1=english, 2=spanish, 3=dutch, then you will have v_products_name_1, v_products_name_2 and v_products_name_3... one for each language.

This also applies to v_categories_names_1, etc. You MUST include v_categories_names_1 (the lowest defined language), but the others are optional - they will default to the first defined language. v_categories_names_1 is very important if you plan to support categories in multiple languages as all category matching and creation is based on this column.

Thanks again to everyone who is testing and providing feedback!

... I'm back to the attribute grind stone ...

[stepgr]

Having said that, it may be possible to do, but would have wait unfil after I finished attributes.

So you will need to do this from within the admin.

WORK-AROUND: If you are not running a store with order history, you could perform a "move" by creating your sheet with the products listed first with status "9" (delete) and then again below with the new category with status 1. Remember, this will be a "new" product and products_id in the products table will be different. I don't know how this would affect orders, order history, or other mods that may use the products_id instead of the products_model. For a new installation this should be fine. However, you will need to re-upload the images for these files as the zencart function for deleting a product also deletes the associated image if not used by another product.

Thanks anyway Chadd. The workaround you provide is also good
for a new installation so it's OK by me anyway!

[keith z]

I have about 13K linked items in a product category folder. I thought that the category could contain sub categories or items not both. Somehow I have done this and created duplicate items from another product sub-category. I understand about deleting the items with product status 9. That removes both items because they are linked and the ID number is the same. I'm ok with reloading the file which re installs the item with a different master ID.

Since I am trying to submit a file for google shopping this action makes my product link invalid and ruins my day. Is there a way to download the master ID number so I can update the product link so it works? In previous version I used the froogle tab to download the file. Since upgrading I am limping along trying to keep my old files updated.

I am using Zen cart 1.54 and Easy Populate 4.0.28 - Beta 01-03-2015

[johnny2234343]

Hi Stan! How have ya been?

Yeah, Johnny has some awesome stuff in his code. Haven't been in touch for some time. I don't know what he thinks of 1.5. I think zenmagik will have to catchup before he considers supporting 1.5. When I complete attributes for EP4 I'll give him another poke to see if he interested in the code. We had different ideas on how to solve the issue. His were more along the lines of what langer does in his 3.03 version. I have a rant about that somewhere :) ....

You are correct. I do NOT have any nice stats to the attribute import yet. I added the stats so you could turn off "verbose" output for better performance, but since I'm still working hard on the import code so I haven't added stats yet. What "price" are you referring to?

Yes, for Attribute import to work you need to follow naming convention of the file.

I am going to be back on attributes very soon. I got sidetracked fixing the UTF8 multi-byte character handling for multi-lingual categories which I'm going to try to push to github tonight. Then it's back to giving myself monster headaches with attributes!

-chadd

hey chadd been awhile!

. actually did a native zenmagick version of EP .. but with most of the same code internally for products (for the moment).

I ended up writing importers for reviews, coupons and order status history. I also made it so you could map your own header file format to the internal names via a yaml file.

I never did finish it for export though since i've been busy with zm core dev.

I doubt i'll ever work on a zencart native version of EP again, but i'd still be interested in seeing your code.

(especially since the next version of the zenmagick admin mostly works as a dropin replacement for the zc admin without any file modifications)