Easy Populate 1.2.5.4 support

[milobloom]

Oh. Btw figure I would add this as it may help my desperate problem.

I was first uploading all my products to a "Temp" directory.
(Checking if all images was there. Troubleshooting etc)
then once I was satisfied with that I would send another upload of the same products to the proper categories I wanted them in.

Problem is, I cannot delete the Temp directory because then it would delete all of the products. Also, All the product now have no Master ID to them. Something I was afraid that would haunt me later. So when I was done with them I moved the "Temp" folder to another spot of witch I closed the file. So I have a bunch of files in a closed directory that I called for fun "The Temp Graveyard"

Now my fear is that maybe with all the multiple places, Is there a limit on how many products I could have? Should I have been doing something different all along?

[madk]

Oh. Btw figure I would add this as it may help my desperate problem.

I was first uploading all my products to a "Temp" directory.
(Checking if all images was there. Troubleshooting etc)
then once I was satisfied with that I would send another upload of the same products to the proper categories I wanted them in.

Problem is, I cannot delete the Temp directory because then it would delete all of the products. Also, All the product now have no Master ID to them. Something I was afraid that would haunt me later. So when I was done with them I moved the "Temp" folder to another spot of witch I closed the file. So I have a bunch of files in a closed directory that I called for fun "The Temp Graveyard"

Now my fear is that maybe with all the multiple places, Is there a limit on how many products I could have? Should I have been doing something different all along?

I'm not fully understanding your problem here but I want to try to help...

If I understand things correctly. You are uploading your CSV file and instead of creating the product in the folder they belong..you are creating them in a temp directory. You are then double checking everything and then reuploading them into the correct folders. Is this correct?

If this is correct I would assume what is happening is that since you are uploading the same products to 2 seperate folders they are linking themselves together. If this is the case then deleting one should give you an option as to leave one of them.

My recommendation to you would be to just upload them with a status of 0. Then you can check all your data and activate them if they are ready to roll out.

Now maybe I am just not understanding this at all and everything I said makes no sense..ha. If so please elaberate.

[DrByte]

- "folder" vs "category" may be confusing

- according to the readme, if you want to change the category in which a product appears, easy populate requires that you actually create a new record, and delete the old one. You do this by creating a column called "v_status" and set the value to 9 for delete, or 1 for active, or 0 for inactive.

(If there's another way, feel free to correct me !)

[milobloom]

Ok. Ill will expand.
I have soo many products with diffrent size options.
Some Small Medium Large
Same Mediam Large Extra Large
etc...

So first, I upload say 300 S,M.L
I Put them in a temp directory.
Then add S,M,L attributes on the 1st item then copy the
attributes to the entire category. Then when I am done,
They are all then moved to their respective catagories.
I thought that was a smart idea.

But perhaps your right. Ill try it. Set status to 0 on the temp
Then take of the 0 status when they get moved to their catagories.
Is that right?

But now. I have this horrible problem.
After i run easy populate, Here is what i see.
Folder Temp. Yup its there. Says there is say 176 Items in the folder.
But when I go into the folder (GASP!) its empty! Where did my files go!
I look on the site. Same thing. Folder is there. No products inside.
I have 1000's and more products to go. So if I was doing it wrong with the folders then I wanted to make sure that wasnt causing the problem and if it was, is there a way to fix it?

[madk]

Ok. Ill will expand.
I have soo many products with diffrent size options.
Some Small Medium Large
Same Mediam Large Extra Large
etc...

So first, I upload say 300 S,M.L
I Put them in a temp directory.
Then add S,M,L attributes on the 1st item then copy the
attributes to the entire category. Then when I am done,
They are all then moved to their respective catagories.
I thought that was a smart idea.

But perhaps your right. Ill try it. Set status to 0 on the temp
Then take of the 0 status when they get moved to their catagories.
Is that right?

But now. I have this horrible problem.
After i run easy populate, Here is what i see.
Folder Temp. Yup its there. Says there is say 176 Items in the folder.
But when I go into the folder (GASP!) its empty! Where did my files go!
I look on the site. Same thing. Folder is there. No products inside.
I have 1000's and more products to go. So if I was doing it wrong with the folders then I wanted to make sure that wasnt causing the problem and if it was, is there a way to fix it?

I guess I'm not sure exactly what is going on.

I would get rid of any sort of temp category. Upload products directly to their home. Setting the status to 0 will allow you to view the items through the admin panel but they won't display in your catelog till you activate them.

When you upload your database does EasyPop list all the new products one by one?

[milobloom]

Well think about this.
I want to add alot of products to existing directories.
But the problem is that I have to put attributes to them
(I used the example Small,Medium & Large)
For me to put them into say 170 different items, It would take me
a very long time. So what I do is stage them in the "Temp" Directory.
Then I added all the attributes all of the products in that "Temp" direcrtory.
Sooo The next step i do is upload the same products again.
Because the ID's are the same. Now I have those products in
their correct catagories WITH the attributes in them! A huge time saver!
But when I went back and deleted the "Temp" folder. All the products were gone!
So I thought, Why is it doing this? So I went into one of the items to see what their master ID was. (I figured that the master ID must have been the first directory I uploaded the files to. The "Temp" directory. The way I found this out is I went into the products attribute controller and then to the "Multible Catagories Manager" In this area you can select multible catagories for any product. It is there where I saw that all the products I uploaded did not in fact have a Master ID, in fact they all had invalid Master ID's for them. Now I could in fact go into each file and set the master ID to their correct folders and then after I do that delete the temp folder. However with soooo many products, That too would be extremly time consuming. So then the only assumption I could come up with is to "Keep" the "Temp" folders and move them to somewhere I dont need them.

I know this sounds very wastful in terms of Database space, but what I am doing is uploading 100's of products at a time wityh attributes. So It was the only quick way I could think of to do it.

This being said.
There are the few questions I have.
1) Is this the wrong way to do this?
2) Can doing it this way cause the problem I am having
3) Is there an answer to my biggest probem, that I cannot upload any more products using my easy populate. (That the folder shows up, shows a count but the products are not inside.)

[madk]

Okay this is making sense now.

When you upload the 2nd database Zen is creating a link between the 2 items.

If you were to delete these items 1 by 1 you would recieve a prompt asking you if you want to delete the item from both the temp category and the final category.

What is probably happening is that you are deleting these items through EasyPop or just deleting the entire folder. I assume that is you are doing so this way you are not recieving this notice and it is removing the product from both categories.

Import a small batch of test products and follows the same steps you have followed but try to delete the items one at at time and see if it has the same effect.

[milobloom]

Well.

I would except for one thing. Which is why I started asking questions in the first place.

I Cannot upload anything now. I Upload to temp directory.
The folder is there, It says there are say 176 Items in the folder.
But when I open the folder. Its empty. The products arent there.

OH BTW I also wanted to add. I do not have the same problem if I add products manualy.

[madk]

1. Are you importing directly from your pc or are you importing from Temp Dir?
2. After you import what is displayed on the screen?

[milobloom]

I am importing directly from my PC
When I import it looks like everything is working properly.

It says NEW PRODUCT after each one.
Yea there are NO errors.

Do you think I would get diffrent results adding it from the temp directory???