Products in Top Level Category - Easy Populate Problem

Hi everyone,

I'm running Zen Cart v1.3.8a, I've been testing a new shop for the past week or so and in the past few days I installed the Easy Populate tool so I could upload information as needed. I'm having a problem where (seemingly) random products are being classed as top level products as well as being placed in a category.

The error that appears at the bottom of the page is this:

WARNING: You have Products in the Top Level Category. This will cause pricing to not work properly in the Catalog.

I installed the shop at first and I put the categories in myself. Then I added a single product myself and everything went fine. Then after installing E.P. I tried uploading a new product using a txt file, so I downloaded the data file containing the shop info, added a new product and I set it to go to the same category as the one I added myself. I gave the product a unique product code too.

Then when I imported the information it said it amended one product successfully, added a new one and successfully linked one. I checked and the new product I added is in the top level, has the yellow symbol next to it and there's a copy of it in the category I set (again with a yellow symbol). My aim was just to have the product in the category so this is completely confusing me!

If I re-download the shop comma delimited file the product is then listed twice in the text file. If I use the number 9 on the status it removes both versions of the product as well.

I tried removing all of the categories and re-adding them again. But I can't work out why it keeps doing this. I've tried deleting the products and adding say 10 at once and sometimes it's still 'linking' these products.

I hope this all makes sense, I don't understand about the linking side so it could be something I'm doing wrong. I've tried looking through the comma delimited file to compare the products (to see if I'm missing anything) and as far as I can see everything is the same.

Oh and I don't know if this is relevant but when I open the product to edit it, the product's master category has a drop down box, one's the chosen category and the other is 'Invalid Master Category'

I did find a similar thread to this but I wasn't sure if this was the issue:

http://www.zen-cart.com/forum/showthread.php?t=54477

Thanks in advance!!

You have to be extremely careful with Easy Populate - especially in naming your categories.

T-Shirts is not the same as T-Shirt, or t-shirts, or Tshirts, or tshirts.

See my WIKI tutorial here:

http://www.zen-cart.com/wiki/index.php/Easy_Populate

Hey schoolboy, funnily enough I found your wiki tutorial through google yesterday - thanks very much for taking the time out to type that out.

I have a master list of category names saved, I copy and paste directly from that to make sure they go the correct categories and they have the correct syntax each time.

As a further development, I tried following (blindly lol) the thread that I referenced to in my other post to see if it would fix the fault. So I clicked the copy symbol on the product that was being 'linked' - I then clicked the 'Multiple Categories Link Manager' and clicked 'Update Category Links' on the following page. The product then stopped being on the top level and it seems to have fixed it.

Have I done the right thing and if anybody can see what I've done, please can you tell me because I'm glad I've fixed it but I don't fully understand why it's fixed it if that makes sense.

Thanks!

The key (with Easy Populate) is making absolutely sure that your categories tree (and relative product data) is accurate. As you saw, it's very bad to have sub-categories and products at the same "level". I go to into some detail about this on my wiki, and point out what to watch for.

The purpose for "linked" products is to enable a shop owner to display a SINGLE product across several (more than one) category(ies). This is a useful marketing feature because a specific product can be displayed in variouys parts of the store.

Consider a "bricks and mortar" shop, selling wine, for example. The shop could also sell corkscrews and wine glasses. These products would appear in their own category - say "Wine Accessories", but would also be useful if they appeared elsewhere. For example, if the category is "Red Wines", the shop owner may also consider featuring Red Wine Glasses in the "Red Wines" category AND the "Accessories" category, as this increases the potential for cross-selling and up-selling. But there is only ONE product ID for Red Wine Glasses, so this product's Master Category would be "Accessories" and it would make use of the linked function to also feature it in the "Red Wine" category.

The Master Category is vital in this respect because that is the database's reference for the master data record of the product. If you need to make changes to the product data (price, description, image ref) then this must be done to the data in the Master Category. Such changes will then automatically reflect across ALL other "linked" categories where the product is displayed. So knowing what the Master Category is for a linked product is very important.

By using the "re-set Master Category ID", ZC ensures that such linked products are definitely allocated a Master category. I think this is done by ZC looking for the lowest category ID number and applying that ID as the master category ID - (I'm not sure though).

Anyway, linked products MUST have a Master Category ID set.

Now, when you use Easy Populate to manage and upload product data, the spreadsheet CAN contain "duplicate" v_products_model references... AS LONG AS the products in question are being featured in DIFFERENT categories/sub-categories.

So, THIS would work:

v_products_model . . v_products_name_1 . . v_categories_name_1 . . v_categories_name_2 . . v_categories_name_3

a12345 . . . . . . . . . . . Red Wine Glasses . . . . Accessories . . . . . . . . . . Glasses . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Red Wine
a12345 . . . . . . . . . . . Red Wine Glasses . . . . Burgundy Reds . . . . . . . Glasses . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Red Wine

... because there is at least one category change (in this case, category level 1).

Go through my WIKI carefully, and do the TESTS as I suggest. Work slowly, and with manageable data quantities. You'll soon see the logic.

Hey again schoolboy, thanks for taking the time out to help with my problem. I read through your wiki page again and again (along with this post) and I think I understand the linking a lot better now. In my minds eye I see the Master ID as a primary key of sorts...

The structure to the site I'm building for my friend though only has a single set of categories, the products (as it stands until testing has finished) will not be linked to other categories.

The problem doesn't seem (touch wood) to be happening any more though. I'm still using the same .csv file that contains the same product structure from before as well.

The problem I was having was that I'd upload ten products to a category (after double checking the case and syntax is correct in the .csv file for the category) and one of the imported products randomly would have this issue (the top linking/invalid master category fault). Once I then went into the 'Multiple Categories Link Manager' and updated the Master Category ID for that product it would work OK again. I'd check and double check to see if there was anything different to do with that product compared to the next and there wouldn't be (even in the .csv file).

I'd understand if I was actually trying to link the products but I'm not. The categories definitely exist (otherwise the other 9 products on that list would have not worked properly either).

To make sure everything was clean and by the book I exported the existing product information as a store data .csv file, I then deleted the products from the store completely (but left the category structure as is). Then I ran the 'Reset ALL Products Master Categories ID' in the store manager along with the 'Optimise Database' (I made sure I made a back-up first lol). Then I imported all the products back again and hey presto, no linking problems or top level products...

I definitely didn't have any repeating SKU values either time I did it. I assume it must just have been my cackhanded way of setting up the shop at first. I hope that makes sense!

Glad to hear you got things sorted...

Easy Populate is a very useful tool - but it's very fussy... one tiny error and it can throw out everything.

When I work with the spreadsheet, I make use of lots of inherent features in MS Excel to check and double-check the integrity of the sheet before I save it as a Tab-delimited TXT file.

Forum Member "phazei" is (I believe) looking at how to re-work EP and has had some success with a CSV-file (as opposed to Tab-delimited TXT), and phazei's work has the objective of simplifying and cleaning up the code.

This CSV version will only work, however, if you have PHP 5.2 on your server...

schoolboy:

Glad to hear you got things sorted...

Easy Populate is a very useful tool - but it's very fussy... one tiny error and it can throw out everything.

When I work with the spreadsheet, I make use of lots of inherent features in MS Excel to check and double-check the integrity of the sheet before I save it as a Tab-delimited TXT file.

Forum Member "phazei" is (I believe) looking at how to re-work EP and has had some success with a CSV-file (as opposed to Tab-delimited TXT), and phazei's work has the objective of simplifying and cleaning up the code.

This CSV version will only work, however, if you have PHP 5.2 on your server...

Well I bought the full version of EP to work with the site and I checked the PHP version as well running on the server and I'm happy to say that .csv support works on Supanames Linux hosting in the UK.

I suppose the only issue I've really had with EP is getting used to installing mysql patches in case anything resets to do with the product attributes but I'm really impressed with it so far.

Thanks again for helping me out mate :clap:

The error that appears at the bottom of the page is this:

WARNING: You have Products in the Top Level Category. This will cause pricing to not work properly in the Catalog.

I have all my products in top level and cannot afford to put them under a cateory. Could any one please advise about this- as in its effects on pricing?
I am using 1.3.8a and currently have 30 products, hoping to have lots more.

Thanks in advance
Sweta

You're going to have "lots more" products, but don't want to ever classify them by category? Why do you think you can't afford to have your products in a category?

Hi Glenn,

Thanks for the quick reply - Yes, i am hoping to add around 20 more products. These products are in general actually my site is about dresses and i don't plan to have categories for them - i have also designed by home page is such a way that i dont have to add categories.

I only fear this warning which is displayed right down - hoping that this does not have affect pricing. And if it does affect then how? so i am more careful.

Please advise.

Thanks,
Sweta

I don't know the exact problems, but you can have your products in a category and have them appear on the home page just as you want.

Set in admin > Configuration > Layout Settings >
Categories - Always Show on Main Page > set to 1
and
Main Page - Opens with Category > set to your category's id.

Thanks Glenn,

Great idea! i will check this with my developer.

One last question - How is the pricing affected if i have no categories at all? this is just for my knowledge. :)

Thanks again!

I can't tell you exactly how pricing is affected, as I have not done this nor do I know all the code behind it.

No problem Glenn
Thanks, you were a great help!