Attributes HOW-TO

Hanlon:

I'm incredibly greatful for all of the work done to ZenCart and will gladly deal with a little confusion.
I couldn't agree more - I am installing a new cart for a friend and am feeling some "attribute" frustrations myself - even thought I would try to use cubecart this time - worked in there for about 10 minutes after installing and realized that I would need multiple add ons to do what zen cart does as is - and that I would have to pay for all of them - the two I needed were going to be 30.00! (one was for taking credit cards OFFLINE and one was for Discount Pricing!) Needless to say, I'll work with ZenCart! Thank you to EVERYONE who works on making Zen Cart what it is ::tup - I think by the time I finish with this particular cart I'm going to be an expert :) NOT to mention the great forum -- we couldn't live without it!

That being said, I am probably missing some posts on this as I found this particular one while looking for attribute "issues" (or maybe I'm just using the wrong search terms so I apologize in advance if these are "asked and answered"):

1. (I already posted this but will reiterate) I saw that someone had a mod for this - but could not find it posted - the ability to do quantity discounts in a "category" - and am trying to understand the linking -
   i.e.
   http://www.magneticspecialtouch.com/shop/index.php
   Create Your Own Jewelry and Ready Made Jewelry will both have Bracelets, Anklets and Necklaces - he offers up Bracelets/Anklets for 15.00 each - 2 for $25 or 3 @ 10.00 each - this was a simple accomplishment for the individual products - but needs to transcend to apply to all - if someone knows how to do this - please let me know (I will have to do the same for Necklaces)

2. Dropdown vs. Checkbox -- if someone wants to order 3 of the same style in 3 different colors, it would make sense to do the checkbox (Since Anklets and Bracelets are the same price I was going to do them as attributes as well but changed because of trying to figure this one out) - If I do checkbox, that will give them the option to choose more than one color - but if they only order one, then of course there will be confusion with the order - I would like to think that someone would figure this "out" when placing an order, but I've seen to many customers get confused and know better - any thoughts on how to do this?

3. He offers free shipping period - since that is the global shipping option - I'm assuming it's NOT necessary to choose always free shipping when adding a product (I've gotten close to 100 added in the past 48 hours so I'm hoping not and just thought I'd ask while I was posting this)

4. I've looked and maybe this isn't there or I'm just not finding it - is there a way to copy pricing discounts from item to item like there is to copy the attribute options? I am using the latest ZenCart and selected that option when I was copying attributes (2nd option Update with new settings/prices, then add new ones) -- but it did not copy the pricing discount -

Thanks in advance and sorry for the long line of questions

Lorri Nevil

afo:

I've been fiddling with the attributes, but either I'm not doing it right (EXTREMELY likely) or I can't get there from here with attributes (also EXTREMELY likely).

Here's what I want to do. I'm setting up a cart for an actor friend of mine. He'll be selling photos and the like from his site. Here's what I want to set up:

unsigned photo $8
signed photo $15
personalized $25 <-- for this one we'd need a text box for how they'd like it personalized.

If the example isn't clear, let me know.

What's the best way to set that sort of thing up?
If I am understanding this correctly ...

You have either an $8, $15 or $25 photo

The $25 needs the personalizing.

Set the Product to Price by Attributes with no price

One way to do this is make an Option Name: Photo Type Dropdown (or Radio Button)

Option Values:
Unsigned 8
Signed 15
Personalized 25

Then include an Option Name: Personalized Signature Type Text

Now Edit the Option Name: Personalized Signature

You will find there is a 64 character comment box where you can include instructions that Personalized Photos can be written here ... or something to that effect.

So the price is in the first Option Name group

The comment you add to the Personalized Signature would appear above the Personalized Signature input box.

When you add these attributes to the product, select one of the Photo types to be the default so there is someone selected.

There is not a way to force including the signature.

An alternative is price personalized in the first group as 0 and add the price to the Personalized Signature for 25

This way, if the personalized signature is filled in there is a $25 charge on the order. If they just select Personalized from the first group but do not add the personalized signature information then there is no charge to them and may in the end be less complicated for mistakes as there would not be a charge for something they did not complete the information on.

I hope this helps you out in the different methods of using the attributes. They can be a tad confusing. But as you work with them they should be more clear to you.

Note: providing you did not go wild and clear the TEXT setting out of the products_options_values table you should not have any trouble making TEXT attributes. This is a common problem where people clean out the database tables and take out too much.

Ajeh:

You will find there is a 64 character comment box where you can include instructions that Personalized Photos can be written here ... or something to that effect.
If that's not long enough, it can be changed by changing the database field itself .. discussed on this thread.

Ajeh:

If I am understanding this correctly ...

You have either an $8, $15 or $25 photo

The $25 needs the personalizing.
Thanks, Linda! I'm gonna give this a whirl. I spoke to him last night and told him about the cart, so he's pretty psyched. He was stunned by the pricing I suggested, but that's not carved in stone.

Anyway, any photo available on his site can be purchased as is (unsigned), signed (just autographed) or personalized (autograhped to a specific person). He's a bit concerned about folks reselling the autographed (but not personalized) photos, but I figure once people know they can purchase merchandise directly from him, why would they bid on eBay?

why would they bid on eBay?

for fun :) and because they may not know of his site.....

Post your own photos on e-bay with a link to your site to see them? Or is that an e-bay no-no :)

Ajeh:

Post your own photos on e-bay with a link to your site to see them? Or is that an e-bay no-no :)
He's concerned about people getting autographed photos and reselling them. There isn't really much that can be done about that unless he ALWAYS personalizes the photos which makes them much less valuable from a reseller's pov. This is actually a concern for any celebrity type (famous or not). There are people who refuse to sign autographs for any adult.

This is still under consideration since I sprung it on him last night that he should have his own "store" this week.

Ajeh:

An alternative is price personalized in the first group as 0 and add the price to the Personalized Signature for 25

This way, if the personalized signature is filled in there is a $25 charge on the order. If they just select Personalized from the first group but do not add the personalized signature information then there is no charge to them and may in the end be less complicated for mistakes as there would not be a charge for something they did not complete the information on.
I'm doing something wrong (again!).

Here's how I set it up.

Priced by attributes - base price 0.

Radio buttons:
unsigned +8
autographed +15
personalized +15
personalization text +10

Unfortunately, when you look at the product, it says "Starting at $18" when it should say "Starting at $8".

Is there a way to restrict the "personalization text" to the "personalized" attribute? I don't want folks to think they can select "unsigned" and "personalization text" and get the signed photo for $18.

spinning-plate:

for fun :) and because they may not know of his site.....
True, but if I live thru setting this up, ;) I'll be posting it to forums and email lists that would be interested.

If you have this setup as:

Radio buttons:
unsigned +8
autographed +15
personalized +15

Then another Option Name for the text as:
personalization text +10

Then set the Personalized Text to not be included in the attribute base price the Starting at will be $8.00

Starting at price takes the lowest price in each Option Name group of prices.

In your case, you don't want the personalized text to be added in here on the display price.

You just want that added in if they fill in the text input box.

Cool beans! That worked B)

I'm now 90% there. Considering that when I posted, I was 0% there, that's a VAST improvement. :P

I'm still fiddling with it. If you select "unsigned" and enter "personalized text", it comes out to $18 which is incorrect. I think I'll have to give it a base price of $8 and take out the "unsigned" attibute. The others will have to be the difference between the price and the base $8. That should work.

Well, it was a tough fight, but I finally won. Thanks, Linda! ::tup

Glad you got it working.

Attributes can be a real trick at times but they are also capable of a zillion and one things.

You just have to fight through the learning curve ... B)

Hey guys, I'm wondering if it's possible to add an attribute to an entire category, and have products added to that category in the future take on that attribute?

Thanks,

Brad

You cannot have a self learning attribute but you can use the attributes copier to add an attribute to a category.

What I do is make a product that is marked out of stock ... add the attribute to it ... then copy the attribute to the category you need it in.

There are options for updating, deleting etc. on the attributes when you copy them in this method.

Peek at the Attributes Controller for the copier.

You could add 1 of the Options to a product then use the copier on the Option Name Manager to Add all of the Option Name Option Values to any products with at least 1 Option Name Option Value.

You will want to make a good backup before experimenting with this until you are use to how it works.

Use the one that reads:

Add ALL Option Values to ALL products for Option Name
Update ALL existing products that have at least ONE Option Value and Add ALL Option Values in an Option Name
Pick the Option Name and it will copy all the Option Values for it.

Read all 10 pages..did the search...am still at a loss.....

I am working on a store that sells custom made candles. You choose the shape, size, color, and fragrance.

Shape, size were easy.

They come in 30 colors, so I thought I would snazz it up with color swatches. I had assumed (there's that A word!) that if I added a swatch to each color attribute that they would appear side by side with the radio box or checkbox next to them.

That's what I get for assuming!

I have a 30 name text listing with the radio buttons next to them, then below that the 30 color swatches. Under the color swatches is the drop-down for fragrance.

All this makes the listing very very long and very fugly.

1. Is there a way to have the swatches next to the color name and radio button?

2. Is there a way to have the colors in 2 rows instead of 1 long one?

3. Is there a way for the fragrances dropdown to be across from the first color listing?

Thank You,

b

I am sure that in this thread somewhere is a post on how to change the arrangement of the attribute images.

Here's my question for this months long thread :)

Is there a way to change the Products Model value via attributes?

I have multiple products of various colours and lengths. Their model numbers are different based on those values. I would like to have only one product entry in Zen, instead of having to add a new product for each colour & length.

For example, if a user purchased productA and chose the green colour attribute, 10 feet long. The products model value would change to producta10green when submitted.

If someone else purchased productA and chose blue for their colour, 5 feet long, the products model value would change to producta5blue.

Thanks alot for the help, and special thanks go to the developers!

Not at this time ...

In a future release there will be attribute stock that may help you with this.