Attribute dropped with Category Change

The drama continues. It appears to be a deletion from the products_attributes_download table and it happens at random or atleast in a pattern I cannot discern. These are definitely not files that are being touched. The entries for the downloads are deleted though.

So, likely suspects. I have modified the admin pages to create a second interface called Vendor Tools. This is for self administration of the products on the site. Would/Could this be due to a heavily modified Attributes Controller page? The strange thing is the entry is still there but the download information is gone. So, you hit Display and an empty assigned attribute comes up.

Theory: Could be a delete attribute artifact in the vendor pages just deleting the entry in products_attributes_download. This seems a bit far fetched but I will pursue it.

Grr, what a pain. (But thanks for all the help guys. Not mad at you, just the situation.)

Bill

Could you look in your admin_activity_log ... this should give you the movement through the Admin when this was done ...

Maybe it can help locate a pattern in there?

Thanks for the update ... still cannot repeat it myself either ... :unsure:

Ajeh:

Could you look in your admin_activity_log ... this should give you the movement through the Admin when this was done ...

Maybe it can help locate a pattern in there?

Thanks for the update ... still cannot repeat it myself either ... :unsure:

This is going to sound stupid, but I can't find the Admin log...where might it be? :unsure:

Thanks,
Bill

In phpMyAdmin ... look for the admin_activity_log ... browse that to see actions in the Admin that are recorded ...

We are suddenly having this problem on our site too. Two orders in today customers emailed to say downloads weren't there... only some products are missing like this.

Went in to look -- it shows the attribute has a download, but it's no longer linked to the actual file.

It's very difficult to check in our store what other products may have lost their files, as we have 900+ products all download and growing.

When you say:

Went in to look -- it shows the attribute has a download, but it's no longer linked to the actual file.

Do you mean that the Attribute is added but the Download filename is blank?

Have you looked at the Downloads Manager to see if it can help spot these?

If you browse the products_attributes_download table in phpMyAdmin, do you see any entries without the download filename?

More or less what I am trying to discover is if the record is missing or blank or not filled in with the right information in the products_attributes_download table ...

Hopefully I can explain clearly enough...

As far as I can tell, the products missing their download files are not showing up in the download manager, and when a person purchases them no download at all shows.

However, when I have gone in to look at the file itself and its attributes, it still has a "download" attribute set, just blank for the actual file name and path.

I know these were originally set.

We do have some addon modules - admin permissions (for multiple manufacturers to be able to add their own products), export orders, image handler. These have all been installed since the get go (about 9 months now) and we've had no issues with them. And this issue has only been occuring within the last week to two.

Might see what files that you have added, changed, etc. reference the products_attributes and products_attributes_download tables to see if there is something askew ...

Just to add, this continues to be an issue with us as well. I have three Zen stores I maintain and all have this issue. Two are heavily modded while the third is virtually unchanged from the original install. Versions range from 1.36-1.38a.

Bill

Also, if you have the UN_Wishlist installed it is VERY BAD for downloads.

If you are dealing with lost download links I have developed a tool for dealing with it. Here is the SQL. Zencart Gurus, this seems to work but am I missing something?

insert into orders_products_download (orders_id,orders_products_id, orders_products_filename, download_maxdays, download_count, products_prid) VALUES (ORDERNO, ORDERS_PRODUCT_ID, (select products_attributes_filename from products_attributes_download where products_attributes_id=YOUR_PRODUCT_ID), 0, 5, (select products_prid from orders_products where orders_products_id=ORDERS_PRODUCT_ID))Replace CAPS vars with your values.

Hope that helps.

Bill

We do have un_wishlist... could this be the whole reason its happening? Its utilized by some of our customers, but not the majority so it may just be better to get it off??

We are still dealing with this, two orders today missing download links, and unfortunately while I can poke around and fix some minor things I am not comfy with delving too deeply in the databases yet.

I've installed the things we have myself, but pretty much just following directions... not too much heavy lifting on my own.

What exactly does your fix do? Find the products missing attributes? Or fix the orders missing download links?

At least it helps to know we're not the only ones dealing with this.

Misery loves company right?? :P

Well just to be safe I did remove the un_wishlist...

Well, my fix was far from graceful. I had wanted to update the wishlist to inject a link with the attributes but Linda said this could not be done. I have not had the time to dig into it to see if I could make a workaround. So, I ended up disabling the links. It worked out o.k. but now there are no links to the products from the wishlist and as you can imagine, it just is not very useful.

Sorry I do not have better news.:no:

Bill

I know this is an old thread, but at least you know I searched for an answer before posting :) .

I have a client that has had this same thing happen. The file names just disappeared. I don't think she's made any recent changes, I will check to see, but on just some of her items, the file names are gone. I looked in the database and those records are completely gone from the products_attributes_download table, but are still in the products_attributes table. If I look at the product attributes in the attribute manager, the attributes are there, but the file names are gone.

Help?

This still randomly happens to products in our store too. I have never been able to figure it out (but not by any means an expert at looking either)... we just fix the ones we find that way, usually when a customer emails saying there was no download for their order - not a fun way to find them but with thousands of products about the only way.

Once we fix them, they seem to stay fixed at least...

digidiva-kathy:

I know this is an old thread, but at least you know I searched for an answer before posting :) .

I have a client that has had this same thing happen. The file names just disappeared. I don't think she's made any recent changes, I will check to see, but on just some of her items, the file names are gone. I looked in the database and those records are completely gone from the products_attributes_download table, but are still in the products_attributes table. If I look at the product attributes in the attribute manager, the attributes are there, but the file names are gone.

Help?
Hah!!! I am not insane!...well, delusional anyway. ;)

This continues to happen to all three stores I manage. This ranges from 1.36 modded to be a mall vendor set up to an unmodded 1.38a install.

Take a look at this thread:
http://www.zen-cart.com/forum/showthread.php?t=136022

I have found a way to detect the dropped file names. This helps with one of my clients because they have a huge catalog. Who knows, it may lead to a solution down the road.

Hope it works out for you.

When you say Attributes are dropped on the Category change ... is this via a MOVE or a Copy to Duplicate Product?

Ajeh:

When you say Attributes are dropped on the Category change ... is this via a MOVE or a Copy to Duplicate Product?
Not speaking for others, no, they are just sitting there.

Also, I realize I may be misleading you. It is an important distinction that the ATTRIBUTE is still there, the DOWNLOAD_FIELD is empty. So, you can go to the Attributes controller and see the download attribute still attached to the product but the download field is empty.

Hope that helps.

ETA: I had a theory at one time that somehow the stock level was being counted and it was dropping to 0 then releasing the download somehow. Unfortunately, I reconfigured the store to not track stock and it still does it.

So the records are still in the products_attributes_download table but the field products_attributes_filename is mysteriously blank? :unsure:

Ajeh:

So the records are still in the products_attributes_download table but the field products_attributes_filename is mysteriously blank? :unsure:

I believe this is what happens for us. I am not sure though whether its triggered by a category change or what exactly. We have 2300+ downloadable products. So it's been mostly just stumbling across the ones missing them when someone emails and says they are missing from their orders.

As stated, it's still set like their was originally a file attached but the field itself referring to that file is empty.

Thanks for the link to the other thread, I will definitely check it out. :D