Google Base Feeder Support Thread [OLD]

Well, I'm at the point of throwing in the towel on this mod. It appears that I can't get support here or on the Numinix user forum. It seems pointless to me to continue to spend hours flailing around in the dark trying to find something that I probably wouldn't even recognize to begin with...

If anyone is aware of a company I can pay to fix this darn thing please email me or send me a PM. At this point it's counter productive to invest more of my time in this mod when it is not performing or generating revenue and possibly never will. My time is better invested in things that make me money especially in this down economy.:wacko:

Hound:

Couple of glitches and hoping someone here can help.

I have a total of 395 active products of 401 total per my Admin.

With attributes added for size, color etc, the total number would be 540 if each was processed individually.

When I create my feed it says that 394 of 400 processed successfully. So I think I only really have one bad record as all other active products are processing.

When I go to open or view my feed I get an rss window asking me to subscribe. Once I do that I can view the feed.

The feed itself contains 776 products (that's about 236 extra?)

If I allow Google to fetch the feed it returns an error saying the feed is in HTML format. However if I manually upload it, it processes 187 or 188 records.

I only have one xml coding error on one product but where the heck did the other 200 or so go and how can I make the fetched file not upload as html so that I can set up a cron job to create the feed each day?

Thanks!

I am the only one providing support on this anywhere at the moment and obviously I am not able to respond to all and even miss some.

In your situation, one error in the feed throws out unknown number of items - sometimes all. It seems capricious and google frequently just isn't clear. Without looking into your account and viewing everything and possibly following it for a while, I can't tell you what went wrong or what's happening.

Gertzy:

if it was anything like mine at first, go look at product 646 and see if it fails there because there are chrachters like the ampersand in description of image name...

It was hittng a product and not just leaving it out, it was stopping the whole sequential load.

I had maybe 8 images that had ampersand in name, changed them one by one and then got all my products to load...

thanks for the info though that doesn't seem to be my issue. I also turned on my debug and I got this error on my products

description length: 0 - skipped, price below zero, description length less than 15 chars, or title less than 3 chars - failed

this isn't the case on any of the products so does anyone know how to fix this

that message can be due to several different factors and can't tell without looking at your products.

That message can appear if you have no product name - which of course is unusual or if you've used some characters - like an ampersand - that google (or an xml feed) would reject.

If it is due to an amperand - change the & to &

And the list goes on - such as using non-English words sometimes with a accent mark and so forth.

bryan7707:

thanks for the info though that doesn't seem to be my issue. I also turned on my debug and I got this error on my products

description length: 0 - skipped, price below zero, description length less than 15 chars, or title less than 3 chars - failed

this isn't the case on any of the products so does anyone know how to fix this

I fixed it my converting to 1.8.2 which seems to work good

I would upgrade to 10.10.1 otherwise you may find what you have does not work come September 22.

delia:

I am the only one providing support on this anywhere at the moment and obviously I am not able to respond to all and even miss some.

In your situation, one error in the feed throws out unknown number of items - sometimes all. It seems capricious and google frequently just isn't clear. Without looking into your account and viewing everything and possibly following it for a while, I can't tell you what went wrong or what's happening.

I completely understand. In my ignorance I thought that Numinix would offer support if I paid them to install the mod for me...

The feed is now generating all 394 products but Google is still only accepting 322.

I have not converted my database to UTF-8. Do you think that would help?

If I load my feed into www.feedvalidator.org It shows I have over 200 instances of ’ in the feed. When I investigated further it appears that any place I have an apostrophe (such as in pet's), this is the code the feed is generating for that apostrophe. When looking at the descriptions in the admin the apostrophe appears more as an accent mark.

Because of the ’ Google has said that is why the file is being recognized as html and cannot be fetched. Even if I go in and edit the descriptions and replace the apostrophe's once I reproduce the feed they revert back to looking like accent marks.

I do have some images with bad titles. Thank goodness there are only 57 of those!

I'd be happy to compensate you for your time. I've come to realize after nearly two months of goofing around with this thing that I probably would have come out spending much less if I had hired this out to begin with in the first place.:blush:

Hound:

RL] I've come to realize after nearly two months of goofing around with this thing that I probably would have come out spending much less if I had hired this out to begin with in the first place.:blush:

Therein lies the danger of open source programs! It's hard to know when to seek professional help. Don't feel lonesome!

Sounds like you've done some solid research though, thanks for posting your findings.

I don't know about the conversion though it's definitely saved some folks according to what has been posted here.

The single apostrophe should be okay with just a normal apostrophe off the keyboard or at least it has in my experience.

but then again I have worked on short descriptions over and over again and still not get whatever the problem was fixed.

So, does this module work with Google's September update?
Do we have to upgrade to 1.3.9h before upgrading the module?

Sorry to bother you but my store is working fine with an older module (Google base) and ZC 1.3.8a, so I really want to upgrade to another stable solution, not a buggy one, incompatible with my current modules, and custom changes ...

So I want to hear about someone who is actually using it, without problems, otherwise I will have to leave ZC in favor of another platform, which will be terrible as I am really fond of it, but if I can't upload and update my product listings to Google it will be a waste of time to continue using it ...

icecold:

so, does this module work with google's september update?
Do we have to upgrade to 1.3.9h before upgrading the module?

Sorry to bother you but my store is working fine with an older module (google base) and zc 1.3.8a, so i really want to upgrade to another stable solution, not a buggy one, incompatible with my current modules, and custom changes ...

So i want to hear about someone who is actually using it, without problems, otherwise i will have to leave zc in favor of another platform, which will be terrible as i am really fond of it, but if i can't upload and update my product listings to google it will be a waste of time to continue using it ...

once more> this module has been updated for the september changes - use 1.10.1.

delia:

once more> this module has been updated for the september changes - use 1.10.1.

It is still a buggy version too. I have played with it for a while now without success. Same problems everybody else is having. No easy answer to what is causing it.

countrycharm:

It is still a buggy version too. I have played with it for a while now without success. Same problems everybody else is having. No easy answer to what is causing it.

There are only two problems that I know of in that version. What you call buggy may well be just that your products are not ready for the new google rules.

The new google rules do impact what you have - not the mod itself in that way. He simply coded in things to prevent your products from getting rejected by google and he actually didn't go far enough.

Such as your feed will get rejected if your image has an ampersand in the name or use of ampersand in the product description.

It's a free mod - done for free by Numinix and supported for free by me. You want to pay someone to set you up correctly? That may be the only way you are going to get it working for you if you are having problems.

If you have a real bug, then let us know.

delia:

There are only two problems that I know of in that version. What you call buggy may well be just that your products are not ready for the new google rules.

The new google rules do impact what you have - not the mod itself in that way. He simply coded in things to prevent your products from getting rejected by google and he actually didn't go far enough.

Such as your feed will get rejected if your image has an ampersand in the name or use of ampersand in the product description.

It's a free mod - done for free by Numinix and supported for free by me. You want to pay someone to set you up correctly? That may be the only way you are going to get it working for you if you are having problems.

If you have a real bug, then let us know.

No I'm pretty good in setting up and modifying modules of any kind. When a module has bugs begin with there is always trouble setting them up. Yes I am aware that it is a free module and no I don't need to pay anybody to do what I need to do. I will get it to work sooner or later, but for a module so many people are having trouble with it hardly worth the effort for some people. With those people I guess it's worth paying somebody else to fix it for them.

delia:

once more> this module has been updated for the september changes - use 1.10.1.

Does 1.10.1 cater for the essential 'google_product_category' field?

Thanks in advance.

Using 1.3.9h/1.10.1 and also have NPF 1.2 installed.

Can anyone tell me how I can avoid these errors once Google has processed my feed.

They state:

Missing recommended attribute: google product category

Missing Unique Product Identifiers

Where and how can i configure this?

the google product category is not required except for some types of products.

and no, this mod has not incorporated that yet.

delia:

the google product category is not required except for some types of products.

and no, this mod has not incorporated that yet.

Thanks, and sorry, I should have been more explicit; It is required for media types products and clothing.

chabbu:

Thanks, and sorry, I should have been more explicit; It is required for media types products and clothing.

Dang, sorry! I don't believe there's anything available yet for that - if it will be I'm sure Numinix will be doing it. His product fields mod is the perfect addition but he has not added the google categories to that so it can be integrated with this mod.

delia:

once more> this module has been updated for the september changes - use 1.10.1.

where do I get 1.10.1 as it isn't listed on the zen cart add ons

bryan7707:

where do I get 1.10.1 as it isn't listed on the zen cart add ons

http://www.numinix.com/google-merchant-center-feeder