Dummied-Up Attributes or Redundant Items? Is there another way?

OK...First thanks in advance for any input on this.

I'd like to know how others are getting around the current limitation of Zen-Cart when it comes to Attributes as individual items. There are so many people using the software that there MUST be a good workaround or a mod out there.

I've searched and searched and as I understand it, currently ZenCart doesn't support attributes as seperate items.

For example:
Let's say I sell widgets and have 10 widgets in stock.
7 of my widgets are blue and x-large. Blue, x-large widgets have a model number of BXW1.
3 of my widgets are green and large. Model number = GLW1.
Etc...

My widget image and description is the same for all options.

I currently have the option of:

1. Creating a different Item for each group of widget options. If I do this I will have multiple listings for widgets with the same picture and description. Thus if I have 50 different widget option combinations, I'll have 50 product listings that are exactly the same except for the color and size options. This doesn't look very professional and is certainly not intuitive for the user.

2. I could create a single widget item and create attributes for each of my option combinations as in:
   [Please Select]
   o BXW1 - Blue X-Large
   o GLW1 - Green Large
   Etc...
   Using this option means that I can't track my actual inventory, and can't control how many of each option combination are available...Which makes this a poor workaround at best.

It seems that there should be a Master/Subordinate item grouping relation in Zen-Cart for this to work. Maybe you have Master Item Model: Widget1 with the description, image, etc. and then subordinate items that link back to the master, each with a different model number and a description of the different option.

Any input? Any plans to implement this kind of functionality in the future? Any volunteers to mod this up? I'm a programmer who's willing to help but I'm pretty feeble when it comes to PHP.

The stock-by-attributes 3rd party module by kuroi available in the downloads section takes care of inventory - & most of your issues sans the mdl # which you can include in the attribute value

Thanks for the quick reply Kobra. I had glanced at that mod but didn't think it met all of the requirements. I'll take a closer look.

Thanks for the quick reply Kobra. I had glanced at that mod but didn't think it met all of the requirements.
I thought that I inferred that it would not do this by mdl# and there is not an opensource script that I am aware of that will. There are commercial(grab your wallet) carts that have this functionality but code is encrypted so you either accept it as it is or find another cause you can not change their code.