SKU Numbers for drop down menus...

[Melinda]

I would like to see ShopSite integrate skus for its drop down menus.

We have items that come in several sizes/colors, but only one sku for the "main" item. Obviously, this cannot integrate into our accounting systems.

Would it be possible to take the "main" sku and then have a number that adds to the end of the main sku depending on the item selected?

This would allow each individual drop down item to have a unique sku and would allow us to integrate shop site into our accounting system effortlessly. As it is, we had key each order into our accounting system.

-Melinda

[dlundell]

I would like to see ShopSite integrate skus for its drop down menus.

We have items that come in several sizes/colors, but only one sku for the "main" item. Obviously, this cannot integrate into our accounting systems.

Would it be possible to take the "main" sku and then have a number that adds to the end of the main sku depending on the item selected?

This would allow each individual drop down item to have a unique sku and would allow us to integrate shop site into our accounting system effortlessly. As it is, we had key each order into our accounting system.

-Melinda

I'll second this request. It would allow much better (for example) Quickbooks integration.

[miliscent]

I would like this option also. Fortunately we had our own middle layer to get orders from ShopSite to M.O.M. Here we map order options to new sku's...kinda sucks really.

[HowToWireaHouse]

I'll Third this request. This would make things much easier.

[ra_design]

not only should you be able to set background variable like SKU for drop down product changes, but it should have the ability to set javscript changes like image swaps for things like the colors pulldown.

[Randall]

I'll vote for this, too. We don't have an immediate need for it, but it seems the logical way to set up.

Overall, some aspects of SKUs don't seem too elegantly handled (although maybe some of this is the version that Verio shared-hosting uses?)...

1. In the show-all products list, only the product descriptions are displayed. When I'm working from a list of SKUs, it would be (slightly) more convenient to have the associated SKUs displayed rather than having to refer to my cribsheet.

2 (and more importantly). Our pages are hard-coded and use Order Anywhere. I recently wasted a lot of time trying to figure out why changes to our SKU numbers wouldn't take. Finally narrowed it down to the database. That enabled me to do a quick search of the forums, reminding me that I needed to mosey over to Merchandising and (re)Generate the Database. Seems a link and/or reminder about that should have been on the Product page and in the Help files. (The term "rebuild database" don't even exist in Help, and I can't find a mention of generation in any of the SKU field help.)

For the benefit of anyone else searching, here are some keywords:

generate database regenerate database rebuild database wrong SKU change SKU number new SKU add a product
The product was not added because the SKU could not be found, please notify the merchant

Come to think of it, do all shoppers know what an SKU is? Maybe technically it doesn't matter, since they can't fix it, but maybe it would be more soothing to say say "product number"... except that means something else in ShopSite, doesn't it. "Product ID"? "SKU Number" "because the product couldn't be found in our database"?

Well, that's irrelevant if the error doesn't happen.

[beley]

Have you guys ever thought of using the cross-sell/subproduct feature to do this? We do and it works perfectly.

[dlundell]

Have you guys ever thought of using the cross-sell/subproduct feature to do this? We do and it works perfectly.

Would you say more about this?

Thanks,

- dc

[beley]

You would setup a product in ShopSite for each color and size of a product (each one with an individual SKU). You also create a "master" product with default price, product description, more information page, and other information.

Then, you assign the colors/sizes as Sub Products under the main product. It is the same feature as "cross sell" but can be used very effectively to track inventory on product attributes.

Check out the tutorials on creating product templates and also check out the default shopsite template with subproducts.

[JDRHost]

Yes, in most cases you can use the cross sell feature. However for I needed to do it would not work.

My site sold automotive accessories like grille guards. I have one product for the parent. For example... Westin Grille Guards. I might have 50 products for each of year make and model truck that westin makes this grille guard for. I needed a way to prompt the user for year make and model and then display only the westin grille guards for that particular truck.


Here is what I did.

I created new custom page template and product templates with the PHP extenstion so PHP would parse the template. Using PHP , Shopsite tags , PERL , sqlite and HTML I wrote a script to read a database and create an html page. (the drop down box is simply htm code)

In the custom templates I call the sql database and do a search on the field that contained the name of the parent (the parent product you assigned to the page). This will get me the sku's of the product that I need to put in the drop down box. Using the sub product data the script then creates the html. For the price I used a perl script to get price directly from Shopsite for each of the subproducts. (this only works in 8.1 and above). Getting price this way ensures that I get the current price.

This of coarse is only a summary but you get the idea that you would need to program a custom template and use an external data base like sql to get the job down.

If you have pro you may beable to use sqlite instead of an external database.


Hope this helps

[mltsy]

I did not realize you could use all 3 technologies in one page. How do you know which order they are processed in? Do you know?

-Joe

[JeremeD]

mltsy,

Your server side code would be parsed first. The Shopsite tags would be parsed first since they become part of the actual page code. The PHP/SQL and PERL would be parsed at the same time. Then finally the HTML would be parsed on the client side.

[sivstorhaug]

It is a full time job to update the items in stock. We are begging you, make our life easier