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Import product catalog from Excel (tab-delimited)


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Sorry if this has been covered, I haven't found anything yet to help me import my product catalog into CubeCart. OS Commerce has something called Easy Populate and I was wondering if CubeCart had a similar way of importing excel tab-delimited catalogs into my store.

Thanks!

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Why dont you import it directly into the database? I think there was somthing on doing that.

I am sure that it could be done.

Well, I would except I'm not sure how to do that either.

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Guest Denver Dave

Just my 2 cents here and I'm not sure of all the related tables. If you don't have a lot of categories, might try setting them up, adding a couple of products hitting each category at least once and then exporting the products with phpmyadmin and see what type of file you get. There may very well be more to this, but this is a place to start.

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The problem is that there are no fewer than 3 tables that need to be populated / modified when importing from a CSV file. And the data in at least one of them can't be imported, but only generated once the other table(s) are populated. You starting the see the reason it's hard? :)

A few people here have done it. There are tips scattered about, but there's no point-click solution yet. If enough people are interested, I'll code one and make it available for sale nice and cheap.

My thoughts are: give user a CSV / Excel template they can populate with their data. Upload the CSV to the server, execute an import script which will put the right stuff in the right places and update all the proper tables accordingly.

Is this what you're looking for?

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Guest theboylard

My thoughts are: give user a CSV / Excel template they can populate with their data. Upload the CSV to the server, execute an import script which will put the right stuff in the right places and update all the proper tables accordingly.

Is this what you're looking for?

Aye, Sir Bill - exactly what I would like!

There is something for cpcommerce that is a nice upload script?

hapless

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I'm trying to figure this out too, I found a post in this topic: http://www.cubecart.com/site/forums/index....=product+import indicating that saztar's mod will work with v. 3 as well as v. 2. I've purchased and installed the mod, but it's not working yet in v. 3.0.2. I'll post here if saztar gets it going.

The mod is at his site, http://saztar.com/

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I think it would be important to have a script which would import from a CSV file or something similar, for the reasons that if you are selling drop shipping products, they will supply their products in csv format file, this would save hours actually doing it by hand each time especially when there are a lot of products.

If something could be done similar to OScommerce then this would make cube cart even better, why should OS commerce have the easy facility when Cube cart is a better cart.

Challenge anyone!! :)

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Guest megagente

I did it on excel and access, the problem in Excel is the first line of the name fields like: productID, stockLevel,description and that stuff. You have to eliminate that first line before exporting to .csv file and dont leave it empty then have to check the .txt file to make sure everything is clean. Use 0 in the empty NULL areas.

The other problem is the product sorting. Because the shopping cart works with id rather than productId have to be carefull when adding to the database. For example you can have productID 200 but the id on the cart is 196. You have to work with table inventory and catidx table. Also have to make sure to fill the category table with the quantity of new products you have. If not the shopping cart number of products will show empty or you will not see products inside.

Be carefull with images and most the thumbnails. I use a bulk thumbnail creator and a bulk file renamer to thumb_imagename.jpg and put them in the thumbnail folder. The bulk thumb script did not worked for me. Since the thumbs are created automatically by the system, by filling the database bulky you have to do the thumb stuff.

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Guest ByondF1

I personally would love it if someone could code and import program. It would save me tons of time. I have a catalog of over 1000 items that change at least monthly and it would save me having to re-enter it every time. If it could download graphics based on a url and add them to the file on the server that would be an extra bonus. I would be willing to pay for such a program so add me to the list.

Thanx.

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Guest edgeways

Yes indeed. We have spent countless hours setting up our website and uploading products. I too would be very grateful for a time-saver. Especially considering we just ordered the latest catalog.

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I've been wanting to convert to cc for a while but can't due to the inability to import 90,000 items into the DB with categories that are already set up by the vendor. After looking at the cc database structure, i can see how the category model all fits together. What's nice is that it appears that there can be an almost unlimited depth to the scheme. For me, I think THE issue is that the category numbers appear to be assigned sequentially as they are added one by one.

So... count me in on this module if someone builds it.

Now.. one other question and if it's too off the topic then fee free to ignore this.. Am I barking up the wrong tree with cc thinking that I could have 90,000 products on this system. Ultimately I know its more a mysql question than a cc issue but if anyone could comment I would appreciate it.

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I can cut you an ascii tab delimited file if you like so you can test with it.

So I take it that 9you think 90,000 records wouldn't be a problem for cc then. I know Mysql can handle it.

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Guest francisx

My MySQL timed out on 26,000 or so records but I was able to Import 10-15 records from a text file into MySQL at GoDaddy. But I have a related Question.

Does CubeCart Work with regular SQL Server?

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No, the software is written strictly for MySQL. While it would be reasonably easy to port to PGSQL or MSSQL, it's not right now.

The timeout is something I had considered. I don't have anything big enough to test with to push that envelope. To be safe, I'll have to see how many products it makes sense to bring in at one time before going to the next block. 10k may be fine if you got 26k. But I'll have to test it on a SLOW machine to be sure. Thankfully I have one of those too.

Yeah, if you can buzz me an excel spreadsheet or ascii file or whatever. bill AT swscripts DOT com. :w00t:

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Would it be possible for the developers to describe the tables effected and the general logic of what needs to be updated in what order. Perhaps this already exists?

I could then take a crack at a perl script to directly enter the records into mysql.

I suppose I could try and travel though the code myself, but my sense is that for someone who knows what it's all about, it wouldn't take too long to create a written description.

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