Hello
I am attempting to integrate the cscart system into our current systems for order processing and inventory synchronization. I am aware that cscart provides this standalone functionality, however we have three other avenues we sell the same products through and need to be able to keep everything in sync. Is there a way through cscart that we can import data from our systems to add new products and update current ones (inventory levels) already in cscart?
Could you please describe how this would be possible, or why it would not be possible?
Thanks,
Eric
[quote name=‘shipweb’]Hello
I am attempting to integrate the cscart system into our current systems for order processing and inventory synchronization. I am aware that cscart provides this standalone functionality, however we have three other avenues we sell the same products through and need to be able to keep everything in sync. Is there a way through cscart that we can import data from our systems to add new products and update current ones (inventory levels) already in cscart?
Could you please describe how this would be possible, or why it would not be possible?
Thanks,
Eric[/QUOTE]
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[url]http://www.atandra.com/[/url]
Thank you for your reply. We actually use SQL Server along with custom COM and .Net apps for our other systems. What I actually need to do is figure out an approach I can use to automate and integrate our systems with cscarts backend so I can write an app to automate the synchronization. I guess what my real question is, is there any built in functionality that you know of that will enable me to do bulk imports / exports of product data or inventory information? If so I could make a service that translates the import / export and update the sqlserver when it’s an export file and update cscart when it’s an import file.
Thanks,
Eric
[quote name=‘shipweb’]Thank you for your reply. We actually use SQL Server along with custom COM and .Net apps for our other systems. What I actually need to do is figure out an approach I can use to automate and integrate our systems with cscarts backend so I can write an app to automate the synchronization. I guess what my real question is, is there any built in functionality that you know of that will enable me to do bulk imports / exports of product data or inventory information? If so I could make a service that translates the import / export and update the sqlserver when it’s an export file and update cscart when it’s an import file.
Thanks,
Eric[/QUOTE]
For the inventory update, that should be fairly simple. I don’t know .NET very well, we use a PHP program that runs in cron that calls our distributors web service and updates our inventory every 15 minutes and our pricing once a day. It’s a simple update to the cscart_product and cscart_product_prices to do that. You can use the MySQL odbc driver and use it to write a .NET app to pull inventory from SQL and update the CSC tables.
For the export of products, take a look at the Data Feed addon. I have not used this, but it might be useful to you: [url]CS-Cart Documentation — CS-Cart 4.15.x documentation
As for the auto import of new products, we have the same issue. I don’t know of an automated way to do this, for now we get new products and updates to existing products from our distributors and again with another PHP program we create the CSC product import file. However to actually get it into CSC is a manual process through the Admin web. I have looked into inserting into the CSC tables, but there’s a lot of them including cscart_product*, cscart_seo_names, cscart_categories*, etc. I think I read a forum post once where a guy got this work, but you really have the know the tables and the relationships so you don’t screw up the import. I haven’t put a lot of time into really looking at this since importing a file once a day is not too big of an issue for us. I would like to get it automated though.
Hope this helps…
Chris
If you have external access to your database, that is the simplest way. In my first integration solution, I updated the cs-cart directly. Basically in VB.Net I check if the category exists, if not create it. Then if the product doesn’t exist, create it. If the product exists, then just update anything that changed like price, inventory, picture etc. To make it all go quick I calculated an MD5 checksum on both sides and if it was different I knew I had to update. (Though a modified date would work just as well.)
If you don’t have direct access you’ll need to write some PHP in cs-cart to do the db work for you. That’s what I’m working on now. I’ve developed a web service as an add-in for cs-cart that lets me add/update categories and add/update products. I’m still working on finishing the rough edges and also I’ve temporarily broken my add/update product because i started using selectbox text variants for product features and therefore I’m coding an add/update feature method to be used prior to the add/update product.
If you aren’t throughly knowledgeable about cs-cart, php, smarty, and cs-cart’s program flow, I would stick with method #1 direct database access if you can help it.
[quote name='scottemick' timestamp='1279284338' post='84432']
If you have external access to your database, that is the simplest way. In my first integration solution, I updated the cs-cart directly. Basically in VB.Net I check if the category exists, if not create it. Then if the product doesn't exist, create it. If the product exists, then just update anything that changed like price, inventory, picture etc. To make it all go quick I calculated an MD5 checksum on both sides and if it was different I knew I had to update. (Though a modified date would work just as well.)
If you don't have direct access you'll need to write some PHP in cs-cart to do the db work for you. That's what I'm working on now. I've developed a web service as an add-in for cs-cart that lets me add/update categories and add/update products. I'm still working on finishing the rough edges and also I've temporarily broken my add/update product because i started using selectbox text variants for product features and therefore I'm coding an add/update feature method to be used prior to the add/update product.
If you aren't throughly knowledgeable about cs-cart, php, smarty, and cs-cart's program flow, I would stick with method #1 direct database access if you can help it.
[/quote]
any news on this subject ?