Product Options Stock Control

[mystifier]

Opencart has an enormous flaw - it can't handle stock control on more than one option. MANY threads have been started about the inability to tell how many Large Blue Shirts are in stock but they inevitably fizzle out unresolved.

My initially delighted first clients are far less pleased with a few months experience because they now realise that they have no means of checking stock and are constantly selling things that are out-of-stock.

I have lost one website enquiry for the same reason and I am on the brink of losing my best project to date because re-ordering is not an option; they buy 500 mixed colour/size/options garments and once they are gone, they are gone. Being able to tell how many Small ones OR how many Blue ones but NOT how many Small Blue ones makes it totally useless.

I can't find the best thread where someone was talking sense and I have failed a couple of times to attract a commercial developer.

Does anyone know of a customisable shopping cart (commercial or otherwise) that can handle Product Option relationships? I have invested a lot of time in Opencart but if this can't be solved, I have to find an alternative.

[i2Paq]

I believe Qphoria has a completely rewritten option add-on.

[mystifier]

Option Plus provides useful Product page information replacement when Product Options are selected, and adds extra fields such as SKU, but there is no hierachy between options.

What is needed is:

COLOUR
- Black *
- White *

SIZE
- Black
-- Small *
-- Large *
- White
-- Small *
-- Large *

SLEEVES
- Black
-- Small
--- Short *
--- Long *
- Black
-- Large
--- Short *
--- Long *
- White
-- Small
--- Short *
--- Long *
- White
-- Large
--- Short *
--- Long *

Without this hierachy, stock control is impossible. Adding a single SKU field at Product_Option_Value level doesn't really achieve anything.

[Qphoria]

Is this another new thread started today for this topic?

[mystifier]

Sorry, I looked for the other thread for ages and couldn't find it because I was convinced that it was this year so started this one, then someone PMed me a link to the other thread which was worth looking over.

Maybe they should be combined or this one deleted.

[froggy2011]

I am new to opencart, and I am now having a similar issue did you find a solution?

With out a relationship between my size and colour options stock control is virtually impossible.

Thanks in advance

Rowan

[mystifier]

No! The best I have is the moment is a spreadsheet with every possible unique product with a quantity column that they manually amend whenever they ship. In other words, they maintain stock as a seperate external exercise.

They are very dissatisfied for two reasons a) When they have a run of sales, people inevitably order things that cannot be delivered because it is impossible to check stock at the time of purchase b) when they run out-of-stock of a product variation, the only way they can mark it as unavailable means also disabling other variations that they DO have in stock but can't then sell.

I am still trying, without success, to generate this as a dataset so that I can re-create a view after every sale to enable stock checking.

I have just lost a pretty lucrative project because of the inability to maintain stock and they have gone for a bespoke website costing several times more.

The only amendment I have made to Opencart is to add sku at product_option_value but this only marginally improves back-office reporting.

Basically, the database is the wrong shape. I have invested a lot (time) in Opencart but it is enough reason to start again with something else if I find something that handles it. I don't really want to go magento/aspx.

[Xsecrets]

well if you can't do it and you don't want to wait then please go somewhere else. All of the developers with the capabilities to fix this have already said they were not going to work on it till 1.5 comes out which should have a database structure that makes it a bit easier.

Besides you can control stock precisely if you create combo options like the option name is size/color then you can track your stock on the Large/Blue yes it's not the best solution, but it's the best you are going to get until 1.5 has been out long enough for someone to create a mod for option combinations.

[opencartisalright]

well if you can't do it and you don't want to wait then please go somewhere else.

Wow. Mystifier has contributed a lot to the community, both by answering questions on this forum and by developing some really useful extensions (most [if not all] of which are free), and this is the response he gets? What's up with that?

[Xsecrets]

well if you can't do it and you don't want to wait then please go somewhere else.

Wow. Mystifier has contributed a lot to the community, both by answering questions on this forum and by developing some really useful extensions (most [if not all] of which are free), and this is the response he gets? What's up with that?

absolutely he's contributed alot and I really would like for him to not go, but as of late he's blasted this idea in several threads and has gotten definitive answers about the status, yet keeps posting it over and over again as if he's trying to leave a bad impression.

[Qphoria]

Did anyone try my idea from the other thread about using the option as color and value as size? Wasn't sure if that would help any but for 2-level combinations it might

Instead of

Code: Select all

Product A
- Color-Size:
    - Red/Sm
    - Red/Med
    - Blue/Sm
    - Blue/Med
    - Green/Sm
    - Green/Med


What if you try:

Code: Select all

Product A
- Red:
    - Small
    - Med
- Blue
    - Small
    - Med
- Green
    - Small
    - Med


[opencartisalright]

absolutely he's contributed alot and I really would like for him to not go, but as of late he's blasted this idea in several threads and has gotten definitive answers about the status, yet keeps posting it over and over again as if he's trying to leave a bad impression.

Quite a negative way to look at it. He probably is just posting it frequently because he doesn't want to leave OpenCart but feels he has no choice if this issue isn't addressed sooner rather than later. He's already mentioned he lost 1 client because of it, and is on the verge of losing another. Wouldn't you be a bit persistent too if you were in his shoes? He's also said he's tried to get paid developers to work on this, but no one has wanted to take it on, so I can feel his frustration and sense of urgency to get some help on this one.

I just see his posts as someone who loves OpenCart and doesn't wanna leave it, but feels like they are going to have to pretty soon unless someone can address the issue at hand.

[Xsecrets]

well as I stated in other threads it will be addressed pretty quickly after 1.5 is released, and the beta of that is expected tomorrow, so I see that as pretty soon. Actually much sooner than anyone could do it if they tried to with the current implementation of the product level options. So as I say the question has been answered its just that the answer is not what he wants to hear that he can do it right now, but no matter how many times he posts the answer is not going to change.

[opencartisalright]

well as I stated in other threads it will be addressed pretty quickly after 1.5 is released, and the beta of that is expected tomorrow, so I see that as pretty soon.

Well, how long have we all been waiting on 1.5 now? Besides, it's kinda hard to say when a developer will release what Mystifier's looking for, unless you are planning on taking it on. A lot of developers will be more concerned about updating their own themes/extensions instead of creating a brand new one. Could be awhile before someone tackles it which would leave Mystifier out in the cold, hence his persistent posts.

So as I say the question has been answered its just that the answer is not what he wants to hear that he can do it right now, but no matter how many times he posts the answer is not going to change.

Again, he's probably just trying to light a fire and get this going sooner rather than later. If it was something important to me I'd probably do the same thing.

Anyway i'm not going to get in a back and forth over this. I'm not his bodyguard. All i'm saying is I think he deserves a more respectful answer than the one he was afforded considering his contributions to the community.

[Qphoria]

Honestly this concept is not bad but I think a bit over blown. Aside from Magento, which has a different method of building products, I've not seen this in other carts.. especially not free carts.
Just checked Interspire and they don't have it.
Just checked cs-cart and they don't have it
I haven't yet found it in Magento but people tell me it exists
I haven't quite figured out Presta either but I dont think it has it.

I dont know that this is our highest priority feature to look into for the 1-2% of users that squeak about it. Certainly it is waiting for 1.5.x at least but even when that comes out I can't say this is a number one priority. Perhaps after 1.5.0 is out then those in the forum with their db ideas can collaborate on this.

This is a popular feature for clothing stores and maybe the short answer is a mod that simply uses its own options table with a max of 2 or 3 options, as opposed to a fully dynamic system. Not to say it isn't something we eventually want to add, but as many of you have noted this is a complex beast and I personally haven't spent enough time on it to even know where to start.

Perhaps for the immediate future, a custom option mod that uses its own tables and lets you have 2 static relational tables strictly for option A and option B for the few store types that have this sort of relationship

[Xsecrets]

Honestly this concept is not bad but I think a bit over blown. Aside from Magento, which has a different method of building products, I've not seen this in other carts.. especially not free carts.
Just checked Interspire and they don't have it.
Just checked cs-cart and they don't have it
I haven't yet found it in Magento but people tell me it exists
I haven't quite figured out Presta either but I dont think it has it.

yes magento has it and actually cs-cart has it as well, at least they did the last time I used a couple of years ago. you cat get it in oscommerce with the qtpro mod. It's not a new idea, it's just a pain to implement, and even harder to do well.

I dont know that this is our highest priority feature to look into for the 1-2% of users that squeak about it. Certainly it is waiting for 1.5.x at least but even when that comes out I can't say this is a number one priority. Perhaps after 1.5.0 is out then those in the forum with their db ideas can collaborate on this.

There will at least be a mod for it not too long after 1.5 comes out, because if no one beats me to it I'm going to develop one.

[Qphoria]

I am scouring the cscart demo and I cannot find it. I see "Option Combinations" but it doesn't show a common qty for 2 options.

[Xsecrets]

I am scouring the cscart demo and I cannot find it. I see "Option Combinations" but it doesn't show a common qty for 2 options.

I guess you are right they only allow images per combination. I thought for sure that they had qty too.

[mystifier]

Thanks opencartisalright, appreciated!

I was simply responding to a direct question asking whether I had a solution so gave the clearest response I could about my current situation. Various threads keep spinging back to life every few weeks through others coming across the same problem and making the same enquiries, not by my deliberately bumping them.

I am used to rudeness and condescension from developers/moderators which is an Opencart characteristic I can live with.

[scanreg]

This would be extremely helpful, best would be to fully track stock entry dates for FIFO (first in first out) cost tracking too, I started a feature request thread here:

viewtopic.php?f=110&t=29208