Authoring SKUs

SKUs that have been imported through a customer database might have missing values. In such cases, you can populate values of attributes for the SKU through external sources. These sources can be a website, an online PDF or a document. The “sources” are defined and listed at the Catalog level, so that all the sources will be available for use for any SKU in the catalog. You can also bulk update Attribute Values for SKU. However, any invalid Attribute value entered for a SKU will result in a validation error based on the Schema Constraints, if defined during Schema creation.

A detailed description on how to populate attribute values for a SKU using external sources is mentioned in the following sub-section.

Using External Sources to Update SKU Values

Once the SKU data is imported, certain values for the attributes might be missing or incorrect values might have been entered. In such cases, you can use these external sources to extract data for those SKU attributes. You can search for the products and look for attribute specific information that might be relevant for the SKU and update those SKU values.

Before you can use an external source to update SKU values, you must install the PCC Plug-in to your Google Chrome browser. So, let us take this opportunity to understand the steps in installing the plug-in to Chrome.

1. Unzip the PCC SKU Authoring Plug-in folder which you received from the PCC support team.

2. Open a new window on Google Chrome and click on the 3 dots ( ) found on the top-right corner.

3. In the drop-down list, click on Settings

4. In the Window that opens, Click on Extensions on the left-hand side.

5. On the new window that opens, turn ON the Developer mode toggle on the right-hand side.  

6. Click on Load unpacked on the left-hand side

7. You will have to browse to the location where you have saved the PCC SKU Authoring Plug-in. Select the folder and click on Select Folder.

8. You will be able to see that the plug-in has been installed to the browser.

NOTE: Always ensure that the plug-in toggle is turned ON

Now, let us discuss the process of using external sources for updating SKUs.

Consider a SKU with SKU Id Ana4589, which belongs to the Node Analog and the hierarchy is Accessories>Watches>Analog. Let us assume that certain values should be updated for this SKU. Let’s understand how to update values for the SKU and the various options available.

To author SKUs using external source links:

1. Select the node and then select the SKU/SKU(s) to be updated. You can also update attribute values for multiple SKUs.

2. Click the Edit SKUs  icon and then click Author SKUs using External Source as shown below.

OR

Right-click the SKU and then click Author SKUs using External Source Links.

The following screen appears.

Figure 159: Authoring SKUs using external sources

The left side of the screen displays the SKU details and the right side displays the area to load the external source. In this case, only 1 SKU is selected.

Let us assume there are no locked attributes.

There are 2 options available to add values to SKU:

• Select the SKU and then click the Astro icon which will give recommendations on the attribute values as well as attributes that can be added. Details about how to use these recommendations are explained here.

• Use the external sources to populate values for SKUs as explained in the following steps.

Enter the source link or click the Select External Source Link to Load icon on the right side of the page to load the website or document that will have information about the SKU values that needs to be updated. For example, in this case, we are updating values for a type of Watch. Based on the type of the watch and its attributes, the search can be refined to arrive at a source that is relevant.

You can save the URL too. Click the Copy External Source URL icon to save the link to the clipboard to copy-paste the URL

Sometimes, a URL or any external source might be protected and will not be accessible. This is indicated by the icon on the right side of the page. It simply indicates that the external source is protected.

For example, a website https://www.abcwatch.com  is loaded and is visible on the right side of the page as shown below.

Figure 160: Sample product detail page

Scroll through the page to locate the attribute values needed as shown below.

Figure 161: Sample attribute list

For example, let us update values for Brand. Double-click the value to be copied. Here, CASIO AMERICA, INC. is selected and as soon as we double-click it, a drop box appears displaying the list of available SKU attributes as shown below.

Figure 162: Copying attribute value

Click the attribute where the value needs to be placed. In this case, click Attribute Brand and the SKU attribute value is updated as shown below.

In this case, the value is added to the existing value. Also, you can update one attribute value for multiple SKUs as well as you can overwrite existing values or add new values to existing SKU values. This is possible using the Authoring Rules option. Refer section Authoring Rules for more details. Similarly, you can update values for any SKU attribute.

Click Submit and the values will be saved and reflected in the SKU view.

You can also do a normal copy-paste of values from the external sources as well as work with multiple SKUs from a node at a time. For example, let us update SKU attribute value for Brand for all SKUs in node Watches as shown below.

Figure 163: Copy-paste attribute values

Double-click the value Garmin from external source and press CTRL+C and select the SKU attribute Brand for all three SKUs and press CTRL+V as shown below.

All the three values are updated simultaneously.

Updating a SKU Value

To update a SKU value, double-click the cell of the SKU attribute to make changes to the values/UoM as shown below.

Figure 164: Update SKU value

Make necessary changes and the values are updated.

However, if the review mode is turned on for user action Review user actions of updates to SKU attribute value while adding / editing a hierarchy, any changes in the SKU attribute value during SKU authoring cannot be done directly as it will be assigned to a reviewer. If an existing value is updated/modified, it will be assigned to a reviewer as explained here.

If an existing value is deleted, it will be assigned to a reviewer as explained here.

Depending on the action taken by the reviewer, the value will be approved/rejected /aborted as explained in section 19.4 Reviewing the User Actions Assigned.

Authoring Rules

There are a few authoring rules in place while copy-pasting the values from the external sources to the SKU attributes. These authoring rules are especially useful while updating multiple SKU values.

Following are the authoring rules with details on how to use it while copy-pasting the values:

1. Populate Attribute Value of Selected Attribute for: This includes two options:

   • All SKUs in the Left Hand Side List – Enables you to copy and paste the attribute value for the selected attribute present in all SKUs on the left hand side. For example, we have 4 SKUs. We can copy and paste an attribute value for Brand which is present in all 4 SKUs in a single click using this option.

   • The Selected SKUs only – Enables you to copy and paste the attribute value for the selected attribute for the SKUs selected on the left hand side. For example, we have 4 SKUs and we need to copy the values in 2 SKUs only. Here, we can select the SKUs and then copy and paste an attribute value in the selected SKU itself.

b. When pasting directly from inline browser: This includes two options:

• Add New Attribute Value – Enables you to add a new value to the SKU attribute which already has a value. Thus, the SKU attribute now becomes a multi-value attribute. For example, an attribute Dial Color already has a value Black. We can paste another value White. Now, the attribute Dial Color will have 2 values Black and White. However, if the SKU attribute does not have a value, the value selected will be added as the new value.

• Overwrite Existing Attribute Value(s) – Clears the existing attribute value, that is, the new value added will overwrite the existing SKU attribute value. For example, an attribute Dial Color already has a value Black. When we paste another value White, the value Black will be removed and replaced by White.

Let us populate attribute values for multiple SKUs and overwrite the existing attribute values using the authoring rules. Following are the steps to perform this function:

1. Perform steps 1 to 3 mentioned in Using External Sources to Update SKU Values section.

2. Click Authoring Rules and select All SKUs in the Left Hand Side List and Overwrite Existing Attribute Value(s) as shown below.

Consider a SKU attribute Dial Color needs to be updated and all SKUs already have values Brown, Rose Gold and Grey as shown below.

Figure 165: Overwrite existing attribute value

3. Double-click the value to be copied as explained in steps 4 to 6 in Using External Sources to Update SKU Values section.

4. Select the attribute value to be copied as shown in the following figure.

Here, Light Gold needs to be copied to attribute Dial Color.

5. Select the attribute and the value is updated in all the SKUs as well as the previous values are replaced as per the authoring rules selected. The SKU values are updated as shown below.

6. Click Submit and the values will be saved and reflected in the SKU view.

Similarly, you can update the values easily for multiple SKUs by choosing the relevant authoring rules.

Organizing SKU Attributes

You can organize SKU attributes on the left side while updating SKU attribute values using the following options:

• Sort Attributes – Enables you to sort the attributes alphabetically in ascending or descending order. Click the Sort Attribute(s)  icon and the options are displayed as shown below.

Figure 166: Sort attributes

Click Sort Attributes Ascending and  Sort Attributes Descending to sort the attributes in ascending and descending order respectively.

• Show/Hide Attribute(s) – Enables you to hide the attributes that might not be needed while updating attribute values. A SKU will have multiple attributes and while updating values, there could be attributes that will not be updated. In such cases, you can hide those attributes so that you can easily work with the required attributes instead of scrolling them across the list.

Click the Show/Hide Attribute(s) icon and the following list box appears.

Figure 167: Show/hide attributes

A list of all available attributes for the SKU is displayed. Clear the attributes that you want to hide, and those attributes will be removed from the view. Similarly, you can add those attributes back to the view by selecting them.

• Keyboard Shortcuts – Enables you to use the keyboard keys for navigating, selecting and copy-pasting the values across the cells for multiple SKU attributes. This feature enables you to easily work with multiple SKU attributes.

Click the Keyboard Shortcuts icon and the following are displayed.

Figure 168: Keyboard shortcuts

A detailed information on how to use the keys to navigate across the cells, select cells and edit values in cells is provided. Click the tabs to view the details.