Managing catalog entry attributes

In IBM® Product Master, specific attributes from catalog entry primary spec are pre-mapped to WebSphere® Commerce attributes.

Attributes from Product Master are mapped to attributes in WebSphere Commerce so that corresponding values are set on WebSphere Commerce when catalog entries are exported from Product Master. In the out-of-box mapping, the following attributes from catalog entry primary spec are pre-mapped to WebSphere Commerce attributes.

General attributes

  1. Code
  2. Display name
  3. General Information/Name
  4. General Information/Short description
  5. General Information/Long description
  6. General Information/Keyword
  7. General Information/URL
  8. General Information/Manufacturer
  9. General Information/Manufacturer part number
  10. General Information/Parent
  11. General Information/Recurring order item
  12. Publishing/For Purchase
  13. Publishing/On Special
  14. Publishing/Announcement Date
  15. Publishing/Withdrawal Date
  16. Display/Display To Customers
  17. Display/Thumbnail
  18. Display/Full image
Note: Other attributes that are added to the primary spec are handled as extended attributes.
Among the general attributes, the following attributes are required:
  1. Code
  2. Parent (Code) (if any)

Extended attributes

This is not in the asset. Solution developers need to enable it through extension of this asset.

Catalog Group specific attributes

This is not in the asset. Solution developers need to enable it through extension of this asset.

Attribute dictionary attributes

The Attribute Dictionary hierarchy represents the attribute dictionary in WebSphere Commerce. The attribute dictionary can have multiple attributes and their type is based on their usage. The attributes are divided into two types:
Defining attributes
This category represents the attributes, which are used in WebSphere Commerce as attributes with predefined values. These are represented by enumeration attributes in Product Master. These attributes are defined in the secondary specs that are associated with the attribute category (Category representing an attribute dictionary attribute).
Descriptive attributes
This category represents the attributes, which are used in WebSphere Commerce as free form attributes. These can be any type of attributes in Product Master. (Currently they have a limitation of not allowing enumeration attributes which are used only for defining attributes). These attributes are defined in the secondary specs that are associated with the attribute category.
The following concepts are important when defining an attribute dictionary attribute:
Attribute Group:
Attribute Group represents a set of Product Master attributes combined together as a grouping. They are represented as a tree structure with a parent and children node.
Attribute Category:
Attribute Category represents an attribute dictionary attribute in WebSphere Commerce as explained. The details of this attribute are defined in the secondary spec that is associated with this category.
As mentioned previously, the details of the attribute aredefined in the secondary spec that is associated with the category that represents the attribute dictionary attribute.
The attributes defined in this spec provide the actual names of these attributes and the types of these attributes provide the attribute data type. The attribute type required for usage in WebSphere Commerce (descriptive/defining) will come from the Attribute Category as explained previously.
Note: For defining attributes, you need to define a list of values, therefore, from Product Master side, it must be an Enumeration type. For descriptive attributes, you do not need to define a list of predefined values, however, you can use Enumeration type from the Product Master side to edit values.
Note: The category name, the category path in the attribute dictionary hierarchy, and the name of the spec which contains the attribute will be used as an "attribute group" for the scope of the attribute.
Note: For the user-defined attributes, for example, descriptive or defining, if you are creating an attribute of type Integer or Number, you need to provide a default value. This is necessary because when such an attribute is exported to WebSphere Commerce Server, it cannot be accepted by the WebSphere Commerce Server data loader as a null value.

Stores specific attributes

Store specific attributes are the attributes that are attached to a catalog entry when the entry is added to a store (mapped to a store category in Product Master). These attributes are defined in the secondary specs, which are associated with the categories that represent stores in Stores hierarchy.

When a new category representing a store is created in the Stores hierarchy, a secondary spec is automatically created for the store where the name is given as <Store category name> spec. This spec is constructed by using predefined sub specs for descriptive attributes, merchandising associations, references, and so on.

When a store category is created in the Stores hierarchy, go to the specs console. In the secondary specs tab, check for the new spec created with name <Store category name> spec.

Open the newly created store category and add this newly create spec as a secondary item spec and save the category. You can see which attributes are added to a store spec. When an entry is mapped to a store category, they are added to the entry. The various attribute groupings will be added to various tabs in tabbed view for the entry. For example,:
  • Descriptive attributes > Descriptive attributes tab
  • Merchandising Associations > Merchandising associations tab
  • Associated assets > Associated assets tab
  • Offer price > Manage Entry tab
  • Remaining groupings for References and Marketing > References tab
The various tabs can be seen in the single edit screen. The various attributes from the various subgroupings can be found on these tabs. You can open the entries in the single edit tab and edit the attributes that are editable.