Mass Markup Tool Question

Discussion in 'General Discussion' started by 65166_deleted, Sep 21, 2011.

  1. 65166_deleted
    65166_deleted Member
    Hey guys!

    So, say we are implement a mass markup tool. Say it's a CSV import/export. All hypothetical, of course. ;o)

    Is there any reason you would want to see models that are not public on such a hypothetical CSV?

    Remember, all your models x all your materials = looooong spreadsheet.

    Just curious...
     
  2. mctrivia
    mctrivia Well-Known Member
    private on spread sheet is a must. all new ring designs are private with 1 public linking the others. that way i can have each size already done. con lots of models that need updating occasionally.

    also would want to see:
    name
    volume
    dimensions
    category
    ect.

    these are important in automatic pricing
     
  3. 28396_deleted
    28396_deleted Member
    I just deleted over 200 of my models... focusing my (last) efforts on the new ones.. - so no more mass updating headache...


    What was selling a year ago cant compete with new designs.. and 100s of shops..
    Aggregating designs backfires at your sales.








     
  4. i hadn't thought about it but i would like as much information as i possibly could have in there. this could be a whole new way of setting up shop.

    for instance you could also list product title, file name and description too. then those could also be changed/updated too. i would also like some sort of history on the objects as well like date uploaded. maybe #views, #likes, #sold would also be good information to include. while we are at it sale dates, amount gross and profit would be nice too.

    the only thing that i could see problematic is on the size/volume portion and file name listing. but you could limit this issue by getting the importer to ignore the size/volume fields and if there is a conflict with the model name field it would ignore that too until the shop owner could come back in there and replace the file that has been lost.

    i see this as a possible powerful tool that give shop owners far more creativity if implemented in the right way.

    chris
     
  5. tebee
    tebee Well-Known Member
    If you mean my private, stuff not viable to the general public but still orderable buy others then I would defiantly need to see that. I have items commissioned by clients, some have paid up front but some I am recovering from each one sold so I need to know the mark-up on those.

    If you are talking about what only I can order, most will have no mark-up and so is less important.

    But considering I'm dealing in files with just under one million vertex even I I have 1000 models any you have 100 materials we are till only talking of 100,000 points of data and most modern spreadsheets should be able to handle that.

    I mean, this is what spreadsheets were made for, Handling and making sense of large chunks of related data.
     
  6. Youknowwho4eva
    Youknowwho4eva Well-Known Member
    Yes have them, especially if you could have them separate. At least grouped together if not two separate pages. (Sorry if I'm using inappropriate CSV language, no idea what that is :p)
     
  7. mctrivia
    mctrivia Well-Known Member
    Csv coma sepeated value

    One line per model. No such thing as pages
     
  8. Youknowwho4eva
    Youknowwho4eva Well-Known Member
    Ok, did some googleing. 2 separate files than? As long as they aren't all mixed together.
     
  9. mctrivia
    mctrivia Well-Known Member
    1 file would be best. Excel and all other spread sheet programs have a sort function that will let you sort in any order you want as long as the data is there to sort by.

    So if you want to seperate by visible status you can. If I want to sort by volume and category I can. But only if all together.

    May i request that a markup or sales price of $-1 be considered not available. Makes it so 1 field does availability and markup
     
    Last edited: Sep 22, 2011
  10. 65166_deleted
    65166_deleted Member
    Since we need to get this out fast, we will likely stick to the bare minimum feature--meaning only using this as a means to update your markups, not add tags, descriptions, change titles, public/private. This is because the more elements we add, the more ripple effects it has for development (ex: to do error checking across all those fields, to write out the comprehensible and helpful error messages, things like that).

    We will be expanding this CSV tool into a more robust shop management feature set, so bulk updates to other things (tags, shop sections) is on the agenda. But for the short term (ie next Wednesday), we are only limiting the CSV to markup edits.

    Thanks,
    Nancy
     
  11. mctrivia
    mctrivia Well-Known Member
    nancy you menioned one with volume one without. we need volume both ways.

    For example I would want to set the price not markup but I need the volume field to know what I can charge for each model. For example under 3cc I would set to 9.99 in WSF but over 3cc I might set to ceiling(volume*1.4+5)-0.01 which would give me a $3.50 markup and final price rounded up to $x.99

    If you are not going to add visibility and other advanced features on import. Export them anyways for sorting reasons and so layout will not have to change in the future when you implement them. Even if you leave things like description blank leave a spot for it.
     
    Last edited: Sep 22, 2011
  12. 65166_deleted
    65166_deleted Member
    Hey guys,

    One thing to keep in mind is that this CSV will also be available for all shopowners. So things like adding empty columns is unfortunately not a good experience for the majority of people out there.

    On the volume question, I want to make sure I understand your problem correctly. What I'm thinking right now is one spreadsheet with both the current pricing in one column, and the new pricing in another column. If you have both the current and new pricing in one spreadsheet, what more info do you need from the volume column? I thought the volume is mainly there to calculate the new pricing, but I think it would actually be easier to embed the new pricing into the spreadsheet--save you guys one extra step.

    Thoughts?

    Thanks!
    Nancy
     
  13. mctrivia
    mctrivia Well-Known Member
    Here is the layout I proposed a while back: https://www.shapeways.com/forum/index.php?t=getfile&id=10 015&

    As you can see even with just 1 coloumn per material per price it is a pretty wide layout. Let alone doubling with current and new.

    For me I would have no need for current as I would write a formula to assign the value of each model and then copy it, and paste values only back to the same location so your server does not need to deal with the formulas.

    SO for example in my spread sheet L3 is the first items volume so for AA3 which is the model price in WSF I would enter

    Code:
    =IF($L3<=3,9.99,IF($L3<=4,11.99,IF($L3<=5,14.99,CEILING($L3*1.1+5,1))))
    This would set the price of all my models to $9.99 if under 3cc, 11.99 if under 4cc, 14.99 if under 5cc, and if over 5 cc set a markup of 10%+$5 and round up to $x.99

    I can then cut and paste this formula to every single model and excel will calculate my optumum sales price for me.


    As for empty fields. We are inteligent people. Let us know the filed is left blank for future use. I would be saving this file on my hard drive and every time I want to make changes I would cut and paste my formla sheet over to the downloaded one. My formulas will only stay valid though if you don't move things around.

    If you need to move things a year or 2 from now that is not much of a hassle. If you don't leave extra space it will either get gumbled up or you will be moving stuff often which would be a problem as I will have to rewrite the fomulas possibly resulting in typing mistakes.
     
  14. 65166_deleted
    65166_deleted Member
    The other thing to consider is what are the must haves and what are the nice to haves, because we are also working on things like adding features back to product details, speeding up the website, so we need to prioritize and hit on the must have items. Thus far I have:

    - model title: must have
    - material: must have
    - base price (old): must have
    - base price (new): must have
    - alternative: volume (so you can calculate the new base price)
    - markup: must have AND editable
    - public vs. private (but on sale)

    The other things I am putting in the nice to have bucket
    - categories
    - tags
    - shop sections (though I feel like we should have either categories, tags, or shop sections--I'm leaning towards shop sections now)
    - views
    - favorites
    - volume
    - surface area

    For my shops, I don't actually use categories/tags/shop sections so much since I try to keep my shops (not the ones on this account) minimal.

    Things that seem simple, ie adding number of page views to the CSV, can actually take a while to spec out and implement. What are views, should we count distinct or repeating... Google Analytics counts views differently than our internal systems, and so on. My goal is to get this out by next Wednesday, so you guys have at least Thursday and Friday to play around with the tool. That's why I want to make sure we only focus on the must haves.

    The empty row columns thing.. what you are basically asking for is that we think out once and for all what is needed so you don't have to update your formulas. I can appreciate that. However, this puts me in a difficult spot because there will be changes in the future anyway (say we add a wall thickness detector or something like that), and present a fully thought out sheet makes it (1) less flexible to add new features in the future (2) less flexible to change the spreadsheet to tweak usability (3) on the whole a more complex experience (I can deal with spreadsheets and code too, but there are more smart and creative people out there who prefer simplicity) and (4) potentially delay in the roll out because there are a lot more things to plan for and think through (each data type also has distinct error cases to work through so we get good data validation).

    Anyway, long post, but I want to make sure you guys know that we are having these discussions and really thinking through our decisions in depth, and also provide some transparency into our thinking along the product dev process.

    Let me know if you have any more questions!
    Thanks,
    Nancy
     
  15. mctrivia
    mctrivia Well-Known Member

    Actually all I am asking for now is the musts. Page views, tags, ect you can fill with a NA and ignore there value on import. Think through what could reasonably be needed(which is what I did to make that layout) then leave a few blank spots that you can use up. It does not effect my formulas if you add something to a column that is unused. If you do that you may eventually outgrow the extra space you left. That is ok since it will not happen that often. At that point you tell us you are now using CSV 1.1 take note of the changes leave a few more blank space for the futere and keep on going. Having a version number as reference is also important.

    As for your points:
    1) You are restricted to adding new things to the blank spaces or to the end. But only until you make a version change which you should try to as seldom as possible. This is not that big of a restriction. And is a must because CSV means that people can write apps to help shop owners deal with there store inventory and apps require known layouts.

    2) Yes if you put things in a bad order you are stuck. Again user apps can handle that and a little bit of pre planning should minimalize. Use my example as a starting point I spent a bit of time thinking it through.

    3) The layout I proposed is not very complex. But you can always offer a simplified view also. But generally I think the bes solution is more info so apps and education can let people get the most out of it.

    4) I have done a fair bit of the leg work by making a workable layout. Also you can always ignore fields and fill with NA until you are ready to use. Get the must dones first. Leave room for the wants in a place that is logical to put them.


    I am admit about having a known layout that will not change often for multiple reasons.

    1) Mistakes can happen with pre writen formulas when things get moved.
    2) There are many smart programers here that could write really nice apps that could manipulate the csv files for shop owners in cool and new ways. For example I will write a new product inventory page that will work instead of the poorly coded one that already exists. People could upload there csv file. make changes in my app then upload the resulting csv back to shapeways. Means you can do less work as your customers can make what they need.
     
  16. how about a selection process...

    say when you want a spreadsheet for your shop you click on a button that says - generate spreadsheet-

    that takes you to a sub page with all of the options available to include in the spreadsheet. certain things are automatically be included but others are available to include.

    you make your selections and then say download and the csv will download to your hard drive.

    now what i would imagine in the spreadsheet is...

    the rows are the objects and the columns are the information that you requested. to alleviate the growth potential issue- with the names of the on the 1st row the importer at shapeways will know that the values of what that column represents so on re- importing will rely on this information instead of arbitrary "column q represents values for whatever" this will make it so that it is usable for the casual shop as well as powerful enough for the power user. and be infinitely expandable.

    one more thing i would like to request for this process. can we make it so that our shops follow the order that the spreadsheet is in.... so we could re arrange what a customer sees when they first enter into the shop.

    thank you and good night.

     
  17. mctrivia
    mctrivia Well-Known Member
    For me I would prefer at the beginning of the page 2 buttons and a file box. One button to download another to upload. After that other options could be available but minimizing clicks is always a nice thing.

    Name based columns is easy to implement for apps and shapeways import. Impossible for pre writen spreadsheet formulas. It is for those using Excel and that want to be able to do formula based that I am strongly encouraging a pre thought out format with room to grow. For apps you are right I could read the header and assign everything based on that.
     
  18. stonysmith
    stonysmith Well-Known Member Moderator
    Here is my perspective..

    The download file should have:
    - model number: must have
    - model title: must have
    - material: must have
    - base price (old): optional
    - base price (new): optional
    - volume: must have
    - surface area
    - markup: must have AND editable
    - public vs. private
    - for sale or not

    Knowing how databases tend to work.. this process really should be keyed to the Model# .. I could easily have two models with the same title, and the title can change over time, where the Model# would not.

    The return (upload) file could be as simple as:

    - model number
    - material
    - markup
     
  19. mctrivia
    mctrivia Well-Known Member
    input and output layout should be the same so people can open make some changes then save.

    Markup or Sales price. Should be an option on upload/download. Some people would find markup easier. I would prefer sales price.
     
  20. 65166_deleted
    65166_deleted Member
    Hey guys,

    I have a screenshot of the CSV that we will use. Now, before you get all :eek: and :mad: about this field and that piece of information not existing, please hear me out!

    This forum is one of the ways I've been gathering data about what shopowners want. There are actually quite a few shopowners and designers who (unfortunately) aren't as active on the forum as you all are, people that I talk to in person, over PM, email, etc. There are designers I know will be just as :( at me for making the spreadsheet too complicated, and filled with data they don't need. So, this is a compromise that I think will satisfy the 80/20 rule and give you all the bulk of what you need to do manage your markups, definitely to make it easier for you to update prices given the upcoming price change. So hopefully, it's a tool that will in ultimately make everybody a bit more :D , even if it doesn't satisfy to the T everybody's individual, specific needs.

    This tool is planning to be released this Wednesday.

    Thanks,
    Nancy
     

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    Last edited: Sep 26, 2011