X-Cart:Product Options

What Product Options module does

If you wish to sell products that differ from one another but slightly (e.g. in color or in size), there's no need to create a separate X-Cart product for each of these variations. Instead, you can treat them as one product and sell them under the same product title. To enable your customers to choose the necessary product variation, you can describe the difference between the variations in terms of product options - choices available to select from when ordering a product item. When adding an item to the shopping cart, your customers will choose the desired option or combination of options and thus will let you know which of the variations they want.

The module Product Options allows you to use options for products. Depending on the nature of the product being sold and on the quantity of variations of the product that need to be made available for sale, your approach to defining product options will be different.

The module allows you to define product options of three types: price modifier, product variant and custom text field.

Price modifier is an option type that allows you to define how choosing this or that product option modifies the price of the product item. The amount by which the product's price is increased or reduced can be expressed as an absolute or a percentage value.

Example:

Product: "Gone With The Wind", a book by Margaret Mitchell
Base price: $7.99

Options: Paperback (base price), Hardcover (+ $19.01).

Prices of product variations (based on the product base price modified by options):
   Paperback - $7.99,
   Hardcover - $27.00 (= $7.99 + $19.01)

Options of the price modifier type are good for describing features that can be made available to the customer on demand (like gift wrap, or anything that you can obtain as soon as a customer orders it - for example, red color for a t-shirt, provided you are the t-shirt producer and red is one of the standard colors that you use for t-shirts).

Product variant is an option type that helps you define all the possible combinations of product options available in specific product items. Product variations treated as product variants can have their own SKUs, prices, weights and product images, and you can track their quantity in stock separately.

Example:

Product: T-shirt

Options:
Color:    White, Blue
Size:      S, M, L, XL

Variants:

White + S          Blue + S
White + M          Blue + M
White + L          Blue + L
White + XL         Blue + XL

Custom text field is an option type that facilitates customization and personalization for product items. It enables customers to provide a detailed description of the options they wish to go with the item. For example, when a customer purchases a product item as a gift for someone else, he or she might want a card to be sent along with it; a custom text field in the list of the item's options would be a nice way to allow the customer to create a custom card message.

Roles in Product Options module management

If you are an X-Cart GOLD administrator/provider or an an X-Cart PRO administrator:

• You can enable/disable Product Options module and adjust its configuration settings (See #Enabling and Configuring 'Product Options').
• You can create and manage options of any type for any product in the store (See #Managing Product Options):
  • add product option groups and define specific option values
  • manage product option groups and specific option values
• You can define product option exceptions to disable certain combinations of product options (Study #Managing Product Option Exceptions).
• You can define properties (prices, weights, stock quantities) of previously created product variants and add images for them (See #Managing Product Variants).

If you are an X-Cart PRO provider:

• You can create and manage options of any type for any of your products (See #Managing Product Options):
  • add product option groups and define specific option values
  • manage product option groups and specific option values
• You can define product option exceptions to disable certain combinations of product options (Study #Managing Product Option Exceptions).
• You can define properties (prices, weights, stock quantities) of previously created product variants and add images for them (See #Managing Product Variants).

Enabling and Configuring 'Product Options'

To begin using the module:

1. Enable Product options module (Administration menu->Modules).

When the module is enabled, you can see:

• Product options link in the 'Product Management' section menu (when a product is opened for editing);
• Product options options section in General settings/Modules options.

2. Adjust the module settings via General settings/Modules options->Product options options.

• Redirect a customer who clicks the "Buy Now" or "Add to wish list" buttons of a product with product options to product details page: Select this check box in order for a customer using the "Buy now" or "Add to wish list" buttons to order or add to wish list a product with product options to be redirected to the 'Product details' page. Leave the check box unselected to allow the customer to be redirected to the cart page, as usual (To edit the options of a product added to the cart, the customer will have to use the 'Edit options' link.)

• The dynamic updating of the Save Money label depending on the selected product options is enabled: select this check box to dynamically update the Save Money label on the 'Product details' page depending on the product options selected by a customer. Leave the check box unselected if you wish the Save Money label value to depend solely on the base price of the product.

3. Click the Save button.

Managing Product Options

Adding option groups

Before you start defining any product options, a few words need to be said about product option groups.

You might already have guessed that individual product options like white, blue, S, M, L, XL, paperback or hardcover do not go into X-Cart unsorted. For a customer who decides to purchase a color t-shirt, it would be natural, firstly, to think, what properties of a t-shirt would be essential (for most people, these are likely to be size and color), and then to decide, how exactly these properties need to be expressed in the t-shirt being purchased (for example, XL and red). When defining options for products, you will want to adopt a similar approach, so your customers will find your options easy to understand and use. X-Cart's approach to creating product options stands in accord with this allowing you to proceed naturally from stating the product's property that needs to be defined (for example, size) to providing values by means of which the property can be defined (for example, S, M, L, XL). This means that any options that you create in your store are created not independently, but in groups (for example, a group of options defining size, a group of options defining color, etc). To add product options means to add a product option group and (in the case of price modifier and product variant option types) to define individual option values that will be available within this group. Note that, in the case of the custom text field type, you do not define any option values, as the value is to be defined by the customer.

To add a price modifier/product variant/custom text field product option group for a specific product:

1. Find the product for which you wish to define price modifier product options, product variants or a custom text field. Open this product for modification.

2. In the 'Product Management' section menu, click the link 'Product Options'. This opens the section of your store that allows you to define and edit product options for the product being viewed/modified.

If you have not yet defined any options for the product, you should be able to see a dialog box titled 'Add new option group':

If you have already added at least one option group, you should be able to see a dialog box 'Product option groups'. To access the 'Add new option group' dialog box from the 'Product option groups' list, click the Add new button.

3. Adjust the fields of the 'Add new option group' dialog box:

Price modifier type:

• Option group name - Name by which the option group will be identified in the 'Product option groups' list and on the shopping cart page, when products with product options are added to cart.

• Option text - Description of the option group that will appear on the 'Product details' page of the Customer area as the name of the field from which your customers will select specific option values.
• Option group type - Type of the options that will be created within the group (Select Price modifier).
• OrderBy - Numeric value defining the position of the option group field relative to the other option group fields that will be displayed on the same 'Product details' page .
• Availability - Check box defining the availability of the option group to customers (Selecting the check box makes the option group field visible in the Customer area and enables your customers to select option values from this group. Unselecting the check box hides the option group field from the Customer area).
• Options list - Specific option values from which your customers will be able to choose when ordering the product.

Enter one option per line and press Enter after each option to create a new line.

For options that are not going to modify the product's price, simply enter option names. For options that will make the product's price cheaper or more expensive, describe how exactly the product's price is going to be changed if the option is selected. Use the symbols = (equals), + (plus), - (minus) and % (percent).

For example, if you were selling color t-shirts:

• 'White' would mean 'Choosing the color white will not affect the price of the t-shirt'.
• 'Red=+3%' would mean 'A red t-shirt will be 3% more expensive than a white t-shirt'.

Product variant type:

• Option group name - Name by which the option group will be identified in the 'Product option groups' list.

• Option text - Description of the option group that will appear on the 'Product details' page of the Customer area as the name of the field from which your customers will select specific option values.
• Option group type - Type of the options that will be created within the group (Select Product variant).
• OrderBy - Numeric value defining the position of the option group field relative to the other option group fields that will be displayed on the same 'Product details' page .
• Availability - Check box defining the availability of the option group to customers (Selecting the check box makes the option group field visible in the Customer area and enables your customers to select option values from this group. Unselecting the check box hides the option group field from the Customer area).
• Options list - Specific option values from which your customers will be able to choose when ordering the product.

Enter one option per line and press Enter after each option to create a new line.

As product variants' prices are defined on a separate page, you just need to define option names.

Custom text field type:

• Option group name - Name by which the custom text field option being created will be identified in the 'Product option groups' list.
• Option text - Description of the option that will appear on the 'Product details' page of the Customer area as the name of the custom text field.
• Option group type - Type of the option (Select Custom text field).
• OrderBy - Numeric value defining the position of the custom text field relative to the other option group fields that will be displayed on the same 'Product details' page .
• Availability - Check box defining the availability of the option to customers (Selecting the check box makes the custom text field visible in the Customer area and enables your customers to enter text into it. Unselecting the check box hides the custom text field from the Customer area).
• Options list - the field is inactive, as custom text fields are not supposed to provide options to select from.

4. Click the Add option group button. You should see an Information box with a confirmation message. This means the option group has been added to the list of product option groups.

Now you can edit the details of the option group, add a translation for the option group, view the list of available option groups or add another option group.

To edit the option group details, scroll down to the bottom of the page, on which the Information box is displayed. Use the dialog box titled 'Update option group' to change any details that need to be changed and click the Update option group button to save the changes.

To add a translation for the option group, from the language selector located at the top right-hand corner of the 'Update option group' dialog box select a language in which you wish to add a translation, replace the values displayed in the dialog box fields by values in the selected language and save the changes. For information on product option translations, see #Multilingual product options further in this section.

To view the list of product option groups, click the link Back to option groups list at the top of the 'Update option group' dialog box.

To add another product option group, click the link Add new option group.

(If you created a Product variant option group) To set prices, weights and stock quantities for the individual product variants within the created option group, go to the 'Product variants' section (Click the link 'Product variants' in the 'Product Management' section menu). For information on managing product variants, refer to #Managing Product Variants further in this section of this manual.

Managing product option groups and product option values

Previously created product option groups can be viewed in the 'Product option groups' dialog box, which is available in the 'Product Options' section:

The table columns provide the following information regarding each of the listed product option groups:

• CLASSID number (a unique number generated automatically and assigned to a product option group for the purpose of identification).
• OPTION CLASS - Name of the option group.
• OPTION TYPE - Type of the option group (Price modifier, Product variant, Custom text field).
• ORDERBY - Numeric value defining the position of the product option group relative to the other product option groups of the same product (affects the order of product option groups in the 'Product option groups' list and the order of option fields on the 'Product details' page of the product in the Customer area.
• AVAILABILITY - Check box defining the availability of the product option group to customers (Selecting the check box makes the corresponding product option group field visible in the Customer area. Unselecting the check box hides the option group field from the Customer area, but leaves it available for editing in the store's back end).
• OPTIONS LIST - List of option values defined in the option group.

The controls of the 'Product option groups' dialog box allow you to perform certain operations on existing product option groups.

To change the order of the product option groups, edit the values in the ORDERBY column for all the groups whose position needs to be changed and click the Update button.

To change the availability status of a product option group, change the value of the AVAILABILITY check box opposite its name and click the Update button.

To delete a product option group, select the check box opposite its name and click the Delete selected button.

To modify an option group:

1. Click on the option name link in the 'Product option groups' dialog box. This should open a dialog box 'Update option group' allowing you to edit the parameters of the product option group and to change the set of option values included into the option group.
2. If necessary, edit the parameters of the product option group:
3. Edit the values of the 'Option group name', 'Option text', 'Option group type', 'OrderBy' and 'Availability' fields.
4. Click the Update option group button to save the changes.
5. If necessary, edit the set of option values in the 'Options list' section.

To change an existing option value in a group of the product variant type, adjust the fields in the following columns:

• OPTION VALUE - Name of the option value.
• ORDERBY - Number reflecting the position of the option value within the option group.
• AVAILABILITY - Availability of the option value to customers.

For the price modifier type, in addition to the columns OPTION VALUE, ORDERBY and AVAILABILITY, which have the same meaning as in the Product variant type, also adjust the fields in these columns:

• OPTION - Number defining the amount by which the product's price is modified. Can be positive (like "3.00") for mark-ups or negative (like "-3.00") for discounts.
• SURCHARGE - Type of the surcharge (Absolute or Percent).

If you wish to remove one or more of the option values from the option group being edited, select the check boxes to the left of those option values that need to be removed and click the Delete selected button.

To add some more option values, first add the desired number of field rows in the 'Add option value' subsection using the Add row button, then complete these fields and save the changes using the Update option group button (Rows created on accident, which do not need to be added to the options list, can be removed by clicking the Remove row button in the respective rows).

After editing any values in the 'Options list' subsection, be sure to click the Update option group button to save the changes.

Multilingual product options

If your store supports more than one languages, you need to provide translations of your product option groups into all the languages supported by your store.

Note: The recommended workflow for defining product options in a multilingual store is to create product options in the default admin language (defined in the 'Languages' section of the Admin area) and then translate them into other languages. This is essential because product options first created in a language other than the default admin language will have empty names in the default admin language.

Translations for any option group can be added at any time after the creation of the option group is completed.

To add a translation for a product option group:

1. Open the details of the product option group so you can edit them using the 'Update option group' dialog box.
2. Use the language selector located in the 'Update option group' dialog box to select the language in which you wish to add a translation. The interface changes to the selected language.
3. Replace the values of the fields 'Option group name', 'Option text' and, if necessary, 'Options list' with new values in the selected language.
4. Click the Update option group button to save the changes.