BUG: Extended Info Pages on Old SPP Method Do Not Work

[leehack]

Reports on an upgraded site (v10-V11.0.0) where the extended info page use has gone a little mad and i'm in the middle of a v10-v11.0.1 upgrade and i am seeing the same. I think some settings and conditions on the links part are wrong.

Setup is a subsection per product, with an extended info page to show an embedded youtube video on one site, on the other site extended info is just being used for a larger image. Both are screwed up.

Despite site options being set as the help says and product settings also, it is seemingly impossible to get an extended info 'image' to show on old SPP method.

In addition on the 'links' menu the options within the "Links From Product Page" are greyed out and impossible to select. The tooltip on the area does not work either, that should surely be a pre-requisite for a brand new area?

In site options, you can set to use an image, the product links layout seems somewhat confused though around the condition controlling things. The standard code will not show the image:

 <actinic:block if="%3cactinic%3avariable%20name%3d%22IsPopUpPageDisplayedByButton%22%20%2f%3e" ><actinic:variable name="ExtendedInfoButton" /></actinic:block>

Remove the condition around it, and it does:

<actinic:variable name="ExtendedInfoButton" />

The condition reads:

(<actinic:variable name="PageType" /> == "Product Page") AND (<Actinic:Variable Name="IsPopUpPageGenerated"/> == TRUE) AND (<actinic:variable name="DisplayByButton" /> == TRUE)

I think that is very wrong, i can't see how it could ever work with those conditions in place and by removing them, because it starts to work, i presume i have found a problem.

[leehack]

Just to confirm, i have uploaded with the condition removed and all works as expected. So the problems are the condition and why options on the links menu get greyed out.

[leehack]

Some further info i have just worked out. The greyed out areas i mentioned are greyed out because a 'product page' has not been selected for the product. I can see the logic here, don't give people options they cannot use if they have not done something else, but the tooltip has to relay this.

This is almost certainly having the knock on effect on the lack of image for the extended info page too. The terminology is confusing here, you have extended info button and extended info image, but in most people's eyes an image will in fact be a button. But worse than that, because you have not enabled a product page, you do not get the option to set what you want (image/text/button) for the extended info page.

I can:
- link the product name to the extended info page
- add a text link to the extended info page
- click on product image to go to the extended info page

I cannot:
- have a 'larger image' or 'view video' image underneath the product image which links to the extended info page without also having to have a product page

This appears to be an oversight perhaps, the options to have an image link to extended info pages on a non-product page is a must, this needs addressing asap IMO.

[leehack]

4 days no reply, does that mean I am going mad or it is confirmed as a bug?Surely this forum is monitored and a reply either way should be forthcoming. Poor show.

[Benjamin Dyer]

Sorry Lee, this thread slipped though the net at Actinic towers. Community is manned but sometimes these things happen.

Reply incoming.

[leehack]

No problem Ben, thanks for your reply. Appreciate if you can confirm either way, I need to hand this site over asap and need to know whether I have a problem or I need to fudge the coding to do what we want, which may come back to bite on further upgrades.

[brucet]

Sorry Lee, I think it falls to me to reply to this, but I've just got back after a week's leave.

It's true there is no option in v11 for a button link from the section list to the extended info page. I didn't anticipate this causing upgrade issues because the section list uses a different product layout in v11, but I was obviously wrong. Unfortunately this didn't show up in internal or external reviews of the spec, or in alpha or beta testing :-(

We have logged this as a usability issue but unfortunately there's no quick fix

[leehack]

It's not on a section list Bruce, it's on a straightforward product layout.

The 'what's included' button like you see on here - http://www.physiosupplies.com/acatal...y_-_85gms.html - links to the extended info page, which houses a youtube video.

Not sure if you're not quite sure what i am explaining, but i can assure you this is not a rare setup, IME it's very common. The most common uses are 'larger image' button showing larger image on extended info page and 'view video' showing youtube video embedded into extended info page.

You provided by text link, by button or by image linking capabilities in v10 and before, you've for some reason removed the by image option on normal product layouts, but the function still exists for product pages. More to the point, you've limited extended info pages functionality as it was to just product pages now, that's completely forgotten the past 5 years of people using subsections for SPP.

I will perhaps pickup on this with you directly rather than on here, but i'm very disappointed, I raised this specific issue when I first read the SPP specifications which must have been a year or more ago now.

What's the suggested way around this, this will render view video and larger image options via image option useless in V11. That's about 30-40% of builds by my reckoning. Some of these cannot use the click on product image facility as a lightbox exists on probably 70% of sites nowadays. So we are left with the linking product name only. Who would ever click on the product name to see a video or a larger image?

Either I am over-dramatising this or you guys are drastically underestimating the impact of this. This is a biggie IMO, even more so as the interface is greying out the options so not a quick fix.

[brucet]

By all means let's chat offline, but we've not limited the extended info functionality. You should be able to link to either a product page, or an extended info page, or both (using different links) and quite independently. Since you don't seem to be able to do that, I wonder if something has gone wrong with the upgrade? In which case one of our technical team would need to look at your snapshot.

[leehack]

I'm going to disagree Bruce, you have limited the functionality as far as i am concerned, because it is seemingly impossible to do what i want in the same way i did in V10 (the exact issue i raised). One of your support staff was on live chat earlier too and they seemed to agree with what i am saying. I can only assume you're not quite getting what we are talking about here.

Here's a practical way of explaining it:

Open up v10, in site options make sure extended info pages are set to use "extended info button image", add an image to use. Then go to a subsection with a product in, enable the extended info page and tick the "extended info button" tickbox. Your button will appear and links to the ext info page.

Try the same in V11 making sure you DO NOT have product page ticked (you wouldn't have this on old SPP setup).

Your support staff confirmed that in a standard v11 site it does not work either, so it doesn't appear to be an upgrade issue, if it is then fab, great news. Any chance you could try the above scenario and see if you can get it to work?

Support said "in v11, that now needs to be hard-coded". That seems pretty conclusive to me that you have indeed limited functionality and it does not work as you seem to think.

To clarify:

The "Links from product page" options on the 'links' menu are greyed out if you do NOT have a product page selected. It's obvious that an old SPP setup, will not need product pages and thus how do they use the greyed out checkboxes? they are only selectable when a product page is enabled from what i can see.

[leehack]

While we are at it, in order to use extended info pages, you have to go to the extended info menu to apply the desired settings, I cannot for the life of me understand why the 3 checkboxes were taken off this page, so we now have to visit 2 menus. That's not great. Leave the extended info controls on the page where you have to go to enable it anyway, moving these has just made it worse. Understand why you have done it, to centralise all links, it simply does not work in the real world as best it could though. Leave the extended info page as it was, it's gone backwards IMO.

[leehack]

Had a 3rd customer with problems with this today. They had also noticed that the image option no longer worked in V11 as it did in V10. Sadly, they enabled product pages on all 483 of their products so that it did work. They didn't realise that this would create 483 duplicate pages on their site!

I guess that confirms it as a bug beyond reasonable doubt, can this now be escalated as a bad oversight (bug) and fixed accordingly please?

[brucet]

I've logged a task for this, but I'm not sure at this stage when we will be able to prioritise it.

[leehack]

Thanks Bruce, at least after 13 days I finally have confirmation that it is a bug/oversight and I'm not yet fit for the looney bin.

[PatchworkRabbit]

Sorry to dredge, but I've just come across this problem myself. Has there been a fix for it?

I've had a little play and the problem seems to be that the "Standard Extended Information Links" layout tests for the Product Page variables, but I'm using the old skool SPP, which is a product list page.

Basically, if I put the variable ExtendedInfoLinkText outside of any conditions, it displays the Product Page text, not the Product List Link text.

I'm guessing the simple solution is to change the layout to use the (correct) stuff, which is ProductListLinkText? But I'm not sure of what the condition to test for would be.

Thanks