external stock sheet

[SolSearcher]

Is there a way that I can easily add and remove stock levels from from my actinic site? Being a clothing store we have stock returned due to fit and customers ordering more that one item just to try on to see what suits them best.
In version 8 I have an external spead sheet with a macro running that lets us search by name or product code, we then edit that stock level. We have a lot of products/sizes and this is a efficent way of dealing with our stock control.

Version 10 will not allow an external stock sheet to be conected and I really need the live stock control that V10 offers so is there a way of efficently adding/removing stock?

[Jan]

The only way is to edit the products in Actinic, either on their own product details page or on operations / stock levels. If you want to use the stock control system, any changes made in any other way will be ignored by Actinic until the next site refresh.

[SolSearcher]

VB Interface interacting with Actinic Database.

Would it be possible then to create a small program in Visual Basic that when opened connects to the Actinic database, I could then search for the relevent products and adjust the stock levels. When I have finnished adjusting the stock levels I could then carry out a Actinic 'Refresh.'

Would Actinic allow another program to interact with the database whilst live stock control is switched on?

[malbro]

Would it be possible then to create a small program in Visual Basic that when opened connects to the Actinic database, I could then search for the relevent products and adjust the stock levels. When I have finnished adjusting the stock levels I could then carry out a Actinic 'Refresh.'

Would Actinic allow another program to interact with the database whilst live stock control is switched on?

If you install epos, you can update live stock control from the Epos system via the Actinic supplied link program. I used a demo system during beta testing and was able to update stock in the Epos system and buy goods on the store and on update the stock level correctly dealt with both incoming stock to the Epos and the sales on the site.

So yes it is possible but the method is undocumented. The site copy of Actinic keeps its own stock levels in between updates and when the PC version updates the stock, it can take account of both changes at the site and on the PC itself.

Logically in order to do this it must hold a record of the stock on site at the last upload and the change to stock made at the PC, then during the update it can calculate the change in stock at site and correct the current stock level before uploading the new stock level to site.

This would imply that if the stock does not update from an external program the external program is not updating the correct location. This logic leads me to examine the Actinic Catalog database and there is indeed a new table in V10 called 'outstanding stock changes'.

[SolSearcher]

Thanks Malcom,
I'm going to download microsofts Visual Basic program and get to work on this over the next couple of weeks. I'll pick up some tutorials and learn how to connect to the database.
The idea is just to be able to add or remove returned items without getting into the thick of Actinic where we have hidden products for different sizes.
There's too much scope for somebody (my wife) messing a product up by ticking an option or adjusting the wrong field and also for the whole process to be much quicker.