Variables and new Tabs not showing up on Product Details.

[NormanRouxel]

Here's a strange one. Instead of lurking at home I decided to visit a live site in Glasgow. Wish I hadn't now as it seems to have a poisoned database.

Site is using Business 8.0.4.

Any newly created Variables show up on the Section and Site level but won't show in the Product Details. E.g I go to Design / Library / Variables, select the Product group and create a variable TESTING. I set Place of Setting to Site, Section and Product. The variable duly appears in the Properties tab of Settings / Site Options, the Properties tab of Section Details, but is missing from the Properties tab of Product Details.

Anyone seen this before?

Also if I import a partial site design containing a new Tab, this tab won't appear on the Product Details but again appears fine on the Site Options or Section Details.

Anyone seen this before?

When I import a Snapshot of this site onto a different computer the problems come with the import, so it's not the Actinic installation that's wrong. It seems to be something in the database.

I'm not often flummoxed but this one's got me stuck!

[dave_finlayson]

Norman,

I had this too with the variables not showing up, it's a bug alright. Had me going batty for about a week while support looked into it! I found that if you temporarily move the variable to a new tab, then move it back, it will kick into the display. Or alternatively, create a new tab and place it in there.

[NormanRouxel]

Hi, David

I'm pretty sure I tried that (I was there about 3 hours trying to fix it) but nothing would induce a new Variable to show up on the Product details.

In your case was Actiic able to cure the database?

[RuralWeb]

I had something similar with variable settings not being transfered to another Pc using a snapshot - support is looking at it.

[Jane]

I had the same problem and resolved it by doing a file export, closing Actinic and then importing the Hierarchical Import file, and hey ho - all was well. Can't understand why, but might be worth trying.

[dave_finlayson]

Norman,

That certainly worked from me. If I remember correctly support suggested removing all the Place of Settings details, clicking on ok, coming out the design library and then going back in and re-creating all the place settings. HOWEVER, this deletes any information you had in them, which for me was a huge job to recreate, so I tried putting them in a new tab and it worked.

And no, they weren't able to cure the database, it seems to be something that will require a fix at some point.

[NormanRouxel]

Many thanks all, especially Jane as it was her solution (#5) that worked for me. Like her, I can't understand why it fixed the database, but it did!

[Jane]

Gosh! Delighted I was able to help. Think this is a first for me - after years of being helped by all of you on this forum ... off to celebrate

[Simon Clark]

Hi folks

does anyone know if this bug has been addressed (and indeed fixed ?)
as I am still getting this now, on v8.5.1.0.0.0.HERA

regards
Simon

[cdicken]

Hi there

I've put a workaround for this for sections online at http://community.actinic.com/showthread.php?t=30425. I'd love to see your snapshot if I can. Can you please drop me an email to cdicken/at/actinic/co/uk and I'll let you know a server you can upload to.

[Orchid]

I think know what's causing all these bugs with partial site design

I've been having loads of problems with one of my new sites after having done a partial site design. Therefore I created a copy of the ActinicCatalog.mdb from my site and opened it in access side-by-side with a clean ActinicCatalog.mdb.

I was looking for why variables haven't been showing up on tabs in products so I compared the following tables in design view.

UserDefinedProperties
Variable

What I discovered is that the tables after the patial-site design had a different values set in their field properties - this is probably leading to a lose of data integrity.

For example:

bCascade after partial site design has the following settings

Format:
Caption:
Default Value:
Validation Rule:
Indexed: No
Text Align: General
lookup:textbox

but in the clean out of the box design

Format:yes/no
Caption:
Default Value:
Validation Rule:
Indexed: No
Text Align: General
lookup:checkbox

I then compared the other field properties for these tables and many had different values - I suspect that this may be the issue across the database and so I no longer trust it's integrity - I'm going to place this as a trouble ticket - but I also wanted to post it here so that others were aware that this is an important issue and that in my view it might be safer to stay away from the "partial site design".

I am now going to export my product data from the unsound database as a hierarchical file, and import it into a clean site. However I am going to have to redo all my layout and variable changes manually as I suspect that these are unsafe - unless anyone has any better Idea's?

[Orchid]

further to above

The hierarchical import doesn't solve the problem - even in a clean database - this means data integrity must have been lost even at product level - now I really am at a lose as to what to do - really don't want to have to add all the products manually.

[completerookie]

have you tried changing the category to any other category thats offered, and then immediately change it back to the original category.
I had an issue similar and the easy solution was to temporarily change the category.

[Orchid]

I've tried everything I can think of, nothing has worked - trouble ticket now in, see if support can fix it - bit stuffed if not. As I don't really know how to progress from here.

[Orchid]

support's reply

Hi Wayne,


This is a bug in the software and it is deemed to be fixed in one of the future maintenance releases.

Kind regards,
Marcello Fenwick
Actinic Support

brilliant - so what do I do now start the design from scratch - rebuild all the products from scratch - this will take a mountain of time.

given the following surely I can manually repair the integrity which HAS to quicker than a complete rebuild.

• Conceptual schema, a map of concepts and their relationships
• Logical schema, a map of entities and their attributes and relations
• Physical schema, a particular implementation of a logical schema
• A description of where the bug has caused the database to lose integrity

What do others with indepth knowledge of the database think (thinking of Jan at Mole-End, Gabe with his wonderful new Actinet and possible some others out there.) And does anybody have the above - or have Actinic supplied this data anywhere?