Renaming .cat files to increase product limit???

[Spitos]

I'm trying to increase the capacity of our site from the ~20,000 sections limit which we are constantly on the edge of. To add new products, we need to remove old products and it is very time consuming, the old products were still selling too!

So here was my plan:
1. Backed up site using a snapshot and created new site
2. Imported snapshot and removed a top level section containing about 9,500 sub sections. Did this in both websites but on different sections.
3. This would give me twice the amount of sections than before by splitting the database into 2 websites and allowing 40,000 on the website.
4. Hardcoded the section list links so it appears as all sections are on a single site.
5. Uploaded to the same /acatalog/ directory 'albeit in test mode for now'.

I've hit a snag...
When I hit 'update' on site B, it does not upload all of the pages so I have to hit refresh to get them all up. All looks great so far.

I go to a product from site B and add it to my cart, no problem.
I go to a product from site A and add it to my cart, but it produces an error 'this product reference was recently removed from the catalogue' etc.

So the refresh needed to get the pages and data on the server overwrites some of the necessary files already there and won't allow full functionality. All perl files are identical so that is the problem, all files in the cgi-bin will be the same for each site too in fact.

I believe this is happening because the .cat files are being overwritten. Each site generates the filenames in the same sequence and generates the same filenames.

I can think of a way around this, but have no idea where to do it, have looked for a while too... If I can Change the sequence letter (from A0000.cat to B0000.cat) BEFORE actinic generates these files, I could then probably get around this issue and increase the site database to in theory and unlimited level.

Does anybody know how to amend the .cat file names?
Where in Actinic is the command that says use 'A00xxxx.cat' as the format when generating these files?

I have tried uploading site B to a different directory then downloading the .cat files onto my computer and changing the prefix on them all then uploading them to the /acatalog/ folder along wit the html pages but still no luck.

Can anyone give any constructive advice on the points above please?

[NormanRouxel]

Probably impossible as these files are generated internally by Catalog.exe.

A quick look at Catalog.exe with a hex editor detected 2 format strings %s.cat and %s%d.cat but the code that uses these will be extremely hard to locate and alter.

The simpler solution would be to contact Actinic Sales and enquire about Enterprise. Expensive, but a site selling over 20,000 products must be worth spending some money on.

[Mike Hughes]

The simpler solution would be to contact Actinic Sales and enquire about Enterprise. Expensive, but a site selling over 20,000 products must be worth spending some money on.

This get's my vote for the best suggestion.

If you have 20,000 products that are all selling then putting some money into the system is going to be worth it.

Mike

[Spitos]

Hi Norman, thanks for your reply.

Oh no, was hoping that the word 'impossible' wouldn't be thrown into the mix!
We don't want to move forward with Enterprise as we are already moving software in a few months to a new, very expensive bespoke package but hoped for a temporary solution until then. Thank you for the suggestion though.

Having tested a bit further again this morning, renaming the .cat files might not actually be my solution after all.

I uploaded the site which i cannot now order products from to a new directory and copied the page I am trying to order from, along with the .cat file that it is referencing
<Actinic:SECTION BLOB="A00033.cat"/>

Downloaded to computer and renamed all references of A00033.cat to B00033.cat in both the html page and the .cat file, including the filename of course.

I uploaded to the original test directory and tried to order but i still received the same message "Error: The specified product (reference 1!ACAPSQ065-A2V) has just been removed from the catalog"

So maybe that isn't my problem. Is there something else that controls what is in the catalog on the server? As far as I can see, all the data it needs is there but it won't allow me to add it to the cart. Not really sure how to proceed.

You can test the page in question here:
http://www.laptopsandspares.com/acat...C_Adapter.html

However, a strange happening is that I can order a product which is the same base/master product as the one that produces the error. This is on the same site too. What am i missing?

Link to same product which does allow ordering:
http://www.laptopsandspares.com/acat...C_Adapter.html

Please remember that not all links work as it is still very much a test area.

Another section with products in that does allow ordering is here:
http://www.laptopsandspares.com/acat...Batteries.html

We actually have about 800 products duplicated into the 20,000 sections just to avoid confusion.

Thanks for the advice Norman & Mike, any further help would be appreciated if possible.

[Duncan Rounding]

V11 due out later this year should have a single product per page option that will not require separate sections, otherwise look at using extended info pages as the product page perhaps.

[NormanRouxel]

Duncan's idea is worth a try. Use less Sections with multiple products per page. Then make the Product layout concise so it looks like a Section List. And Extended Info pages that open in the current window and use a full product layout instead of the Extended Info one. All probably do-able, even though you're on V7.