product pick lists problem

[cobbler]

Hello all,

I sell books and I have a section called "aircraft profiles" There are over 200 different titles in the series and I want customers to be able to choose from a list, rather than add 200 separate products to the catalogue.
I have added an attribute to the Profiles section with a drop down list of titles, but at the moment you can only select one title to add to the cart; if you go back and select another title the message "You have already exceeded the maximim number of items allowed" appears.
I have tried changing the shopping mode to "quantity on product page" with a "single add to cart button" but this then allows the customer to order more than one copy of the same title, regardless of the stock available.

What I am trying to achieve is this:

A list of titles from which the customer can choose more than one title, but not more than one of the same title. Can anyone tell me if this is posible please, and if so how? (I hope this makes sense!)

[cdicken]

It is possible to turn your quantity fields into checkboxes via some HTML customisation. Here is how:

Open your product layout template and save it under a new filename.

With this template, locate NETQUOTEVAR:PRODUCTQUANTITY and replace that variable with the following:

<!-- NETQUOTEVAR:PRODUCTQUANTITY --><input type="checkbox" name="Q_NETQUOTEVAR:PRODUCTREFERENCE" value="1">

Then save your template

You can use this product layout template just for the products within section by selecting it in the 'Product' tab of the section.

This will replace your quantity fields with checkboxes, and when customers select them and click the 'add to cart' button, a value of '1' is added to the cart.

[cobbler]

Thanks (yet again!) for your help Chris, but this only solved half the problem. Adding the check box limits the quantity of each profile to one, but still does not allow the customer to buy more than one title from the list of available profiles. If you try to add another title to the cart the "exceeded maximum quantity..." message appears. I think I may be trying to achieve the impossible by using a drop-down list this time. It may be better to use your check box solution, but with all 200 profiles listed directly on the product page?


If it helps, have a look at my site, the problem page is http://www.flyingbooks.co.uk/acatalog/Profiles.html

Once again, many thanks.

[cdicken]

I see where the problem is now. In order for the quantities of the profiles to work independently from each other, they need to be either 1) separate products or 2) separate components within a product.

If you go for the components option, you can have a list of 200 checkboxes underneath the product, and then people can tick the boxes they want to select the profiles they want.

Alternatively, include every profile as a separate product and then use a product layout template similar to the following to lay them out in very compact rows:

NETQUOTEVAR:ENDSEPARATOR
NETQUOTEVAR:PRODUCTFORMBEGIN
<tr>
<td colspan="3">
<table width="100%" border="0" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="0">
<tr>
<td width="250">NETQUOTEVAR:PRODUCTNAME</td>
<td align="right" width="100">NETQUOTEVAR:PRODUCTPRICE</td>
<td align="right">NETQUOTEVAR:PRODUCTQUANTITY</td>
<td align="right">NETQUOTEVAR:ADDTOCARTBUTTON</td>
</tr>
</table>
</td>
</tr>
NETQUOTEVAR:PRODUCTFORMEND
NETQUOTEVAR:NEXT

[cobbler]

You're a true bacon saver so you are!

I tried both suggested methods and settled on relisting all 200 as separate products, in eight pages of 25 each, using your template. It looks like this now: http://www.flyingbooks.co.uk/acatalog/Publishers.html

(I would like to contribute something to this forum instead of "taking" all the time, but unfortunately I don't know anything worth passing on...yet.)

Once again thanks for your help, I'd be sunk without it