The OFBiz Catalog Manager

Getting Started with
Apache OFBiz™E-Commerce
(OFBIZ Release 4.0)
The Catalog Manager Application
Ruth Hoffman
Getting Started with Apache OFBiz E-Commerce, Release 4.0
"Getting Started with Apache OFBiz TM E-Commerce (Release 4.0)"

"The OFBiz Catalog Manager Application"
Version 1.0
Copyright © 2009 Ruth Hoffman
All rights reserved.
Java ™ and all Java-based marks are trademarks or registered trademarks of

Sun Microsystems, Inc.
ApacheTM, OFBiz TM, Apache Derby™ and the OFBiz

logos are trademarks of the Apache Software Foundation.
myOFBiz © and myOFBiz.com © are copy write marks of Adaptive Enterprise

Solutions, Inc.
Cover: Laurie Morrison
Editorial assistance: Sue Ridgeway (suewrites@mindspring.com)
The information in this book is distributed on an "as is" basis without any
warranty. Although every effort has been made to ensure accuracy, the author
shall have no liability to any person or entity with respect to any loss or damage
caused by or alleged to be caused directly or indirectly by the information
contained in this work.
Copyright, Ruth Hoffman 2009 2

Publication Number: OFBIZCS1P1V1092009, Version 1 August 2009
Table of Contents
About This Book.................................................................................5

Who Should Read This Book............................................................................ 5
About The Author.............................................................................................. 5
Conventions...................................................................................................... 5
Organization of the Book .................................................................................. 7
Downloads........................................................................................................ 8
What You Need to Know....................................................................9
About E-commerce ........................................................................................... 9
About OFBiz ..................................................................................................... 9
About OFBiz Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) ........................................ 10
Finally a Note About OFBiz Versions.............................................................. 10
The Catalog Manager Application ..................................................11
1.0 Introducing the OFBiz Catalog Manager ................................................ 11
2.0 Navigating the Catalog Manager User Interface .................................... 14
2.1 Quickly Find an Existing Product ........................................................ 15
2.2 Quickly Find an Existing Catalog or Category .................................... 17
3.0 OFBiz Stores.......................................................................................... 18
3.1 List Available Stores ........................................................................... 21
3.2 Setting Stores On Websites................................................................ 22
3.3 Basic Store Settings ........................................................................... 25
3.4 Creating a New OFBiz Store .............................................................. 30
3.5 Stores and Payment ........................................................................... 31
3.6 Store Shipping Services ..................................................................... 34
3.7 Setting Shipping Estimates................................................................. 38
3.8 Notifications (Emails).......................................................................... 39
3.9 Store Surveys..................................................................................... 43
4.0 Products................................................................................................. 45
4.1 Listing Products.................................................................................. 47
4.2 Creating a New Product ..................................................................... 49
4.3 Changing Basic Product Settings ....................................................... 52
4.4 Product Descriptive Text .................................................................... 54
4.5 Product Pricing ................................................................................... 57
4.6 Product Features ................................................................................ 61
4.7 Product IDs......................................................................................... 65
4.8 Products as Configurations................................................................. 66
4.9 Product Configuration Items ............................................................... 69
5.0 Price Rules............................................................................................. 73
6.0 Promotions............................................................................................. 77
6.1 List All OFBiz Promotions................................................................... 79
6.2 List Store Promotions ......................................................................... 80
6.3 Add/Remove Store Promotions .......................................................... 81

6.4 Promotion Configuration..................................................................... 83

6.5 Product Promotion Rules.................................................................... 88
7.0 Product Catalogs and Categories .......................................................... 93
7.1 Introduction......................................................................................... 93
7.2 List All Catalogs.................................................................................. 95
7.3 List Available Categories .................................................................... 96
7.4 Add/Remove Catalogs from Stores .................................................... 98
7.5 Creating New Catalogs....................................................................... 99
7.6 Creating New Categories ................................................................. 100
7.7 Adding/Removing Categories From Catalogs................................... 102
7.8 Building Category Hierarchies .......................................................... 104
7.9 Add/Remove Products from Catalogs .............................................. 106
8.0 Miscellaneous Topics........................................................................... 110
8.1 Subscriptions.................................................................................... 110
8.2 Catalog Thesaurus ........................................................................... 114
8.3 Product Keywords ............................................................................ 115
8.4 Product Reviews............................................................................... 116
Appendix A OFBiz Downloads......................................................117
Appendix B OFBiz Versions..........................................................120

About This Book
Who Should Read This Book

This book is an introduction to the Apache "Open for Business" TM (Apache
OFBiz TM) Catalog Manager Application. If you want to understand what you
get out-of-the-box with the Apache OFBiz Catalog Manager, this book was
written for you. We've highlighted key features, essential functions and
product benefits in an easy to read, non-technical format. Business owners,
consultants and Users looking for a competitive edge, whether it be for a
small, home-grown business or a global multinational organization, will find
useful information here.
If you are completely new to OFBiz, consider reading the introductory,

companion book in this series: "Getting Started with Apache OFBiz E-
Commerce, The eCommerce Application" for a thorough understanding
OFBiz e-commerce out-of-the-box, from the end-user's point of view.
On the other hand, if you are looking for an OFBiz developer's guide or
details of the code base, this book is not for you. No JavaTM code snippets,
eXtensible Markup Language (XML) or code diagramming were used in the
creation of this book and will not be discussed at any point.
About The Author

Ruth Hoffman has over 30 years of computer industry experience ranging
from early work writing real-time command & control systems to more recent
marketing and sales support endeavors. Over the last several years, she has
moved back to her roots as a software developer, embracing the Web and
searching for the next "killer app".
Conventions
Apache OFBiztm is the trademarked designator for the code base and the
software that is the Apache Open for Business project. OFBiz (also
trademarked) is the short-cut moniker adopted by the community and in
common use today. Throughout the remainder of this book, OFBiz shall
mean the Apache OFBiz project code base and any relevant derivative
materials.

"Cue balls" such as  are used to bring attention to certain areas of

interest on a graphic such as a web screenshot.
Bolded Type indicates the name of a software product, an OFBiz application,

a named software feature, a web page or a web page form name. For
example: OFBiz.
"e-commerce" is used as a generic term referring to online business

transactions.
The term "eCommerce" is the name of the OFBiz application that brings e-
commerce features and functions to an instance of the OFBiz Enterprise
Resource Planning (ERP)1 software suite.
HTML submit buttons and some navigation tabs are indicated as follows:
Button_Label
"" Indicates one or more navigation links or mouse clicks used to access a
web page or navigate through a series of web pages.
"Web" (with an upper case "W") refers to the World Wide Web defined as a
computer network consisting of a collection of Internet sites that offer text and
graphics and sound and animation resources through the hypertext transfer
protocol2.
"web" (with a lower case "W") refers to a single Hypertext Markup Language
(HTML) document.
1
ERP is defined as a system that integrates all data an processes of an organization into a
unified system. A key ingredient of most ERP systems is the use of a unified database to store
data for the various system modules. (2009, http://www.threerivers-
cams.com/Resources/Terminology)
2
http://wordnetweb.princeton.edu/perl/webwn?s=world%20wide%20web

Organization of the Book

This book is the second in a two part series written to introduce the Apache
Open for Business ERP software suite's e-commerce capabilities. In this
book, "Getting Started with Apache OFBiz E-Commerce, The Catalog
Manager Application", we discuss the OFBiz Catalog Manager application.
The Catalog Manager is the OFBiz application used to setup, configure and
manage OFBiz e-commerce stores.
Chapter 1 begins our tour of the OFBiz Catalog Manager with a high level
overview of features and functions.
Chapter 2 discusses the Catalog Manager's User Interface with some helpful
hints on how to navigate the many and varied web pages that make up this
application.
Chapter 3 begins with an overview of the OFBiz "Store". It continues with a

discussion covering some basic store management tasks such as viewing the
configuration settings of existing stores; configuring new stores; changing
store settings; store payment options; store shipping provider methods; email
notification to users and store based surveys.
Chapter 4 is a basic introduction to OFBiz "Products". Products are a

complex beast and this chapter begins the discussion about basic product
management activities such as creating new products; changing properties of
existing products; adding pricing to products; giving products features and
products as configurations.
Chapter 5 is an introduction to the OFBiz "Price Rules" engine. In this chapter

you will learn how price rules work and how to apply price rules to stores,
products and groups of products.
Chapter 6 discusses store based "Promotions". Promotions or "Special

Offers" may be configured and applied across an entire store, on a single
product or anywhere in between. The choice is yours. In this chapter, learn
how OFBiz promotions work.
Chapter 7 is all about OFBiz "Product Catalogs". Product catalogs are

collections of products, grouped, organized and displayed to make online
shopping easy and browsing fun. Discover the many and varied ways OFBiz
supports product listings and promotions through the implementation of
product catalogs.

Chapter 8 completes our tour of the OFBiz Catalog Manager with

discussions about several miscellaneous topics including product
subscriptions, support of catalog thesaurus and product reviews.
Downloads
While you don't need the OFBiz software to make good use of this book,
there is nothing like trying it out and seeing for yourself. For detailed
instructions on how to download and install a free copy of OFBiz on your PC
or desktop system, please visit the official OFBiz website at:
http://ofbiz.apache.org or see Appendix A OFBiz Downloads.

What You Need to Know

While you don't need to have a PhD in Computer Science to make sense of
this book, there are some basic things you need to know to ensure you get
the most out of it.
About E-commerce
Electronic Commerce or e-commerce has been defined as the buying and
selling of products and/or services over a network. The focus of this book is
the part of e-commerce, transacted over the World Wide Web (Web), and
often referred to as business-to-consumer online retailing or e-tailing.
There is no denying the importance of e-commerce and online retailing. If you

are reading this book, then you already understand this and realize the
potential OFBiz has to help our business grow and become a major e-
commerce player.
What should you be looking for in e-commerce software tools? At minimum:
√ Support for one or more virtual store(s) where products and/or services
are showcased and consumers browse product offerings and place
orders.
√ A virtual shopping cart where a consumer may select items from the
storefront and hold them until they are ready to purchase.
√ An automated checkout, facilitating order placement and payment.
√ Integration with other business applications as needed. Accounting,

inventory, website management, customer management, content
management and manufacturing are all business areas that may benefit
from seemless integration with the e-commerce software.
About OFBiz
If you are looking for an Open Source3, easily customizable, robust, secure
and reliable e-commerce software solution, then OFBiz may be just the ticket.
OFBiz is free for the downloading. Licensed under the Apache 2.0 umbrella,4
there are no upfront fees; no royalties of any type and once you download
3
With open source software you get all the code at no charge.
4
For more info on the Apache 2.0 license and open source licensing as it applies to the Apache
Open for Business project, please see: http://www.apache.org/legal/resolved.html

OFBiz, you own OFBiz. You may change it in any way, deploy it and resell it
without penalty or obligation to the OFBiz project. That is the freedom of the
Apache 2.0 license.
If you are new to Open Source software and are not sure about this freedom,
then no harm done. You can still download it and try it out. Or, you can just
read the rest of this book and see what its all about and then decide for
yourself.
As an open source community-driven project OFBiz is maintained and

improved by a dedicated team of skilled contributors. The primary source of
OFBiz information is the OFBiz Wiki (http://ofbiz.apache.org/). The reader is
encouraged to visit the site as this is an active, ever improving project.
About OFBiz Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP)

Look to OFBiz for reliable, scalable and easy to integrate Enterprise ready
software. OFBiz is an Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP)5 software suite
built using the latest Java J2EE tools and best practices. To quote the
project's web site:
"Open For Business (OFBiz) is a suite of enterprise applications built on a common

architecture using common data, logic and process components. The loosely coupled nature
of the applications makes these components easy to understand, extend and customize."
"The tools and architecture of OFBiz make it easy to efficiently develop and maintain
enterprise applications…It also makes it easy to customize and extend existing functionality
6
when you have a specific need."
Finally a Note About OFBiz Versions

OFBiz is community-driven software so don't be surprised if the version that
you download today doesn’t match the version used to capture screenshots
for this book. The author has made every effort to stay current with the
project. Screenshots used to illustrate this book are taken from Release 4.0
version 7x.
For more information on OFBiz project versioning, please see Appendix B

"OFBiz Versions".
5
ERP is defined as a system that integrates all data an processes of an organization into a
unified system. A key ingredient of most ERP systems is the use of a unified database to store
data for the various system modules. (2009, http://www.threerivers-
cams.com/Resources/Terminology)
6
From the OFBiz project Website,
http://docs.ofbiz.org/display/OFBADMIN/Apache+OFBiz+Project+Overview

1.0 Introducing the OFBiz Catalog Manager

The Catalog Manager is the OFBiz application used to configure and
manage the OFBiz eCommerce store. Through the Catalog Manager
browser based User Interface (UI) you may:
Manage one or more OFBiz "Store" including: creating new stores;

editing storewide settings such as the web page logo and the web page
store "title"; setting stores on websites so that they are visible via public
(or private) IP addresses; removing stores from websites; associating
inventory including physical inventory locations - called "Facilities"; setting
default locales; setting default currency and much more.
Create and configure goods and services ("Products") that may be

sold through any OFBiz store. Product configuration options include:
product type (physical product that may require inventory or
virtual/downloadable products); size, weight, depth, quantity (if multiple
parts are included), tax adjustments, shipping adjustments, description(s)
and graphical images.
Add, remove and expire products from display on the store by

managing "catalogs" and catalog "categories". Product catalogs provide
the structure necessary to group together and organize any number of
different products to met any business need. With the power and
versatility of OFBiz catalogs, store owners may have any combination of
product, catalog and store.
Configure and enforce enterprise wide pricing rules. OFBiz pricing

comes in two flavors: storewide "Promotional" pricing applied to the store's
shopping cart on a per User basis and per product pricing actions. Both
pricing actions are completely configurable and offer a wide range of
options and application.
Create and manage subscription services. The Catalog Manager

provides support for selling products through subscription based
distribution models.
And much more.

The Catalog Manager is an OFBiz application in its own right. Out-of-the-box

it is ready to run, with no further configuration or administrative support
necessary. In this part of the book we examine how to use the Catalog
Manager to perform some basic OFBiz eCommerce customization tasks.
If you would like to follow along with your own instance of OFBiz, access the
Catalog Manager "Main" page (shown in Figure 1.0) by typing the following
URL: http://localhost:8080/catalog into your browser's address bar.
The Catalog Manager is password protected. If you have not already logged
into another OFBiz tool or framework component, then you will be prompted
for the OFBiz Administrator's user name and password. Enter the following:
username: admin
password: ofbiz
Note:
Before we go any further, a word about OFBiz and data persistence. OFBiz
data is saved in a physical disk based database. Out-of-the-box, the
distribution comes bundled with the Apache Derby™ relational database. No
further administrative support is necessary to use the Derby database with the
demonstration data or any of the OFBiz applications. While it is not
recommended to go into production using this database, testing and
prototyping websites is made much easier because of this integration. For
more information on the OFBiz database environment, look for forthcoming
publications in this series at http://www.myofbiz.com or visit the OFBiz Wiki
main page: http://ofbiz.apache.org.
All store, product and catalog configuration settings made through the Catalog
Manager are automatically saved in this database. As a Catalog Manager
user, you need not be concerned about the underlying database, data
persistence or database interactions. OFBiz handles all that for you.

Quick Search Menu Selections OFBiz Application Navigation Links
Catalog Manager Navigation Links
Catalog Manager "WorkSpace". This section of

the web page's contents are dependent on the
current task the User is performing. The "Main"
view, shown here is the default screen when first
entering the Catalog Manager or when the User
returns via the "Main" navigation link.
Figure 1.0
Successful Invocation Displays The Catalog Manager's "Main" Web Page

2.0 Navigating the Catalog Manager User Interface

The Catalog Manager User Interface (UI) is web browser enabled. It consists
of a series of content dense web pages chock-full of HTML forms and web
site navigation buttons. Moving among the various parts of the Catalog
Manager is not intuitive. For the beginner, finding your way around may seem
an impossible task.
What follows is a quick discussion of the layout of the Catalog Manager UI:
The Catalog Manager has its own set of navigation links that run along the
top of the web page, just below a set of navigation links to other OFBiz
applications (See Figure 1.0). These links jump the user to primary functional
areas within the Catalog Manager application. Included are navigation links
to web page(s) for managing global OFBiz settings such as:
√ Product Features
√ Site and Product Promotions
√ Pricing Rules
√ Product Stores
√ Search Thesaurus
√ Product Reviews
√ Product Configurations [Configurations are products built from
components that are not other products.]
√ Subscriptions
√ Enterprise-wide Shipping
Below the Catalog Manager top navigation links, the web page is divided into
two columns: the left column contains search and quick jump navigation links
for specific products, catalogs and categories. The right column is a generic
work space dynamically filled with forms and/or content based on the
currently active top navigation link.

2.1 Quickly Find an Existing Product
Quick searches allow the User to move amongst the many Catalog Manager
web pages and functional areas with a minimum of keystrokes. To use the
keyword quick search feature to find an existing product enter all or part of the
product name as shown in Figure 2.1 below:
Enter keyword (all or part of the

search criteria) here and hit the
Find button
Select and bring up list of all products

that match "GIZ". See Figure 2.1.1 for
an example of the returned results.
"Lookup" icons provide

shortcuts to popup full page
search boxes.
Figure 2.1 Quick Product Search Form

Number of products returned with auto

Unique product identifier or pagination. [Note - the graphic has been
"ProductId" as given when the resized and does not show all 18
product is created. products.]
Partial list of products returned from the

keyword product search. Click on a
product name to bring up the Product
configuration page.
Figure 2.1.1 Return Product List From Keyword Search

2.2 Quickly Find an Existing Catalog or Category
From the left column of the Catalog Manager UI, you can quickly find and
bring up configuration forms for existing catalogs and categories. Figure 2.2
highlights some of the many ways in which to use the quick searches menu
options:
Table 2.2
 "Quick Searches"
Feature Key
Key Feature
 "Lookup" icons. When selected, a detailed
lookup form is presented allowing filtered
 lookups based on various category features.
Quickly list all available categories
independently of any catalog by hitting this
"lookup" icon and then selecting the Lookup
button.
  Jump to specific configuration forms by
selecting an option from this dropdown box. In
the absence of any other qualifying
information, selection of the "Product Jump"
option will bring up a form to create a new
product.
  Collapse or expand these menu options here
by select the "-"/"+" ("+" not shown).
 See all the categories for the selected catalog

at a glance by selecting the catalog's name in
 this box. The selection of this catalog link
also resets the contents of the "Browse
Categories box" #5 below.
 Select a "top" category for the currently
selected Catalog. Catalogs may have one or
more hierarchical groupings of categories.
Each grouping has a "top" or "parent"
 category. This "top" (a category that itself has
no parent) selection allows you to change the
parent category to another "top" category
within the current catalog revealing all children
Figure 2.2 for the selected "top" category.
Quick Searches  If there are any products in this category they
will be listed here with links to navigate
directly to the product configuration form.

3.0 OFBiz Stores

"Stores", often referred to as "Product Stores", are a convenient way of
grouping global or common commerce properties together based on business
requirements and/or business policies. Each OFBiz store has its own set of
storewide settings that include, but are not limited to:
Store Name. A store's name appears on the website header and other
contexts where human readable text is desired. For example on orders and
email correspondences. Store names may consist of up to 100 characters
and may include spaces and upper and lower case combinations.
Company Name. An OFBiz "Company" is an OFBiz User (called a "party")

that is the owner of this particular store. The "Company Name" appears on
invoices, orders, billing statements and other store related documents.
Title of the Store. A store may have a title (and a subtitle). These text strings
are used by the eCommerce application in a number of settings including the
webpage store header.
Web page(s) Style Sheets (CSS) and Header Logo. A store may have its
own logo and style sheet distinct from any other store defined for this instance
of OFBiz. If specified, this header logo and style sheet will override the
default settings.
Active Catalogs. Each OFBiz store may have one or more "active" catalogs
available for User browsing. Catalogs are organized collections of product
listings. "Active" catalogs are viewable by Users. "Inactive" catalogs may
exist, but are not visible to consumers.
User roles (called "Party" roles). Stores may have access controls applied to
them such that only certain authorized User's may browse or purchase from
the store. By default, all eCommerce store User's have a role of "Customer"
assigned to them when they start using the store's shopping cart during
checkout. There is no need to assign any other roles for the OFBiz
eCommerce store to work.
If you need to have other roles assigned to the store, that is authorize other
Users such as employees or sales agents to view and purchase from the
store's catalogs, the Catalog Manager supports the application of additional
roles on a store by store basis.
Shipping and shipment providers. The availability and user selection of

shipping providers such as UPS or FedX may be added or removed from a

store using the Catalog Manager. Shipping provider availability is set per
store.
Payment Methods. OFBiz supports a number of payment methods including

online credit card payments and offline methods such as cash, cash-on-
delivery (COD), check and store account. Each store may choose which
payment methods and payment providers to implement.
Order Fulfillment Procedures and Order Status. The order fulfillment

process, including payment authorization, may be configured to meet your
business needs using the Catalog Manager.
Event Notifications. Each store may choose to send notifications (emails)

when certain events occur. Using the Catalog Manager notifications may
turned on or off and configured with source, destination, subject line and
content.
Product & Store Promotions. OFBiz stores may have any number of
"promotions" or store based "Special Offers" associated with it. Store
promotions may be set on products, categories or products or on entire
catalogs.
Shopping Cart Behaviors. The shopping cart may be set for each store, to
always be displayed after an item is added to it, or to only be displayed when
the View Cart link is selected.
Default locale. OFBiz has been Internationalized and localized. It supports a

number of different translations out-of-the-box. You may change the default
locale setting from United States to any locale of your choosing on a per store
basis. Setting the default locale does not effect the User's ability to select a
preferred language using the "Language" drop down selection box.
Default currency. Each store may have a default currency set. Without any
modifications, the default currency setting is the US dollar.
Tax Calculations. Applying tax to an order may be set depending on the

target audience. Tax configuration options include allowing tax exempt
purchases; showing/hiding VAT tax (where appropriate); and setting VAT tax
geographical identifiers.
And Much More.
An OFBiz instance may have any number of stores defined. Out-of-the-box,

OFBiz demonstrates the configuration of three stores: the "OFBiz E-

Commerce Store", the "OFBiz Physical Retail Store" and the "Open Travel
system [sic] Demo Site". By default, the "OFBiz E-Commerce Store" is the
store you see when you first browse to the OFBiz eCommerce website
(http://localhost:8080/ecommerce).
If you are wondering how these demo stores came into existence (perhaps
you are thinking they are "hardwired" into the code), then read on: The three
available stores are derived from "seed" data provided with the distribution.
As with most of the other data encountered out-of-the-box, seed data,
(provided by the project as part of the download distribution), is loaded and
persisted with the embedded OFBiz database and then accessed by the
various OFBiz applications as needed.
If you download a "nightly build" version of OFBiz, you are downloading the
source code as well as the seed data already stored in the database. That is,
someone else already ran the utilities that load predefined data into the
database and then zipped up the entire directory contents for our
convenience. If you download from source, then part of the build process is to
run the scripts that load seed and other data into the database.
In the following sections, we shall discuss using the Catalog Manager to:
 List Stores
 Set Stores On Website
 Create new Stores
 Configure Store Settings

3.1 List Available Stores
Note:
OFBiz supports both virtual and physical stores. Virtual stores conduct all
business on the Web and are supported by the OFBiz eCommerce
application. An OFBiz store may also be real and include one or more physical
locations each with point-of-sale, cash registers or other payment capture
devices. The focus of this book is the OFBiz virtual e-commerce store.
An OFBiz instance may host an unlimited number of OFBiz real and virtual
stores. Why have more than one store per OFBiz instance? If you have one
set of products but many web distribution channels, maybe several Internet
domains or different websites targeted at specific audiences, then you may
want many OFBiz stores. Each OFBiz store may have its own name, look
and feel, payment methods and even its own sales promotions.
To view a list stores available out-of-the-box as part of the demonstration data

provided:
 From the Catalog Manager "Main" Page Select the Stores tab
This will bring up the "Product Store List": a table with one row for each
configured OFBiz store as shown in Figure 3.1
"Store Name" is a clickable navigation link

to the store settings web page for this You may also edit a store's
store. settings by selecting this link.
Figure 3.1 Product Store List
From the "Product Store List" you can easily navigate to an individual store's
settings by either selecting the Edit button or clicking on the store's name.

3.2 Setting Stores On Websites
In the world of OFBiz eCommerce, Users browse the Web and, with a little
bit of luck, land on a website hosting an OFBiz store. An OFBiz "website"
links an OFBiz store to a real life web application7 and address on the Web.
This web address is known as a Uniform Resource Locator(URL)). Out-of-
the-box, "localhost:8080/ecommerce" is the URL (and web application) used
by the OFBiz eCommerce store. When OFBiz is deployed in a production
environment, the localhost portion of the URL is replaced with the domain
name of the server on which OFBiz is running.
Just as single instance of OFBiz may have any number of stores, a single
OFBiz store may point to or be "set" on any number of different websites.
There is no limit to the number of unique websites an OFBiz store may be set
onto.
Note:
If your business rules call for multiple stores on multiple websites, where each
store has different product catalogs and order fulfillment policies such as
payment options and shipping, then OFBiz supports that configuration as well.
Read on to find out how this works.
To set a store on a website, select the store from the "Product Store List" (see
Figure 3.1) to display the store's primary configuration web page. From the
store's configuration page:
 Select the Web Sites navigation tab.

 Select the destination website from those in the dropdown menu.
 Hit the Update button to submit your change.
If there was already a store on this website, you will need to remove that store
before another store may be set there. To remove a store from a website:
 Navigating to that store's primary configuration page.

 Selecting the WebSites tab.
 Selecting the Delete button.
7
Web application per Java Servlet web.xml deployment descriptor. OFBiz may have any number
of web applications each with its own web.xml deployment descriptor.

Once the old store is removed and the new store set onto the desired
website, the new store is ready to browse. No need to restart OFBiz or any
part of the OFBiz server.
Figure 3.2 demonstrates the effect of setting the "Open Travel system Demo
Site" onto the default (out-of-the-box demo store) website
(http://localhost:8080/ecommerce). Before setting the "Open Travel system
Demo Site" onto this website, the "OFBiz eCommerce Store" is installed
there. You can see from Figure 3.2 that after changing the website setting,
the URL http://localhost:8080/ecommerce now displays the "Open Travel
system Demo Site" logo and title, but retains the same default product catalog
as the "OFBiz eCommerce Store". This is an example of multiple stores
sharing the same catalogs and products.1
1
For those purists out there that caught this: the "Open Travel" website should really be showing
the "Open Travel" product catalog - of which there is a single rental catalog provided with the
demonstration data, and not the default eCommerce store's "Demo Catalog", after we make the
website switch. The author believes there is a bug in this version of OFBiz.

URL/Website before moving the "Open Travel" store

from the "Cloned eCommerce Web Site"
[http://localhost:8080/ecomclone]
Choose from the available websites

by selecting from this drop down
box. "eCommerce Web Site" is
"http://localhost:8080/ecommerce
Hit the Update button to make
change
After: same URL, new store

header.
Figure 3.2
Before and After Setting the "Open Travel system Demo" Store
on the
"http://localhost:8080/ecommerce WebSite"

3.3 Basic Store Settings
To view or change an existing store's configuration settings, select the store

from the "Product Store List" to bring up the HTML form used to manage
basic configuration settings as shown in Figure 3.3.a.
Navigation tabs to all the settings related to configuring the currently displayed
store. Current store in the workspace is "OFBiz E-Commerce Store".





 
Figure 3.3.a OFBiz Store Configuration Form, Part 1

Table 3.3.a "OFBiz Store Configuration Form Part 1"

Features Settings Key
 "Store Name" uniquely identifies the store within the OFBiz instance and database. This
is an opportunity to give a human readable name to the store as it already has a unique
database identifier associated with it. "Store Name" is used in places, such as the list of
product stores, where a textual name is preferred. This setting may be changed at any
time.
 "Company Name" is used in several places outside of the eCommerce Application and
Catalog Manager to uniquely describe the Company or OFBiz "Party" owning the store.
For example, for automatic email notifications, the "Company Name" as it appears here,
is used. This setting may be changed at any time.
 "Title". The store's "Title" is used on the website web page as part of the header.
 "Sub-Title". The store's "Sub-Title" is used on the website web page as part of the
header.
 "Pay to Party Id" is used by the OFBiz Accounting Application to identify and provide
contact information about the store owner for such business functions as accounts
payable, accounts receivable and general correspondences. Changing the default entry
from "Company", is accomplished using the OFBiz Party Application and is beyond the
scope of this document.
 "View Cart on Add" & "Auto Save Cart". These settings control the initial shopping cart
behavior for this store. "View Cart on Add" set to "y" will always show the full shopping
cart contents after the user adds and item to the cart. The User will then need to navigate
back to the storefront to continue browsing the store, or continue with checkout.
 "Auto Approve Reviews". "Auto Approve Reviews" sets the default behavior for the
OFBiz product review feature. OFBiz supports product reviews per product, but the
approval of review and subsequent display of review content on the "Product Detail"
page may be controlled using this setting. Setting this to "N" will require a User to login
and approve a review before it is visible on the website.
 Various inventory settings. Used by the OFBiz Facility Application to manage inventory
for the store.
 "Check Inventory" will force the eCommerce Application to check the status of
available inventory in the inventory facility defined under "Inventory Facility Id". To
change inventory facilities, use the OFBiz Facilities Application.
 "Require Inventory" set to "Y" will alert the consumer that an item is out of stock if the
number of items in stock (for this product) goes below 0. Note: This is a store-wide
setting and not based on the availability of any one product.
 "Order Number Prefix". Used by OFBiz to generate unique Order identifiers as seen by
the Users on the "Order Confirmation" page and "Order History" web pages.

Moving down the configuration form, more settings are displayed.





Figure 3.3.b OFBiz Store Configuration Form, continued.

Table 3.3.b
"OFBiz Store Configuration Form, continued" Features/Settings Key
 "Retry Failed Authorizations". If an inline authorization is attempted, for example, real
time attempts at credit card authorizations, and it fails, this setting tells OFBiz to make up
to three repeated tries.
 Various "Status" labels used by the OFBiz Order Application to indicate the status of
Order items as they pass through the fulfillment process.
 The content of various messages or notifications specifically for failed payment

authorization. This is what the User sees when there are problems with the payment
authorization process.
 "Style Sheet". This is the CSS (style sheet) used to by this store when building web
views. The file used may be changed here at anytime. Additionally, the style sheet itself
may be edited - using a text editor of choice. Editing OFBiz CSS is beyond the scope of
this book.
Note: /images is the URL used by OFBiz to find CSS, images, Javascript and other files
served directly by the embedded Web Server. This URL translates to a hard drive (disk)
location relative to the OFBiz install directory followed by:
/framework/images/webapp/images
 "Header Logo". This is the location (relative to the URL /images) of the store logo used
on the store's header web page. This may be changed. The file may be replaced with a
logo of your choice or you may change the file pointed to here.
 "Use Primary Email Username". If set to "Y", the User's primary email address will
automatically be inserted in the username request form and used as the User's login
username. If set to "N", the User will be asked for a unique username for login purposes.
 "Require Customer Role" . This indicator is used by the OFBiz Order Entry Application
to determine if a User is permitted access to this store's products. OFBiz Order Entry
Users will be required to login to the Order Entry application where roles will assigned. If
they have a role of "Customer" and this is set to "Y", then they will be allowed to
purchase products from this store. If this is set to "No" then they will not be allowed to
view or purchase from this store. [Note that roles are assigned using the OFBiz Party
Manager Application.] This setting may be useful if you have "buyers" or other third
party User's who you want to restrict to viewing certain stores.
Note: a Web based consumer is automatically given a role of "Customer" when they
process through the eCommerce Application's checkout process.
 Various tax settings. Set here if you are required to collect VAT tax.




Figure 3.3.c OFBiz Store Configuration Form, continued.
Table 3.3.c
"OFBiz Store Configuration Form, continued" Features/Settings
 "Vat Tax Auth Geo Id"/"Vat Tax Auth Party Id". Used to configure VAT tax for this store.
By default, VAT tax is not collected for store orders. To configure and use the OFBiz
VAT tax system with this store: create a taxing authority using the OFBiz Accounting
application and assign the correct "Geo Id" for this store and taxing authority here.
 "Enable Digital Product Upload".
 Various automatic retry settings for credit card payments.
 Settings to automatically approve or require manual approval of invoices and orders. Set
to "Y" will automatically approve invoices and orders. "N" requires a privileged User to
login to the OFBiz Order Entry application and manually approve.
 Link to configure associated inventory/warehouse facility. Inventory and warehouse
facilities are managed using the OFBiz Facilities Manager application. This is a link to
that application.
 Update is the submit button for store configuration form.

3.4 Creating a New OFBiz Store
To create a new OFBiz store:
 Navigate to the "Product Store List" web page (See Figure 3.1).
 Select the Create New Product Store button as shown below in Figure 3.4:
Select this link to bring up a new store

configuration form.
You only need to enter in

the "Store Name" to create
a new store.
"Product Store List" after

hitting the Update button.
Figure 3.4
Creating a New Product Store

3.5 Stores and Payment
OFBiz supports many different methods of payment. The methods chosen for
a particular store will dictate the options available to the User at checkout.
Using the Catalog Manager, each OFBiz store may be configured to support
any or all of the following payment methods:
Payment Type Default Notes

Behavior8
Billing Account Offline A "Billing Account" is a local payment account which may
be charged for payment. This account must already be
established. Billing accounts are managed using the
OFBiz Accounting application.
Cash Offline Payment is does not effect order creation or shipment of
the product. Note however that the default store setup
requires payment reconciliation before an order is
considered complete.
Cash On Delivery Offline Payment is does not effect order creation or shipment of
Credit Card Online Requires the configuration of a number of OFBiz services
including services to:
Authorize Payment
Capture Payment
Re-authorize Payment
Support Refunds
Release Authorization
Please refer to the OFBiz Wiki for more information.
Electronic Funds Offline EFT are account to account transfers that are typically
Transfer (EFT) initiated manually. Please refer to the OFBiz Wiki for more
information.
Gift Card Online Support for local store gift cards with automatic payment
reconciliation and ValueLink gift cards is provided.
ValueLink requires further configuration. Please refer to
the OFBiz Wiki for more information.
Offline Payment Offline Payment is does not effect order creation or shipment of
PayPal Online/Offline Please refer to the OFBiz Wiki for more information.
WorldPay Online Please refer to the OFBiz Wiki for more information.
8
Each payment option has a default out-of-the-box behavior. Behaviors fall into two general
categories: online payments, reconciled while the user is checking out using online, automated
processes and offline methods which allow for payment at some future date. Online options
require further configuration as noted. Offline payments allow for order creation and shipment, but
require payment reconciliation before an order is considered "complete".

3.5.1 Listing, Add, Remove Store Payment Methods
To list existing payment methods for a store:
 Select the desired store from the "Product Store List" (Figure 3.1)
 Select the Payments tab from the Store's top navigation menu
This brings up the "Product Store Payment Settings" page as shown in

Figure 3.5.1 listing all the payment options applied to the selected store.
    
Figure 3.5.1
Payment Settings for the "OFBiz E-Commerce Store"

Table 3.5.1
"Payment Settings for the OFBiz E-Commerce Store" Features Key
 "Payment Method Type." Type of payment method supported for this
store.
 "Service Type". A list of services, if appropriate, required to implement the
payment method. For example, credit card payments require a number of
services to implement the various processes involved in satisfying a credit
card payment.
"Service Name". The name of the OFBiz service, if required, that
implements this processing function.
 "Payment Props". Default is "Global".
 To remove a payment option from the store, click on the Delete button for
the payment option you wish to remove. Once this setting is removed, it
will no longer be available during checkout as a payment option.
Note: removing the setting from the store does not remove this payment
type from the OFBiz system.
 Select the Edit button to edit this payment method and bring up this
payment method's configuration in the box below.
 Create / Update
If previous User action was the Edit button the Update button will be
displayed. Selecting Update submits this form for processing.
To add another payment method to the store, select:

"Payment Method Type" from the available types in the drop down
select box
"Service Type" from the available types in the drop down select box
Hit the Create button to add the selected type to the store.

3.6 Store Shipping Services
Similar to payment methods, shipping providers and shipping services are

configured globally for the entire OFBiz instance and then applied to a store
as desired.
To view a list of the existing Shipping services available for all OFBiz stores:
 Navigate to the Catalog Manager "Main" web page and select the
Shipping tab
 Select the Carrier Shipment Methods tab
This will bring up the "Carrier Shipment Methods" list as shown in Figure
3.6:
  
Figure 3.6
List of Shipping Methods Configured per OFBiz Instance

Table 3.6
"List of Shipping Methods Configured per OFBiz Instance" Features Key
Key Feature
 "Method Type". One line for each method type configured per this
instance of OFBiz. Method types are preset. Adding a service provider to
one of these preexisting types may be accomplished by using the Submit
button below.
 Select this Edit button to edit the existing entry. Selection of this button
will pre-populate the bottom half of this screen. See 
 Selection of the Remove button will remove this method from this instance
of OFBiz. Once removed, it will no longer be available to add to any of the
store's configured for this instance.
 Edit/Add Form. This form will be pre-populated with a shipping method if
the Edit button has been selected. Otherwise, default values will be
inserted. The following table describes the fields used for this form.
Field Notes
Shipment Predefined values. Select the appropriate method from
Method Type the drop down list
ID
Party Id The name of the shipping provider or carrier. For
example Fed-X. Shipping provider Party Ids must
already exist. Use the "Lookup Icon" to search for
existing parties. [Many are already preconfigured with
OFBiz]. To add a new party you must use the OFBiz
Party Manager Application.
Role Type Id Defaults to carrier. For the OFBiz eCommerce store, all
shipping providers will have a role of "carrier".
Sequence This is the order in which all methods will be listed for
Number the User.
Carrier For existing carriers, this is preset. Changing these is
Service Code beyond the scope of this document.

3.6.1 To List/Add/Remove Shipping Methods Per Store
A single web page is used to view a list of shipping methods that have been
applied to a given OFBiz store and to add or remove a method. To bring up
the list of shipping methods per an OFBiz store:
 Select the Shipping tab from the top level store navigation bar
This will bring up the "Product Store Shipment Settings" as shown in

Figure 3.6.1 below:
  
Figure 3.6.1
Shipping Providers Available for the "OFBiz E-Commerce Store"

Table 3.6.1
"Shipping Providers Available for the OFBiz E-Commerce Store"
Feature Key
Key Feature
 OFBiz Store for which this list applies. This list shows all the shipping
methods that are available for the buyer to choose from when checking
out. If you don't want the buyer to choose a method, remove all methods
from the store.
 "Method" of shipment.
 Other information about the method and service provider. This information
is configured for the OFBiz instance and not on each individual store. See
section 10.6 for more information.
 Remove button removes this method from the store. It does not remove
the instance from OFBiz. You may add this method back at any time.
 Add button to add another, preconfigured, shipping provider to this store.

3.7 Setting Shipping Estimates
Shipping estimates are used to provide an approximate cost for shipping of

store products. These estimates are provided to the virtual store when a User
is in the process of checking out, before they make the shipping method
selection, so that they may better determine shipping option(s).
To see a list of the preconfigured shipping estimates as delivered with OFBiz

out-of-the-box:
 Select the Shipping Estimates tab from the top navigation links
This will bring up the "Product Store Shipment Settings" screen with a table
containing each configured cost estimate cross referenced with the shipping
method and actual carrier that the cost estimate is valid for and the specific
conditions that make up the estimate's calculation parameters. Please refer to
Figure 3.7 below for more information:
Figure 3.7 Shipping Estimates Matrix for the "OFBiz E-Commerce Store"
Details concerning how to derive new shipping estimates are beyond the
scope of this book.

3.8 Notifications (Emails)
OFBiz has been described as having an "event" driven framework. Events

are points within the processing logic, that when invoked (executed), trigger
an action. There are a number of built-in events within the OFBiz
eCommerce application that when triggered - usually by a User performing
an action such as clicking on a navigation link - automatically send
notifications in the form of email. The Catalog Manager provides an interface
to allow the configuration of email notification behavior. The following events,
if configured for a store, will trigger the sending of emails:
Table 3.8 Available Email Triggering Events

Events That May How Event is Invoked Notes
Be Used to Send
Notifications
User Registration User successfully By default, Users are not
completes the OFBiz required to register with the
registration forms store website in order to
(receives a unique browse or purchase products.
Username & password) User's who choose to register
and has been added as an and have completed the
OFBiz User. registration process are sent
an email notifying them of
successful registration.
Order Store has processed the Store sends the confirmation
Confirmation order and it is ready for email after the order has been
shipment (if applicable.) successfully processed.
Successful processing
depends on how the store is
configured.
Order Complete This is automatically sent
by the store if automatic
order approvals have
been set in the
configuration. Otherwise,
the OFBiz Order
Application will initiate
the event when the status
for an order is set to
"Complete".
Order Placed on OFBIz Order Application
Back-order
Order has been
Changed

Payment Retry Store Sent when payment

authorization fails
Return accepted OFBiz Order Application
Return complete OFBiz Order Application
Return Cancelled OFBiz Order
Application
User Password OFBiz framework
Request
Tell-a-Friend Store
Request
Gift Card Store
Purchase
Gift Card Reload Store
Quote OFBiz Order Application
Confirmation
To add or remove any of the email notifications discussed in Table 3.8:
 Select the Emails tab
This will bring up the "Product Store Email Settings" web page as shown in
Figure 3.8.1:

    




Figure 3.8.1
Product Store Email Settings Page

Table 3.8.1
"Product Store Email Settings Page"
Feature Key
Key Feature
 List of existing email notifications for this OFBiz store. Each listed
notification has a "Type" that defines the event triggering the notification.
 Each notification may specify a screen location for the body of the email (if
the email is being generated from a web screen) and a screen location for
any applicable attachments (if appropriate); from address; carbon copy
address (cc); blank carbon copy address (bcc); and subject that will
override the default subject for the event. Note that multiple address may
be entered by separating each address with a comma.
 Each notification may have its own subject as it appears on the "subject"
line of the email.
 Select of the Update button will update the notification's configuration.
 Select the Delete button to remove this notification. Removing the

notification may be reversed by adding it back. See  below.
 To add a notification back to a store, select its type from the drop down
select box as shown.
 Add email addresses as needed.
 Add subject content.
 Hit the Add button [The Add button is hidden in this screen shot by the
Email Type drop down list]

3.9 Store Surveys

Surveys are used to interactively collect information from website visitors.
There are several examples surveys on the demo store provided out-of-the-
box. These range in sophistication from the single response "Mouse Hand
Poll" found on the website landing page, to product survey questionnaire
found at checkout and customer satisfaction surveys found
Support for survey creation, publication and viewing of responses is part of

the OFBiz Content Manager Application and beyond the scope of this
document. From within the Catalog Manager, you may only add or remove
an existing survey from a store. To view a list of surveys per store or to add or
remove a survey from a store:
 Select the Surveys tab
This will bring up the "Store Survey Settings" web page as shown in Figure
3.9.



 



Figure 3.9 Store Survey Settings for Demo OFBiz E-Commerce Store

Table 3.9
"Store Survey Settings for Demo OFBiz E-Commece Store" Feature Key
Key Feature
 List of existing surveys for this store. One line for each survey associated
with this store.
 Link to remove this survey from this store.
 Start of the form to add a new survey to this store.

"Type". Survey types include:
Type Usage within eCommerce Store Website
"Add-To Cart" Product added to cart.
"Check-Out" As User process through checkout.
"Customer Profile" User accesses profile web page(s).
"General Poll" Main web store landing page.
"Purchase Order Item When item purchased using purchase order.
Placement"
"Purchase Order When entire purchase order is placed.
Placement"
"Random Poll" Main web store landing page.
"Sales Order Placement" When order placed through sales order placement.
 "Surveys". A dropdown list of available surveys to place on the store. Note

that a store may have many surveys and many of the same survey
associated with it. Out-of-the-box available surveys include:
"Account Activiation"
"Gift Card Purchase Information"
"Gift Card Reload Information"
"Tell us about your on-line shopping patterns"
"Tell us where the mini-poll should go"
"Your mouse hand is"
 "Product ID". If you want this survey to be associated with a product and
not the entire store, enter the product ID here.
"Category ID". If you want this survey to be associated with a specific
category and all the products in that category and not the entire store
enter the category ID here.
 "From Date" "Thru Date". Select start and end dates and times for this
survey to be visible on this store's website.
 "Sequence Num". I there is more than one survey for this store, set the
desired sequence number viewing.
 Add a new survey to the store.

4.0 Products
"Products" are the goods and services bought and sold on the OFBiz
eCommerce virtual storefront. Managing the configuration of products is
accomplished using the OFBiz Catalog Manager application. Through the
Catalog Manager, the User may:
√ List Existing Products. There are many examples of all sorts of different
product configurations provided out-of-the-box. An OFBiz instance may
have an unlimited number of products configured. Use the Catalog
Manager to list all products or a subsets of products.
√ Create New Products. Use the Catalog Manager to create new products
either by duplicating existing product definitions, creating "virtual" products
from existing product "variants" or by completing the product configuration
form as described below.
√ Edit Existing Product Definitions. Product definitions run the full range
of complexity. Simple product definitions that start life with just a unique
product identifier and name, may require reconsideration over time. Use
the Catalog Manager to first create a new product and then change or
add product properties as needed.
√ Make a Product a "Virtual" Product. "Virtual" products don't exist as real

objects. They are instead like templates for other products, called "variant"
products. Variant products are made from variations using the virtual
product template. For example, if you wish to offer pizzas for sale, you
could configure a virtual product called "pizza" and then create numerous
variants such as a: "small pizza"; "medium pizza"; "large pizza" and an
"uber pizza".
The advantage of creating variants from the original "pizza" product is that
on the website, the User will see a single "pizza" product listing and an
option to select the desired variant. Otherwise, the User would see
separate listings for a: "small pizza"; "medium pizza" etc.
Note:
Virtual products cannot be added to the shopping cart or an order. Only the
User selected variant can be added.
Any existing product may be made a virtual product (and each virtual
product may have an unlimited number of real, physical "variants") using

the Catalog Manager. [Examples of virtual products that are part of the
demo store include product IDs: GZ-1006, WG-9943 and GC-001.]
√ Adding "Features" to Products. OFBiz "features" are those product

characteristics used to differentiate amongst similar product and product
variants. Examples of features include: "Color", "Size", "Fabric" or "Model
Year". Features may be organized into categories and groups. Use the
Catalog Manager to add or remove features from categories and groups
and to add or remove features from specific products.
√ Add Pricing to Products. Products may exist without any pricing

associations. Use the Catalog Manager to add or removing pricing rules
for individual products.
√ Offer Products for Sale on OFBiz Stores. Products are made viewable
on OFBiz stores by associating them with one or more OFBiz catalog.
Use the Catalog Manager to add existing products to catalogs to make
them browsable.
√ Managing Product Suppliers. Each OFBiz product may have one or

more suppliers. The Catalog Manager provides some supplier
management functions.
√ And Much More.

4.1 Listing Products
An OFBiz instance may have many hundreds or even thousands of products

defined. Some products may be expired and no longer available for sale but
still under support contracts or warranty, while other products may be listed in
many different catalogs and available on many different OFBiz stores. To list
all products for a given OFBiz instance:
 From the Catalog Manager Main web page select the "lookup" icon as
indicated in Figure 4.1 below:
Product lookup icon. Select

this to bring up a full screen
product search page as
shown in Figure 4.1.1.
Figure 4.1 Location of the Product Lookup Icon
To lookup and return all

products know to this instance
of OFBiz, select the Lookup
button to bring up a list as
shown in Figure 4.1.2.
Figure 4.1.1 Product Lookup Search Form

Figure 4.1.2 Results From a Product Lookup Request

4.2 Creating a New Product
OFBiz products are uniquely identified by a "Product ID" assigned to the

product when it is created. Beyond this unique identifier, OFBiz does not
require any other information to create a new product. Products may be
created and exist without ever being associated with an OFBiz store and/or
an OFBiz catalog. Similarly products may exist and be part of many catalogs
but never be associated with a store. To create a new product:
 From the Catalog Manager "Catalog Administration Main Page" web

page select the Create New Product button as shown in Figure 4.2:
Select the Create New Product button to

bring up the basic "Product Configuration"
form seen in Figure 4.2.1
Figure 4.2
Creating a New Product From Link on Catalog Manager Main Page

The only field required to create a

new product is the "Internal
Name". Without "Internal Name"
Product ID may be left blank. If left the create operation from this form,
empty, OFBiz will automatically assign a will fail.
unique value to this product.
To create a new product, submit

this Form by selecting the Create
Product button
Figure 4.2.1
New "Product Configuration" Form

Product ID was automatically created and assign

for this product.
You may now update your

product if desired or come
back later and edit this
product's configuration.
Figure 4.2.2
Successful Return After Submitting
"Create Product"

4.3 Changing Basic Product Settings
Product definitions consist of those properties that are added/removed to/from

a product's configuration using the "Product Configuration Form" as shown in
Figure 4.3. and those features added/removed to/from a product through
association with other OFBiz entities (for example, pricing.)
In this section we shall look at just a few of the many product properties that
may be edited using the "Product Configuration Form". To edit an existing
product's configuration, first find the product using the "Search Products"
menu selections [Please see Chapter 2.0 "Navigating the Catalog Manager
User Interface" for help in finding a product].
Once you have the "Product Configuration" Form in view, you may change
any of the fields as desired and then update the product by selecting the
Update button.
Figure 4.3
Example "Product Configuration" Form

While there are many product properties that may be set here, in the real
world, only a few are relevant to the eCommerce application. These include,
but are not limited to:
Table 4.3 Product Configuration Form Field Values/Usage

Product Property Usage
Name [Note: Unless other wise stated, all fields are optional or default values are
provided]
"Is VIRTUAL" Indicator
"Is VARIANT" Indicator
"Product Type" Required and defaults to "Finished Good". Used by OFBiz to determine
appropriate handling for various uses. For example, a "Digital Good" by
default does not require shipping. If the product is a "Digital Good", then the
buyer will not be presented with shipping options. Possible choices for this
field:
Product Type
Fixed Asset Usage
Service
Good
Raw Material
Subassembly
Finished Good
Digital Good
Finished/Digital Good
"Primary Category" Assign this product to a primary category if desired.
"Internal Name" Required. Name the product is known as. This is the name as seen on web
store product page(s).
"Brand Name" Marketing name for the product.
"Introduction Date" First date/time the product will appear for sale.
"Sales Last date/time the product will appear for sale.
discontinuation thru
Date"
"Support Date" Last date/time product will be supported. Useful if warranties or returns are
applicable to this product.
"Disc. When Inv. Not Indictor. If set to "Y", the store will offer a discount for waiting until inventory
Avail" is available.
"Require Inventory" Indicator. Defaults to catalog setting/"Require Inventory" setting. To override
catalog setting for this product only: set to "Y" to make the product "invisible"
to browsers when no inventory is available.
"Inventory Message" Set a message such as "This product is out of stock" when no inventory is
available.
"Returnable" Indicator as to whether this product may be returned.
"Charge Shipping" Set to "Y" if shipping should be charged for this product regardless of
product type. Note: Promotional pricing rules may override this setting.

4.4 Product Descriptive Text
Products may have descriptive text such as a "short description" and "long
description" as part of the product's basic settings. These product properties
may be easily modified using the Catalog Manager. To change product
descriptive content:
 First, navigate to the desired product's configuration page (See Chapter

2.0 for hints on finding products.)
 Select the Content tab
For simple content edits such as the short description found on the product
listing page or the longer description found on the product detail page, scroll
down to the "Override Simple Fields" portion of the screen and enter edits as
desired. Figure 4.4 demonstrates the before and after effects of simple
content edits as described here.

Product Listing As Seen on Web Store for "Open Gizmo" Before Simple
Content Edits
Product Listing As Seen on Web Store for "Open Gizmo" After Simple
Content Edits





Use "Override Simple Fields" to Edit Basic Product Descriptive Text
Figure 4.4 Before and After Simple Product Content Edits

Table 4.4
"Before and After Simple Product Content Edit" Feature Key
KEY Feature Description
 "Product Description". A short (up to 255 characters) description of
product. This text appears as part of the product's description within the
category listing.
 "Long Description". Appears on the product detail listing.
 Each product may have a small, medium, large and detailed graphical image
associated with it.
Image Usage
Small Category listing web page.
Medium N/A
Large Detail product web page.
Detail N/A
Field entries are URLs indicating where to find these images relative to the default
OFBiz image location.
For easy uploading of images (without the worry of knowing where the default OFBiz
image location is) use the "Upload Image" feature. The "Upload Image" feature is a
three step process to allow easy uploading and placement of product images. To
upload images:
 Use the Browse button to find the images on your local hard drive
 Select the image usage from the radio buttons provided
 Select the Upload Image button
This should place the image in the proper directory for use by the Catalog Manager.
 Update button to submit changes.
 "Detail Screen". Pointer to the Freemarker HTML template used to

render the detail product web page. For more information about the
Freemarker HTML templating system used by OFBiz see
http://www.freemarker.org

4.5 Product Pricing
To support the most flexible pricing model possible, OFBiz product pricing
consists of two parts: a "price" and one or more rules that define how the
price is applied to the product. These rules are called "pricing rules".
Because pricing rules are global to the OFBiz instance and not tied to
individual products or stores, they are discussed in more detail in Chapter 5.
OFBiz "prices" are more than just numeric values statically assigned to
products. Prices have features such as: "type", "purpose", default currency,
effective date ranges and a few other characteristics, used by the
eCommerce application to determine appropriate application of pricing
information. Table 4.5 describes the available "Price Types" and how they are
used by the eCommerce application to arrive at a final price for a product.
Table 4.5 Product Price Type Usage

Product Price Types How Used by eCommerce Application
Default Price Used by the eCommerce store application when no pricing
rules are applicable. The "Default Price" is the only price
value not subject to any price rules.
Average Cost May be used in conjunction with pricing rules to determine a
product's sale price.
Competitive Price May be used in conjunction with pricing rules to determine a
List Price An indicator that price rules exist for this product. If a "List
Price" exists, the eCommerce application will run through all
the price rules for this product.
Maximum Price If defined, the price will never exceed this value. Will override
the "Default Price" if the value is larger than the that of the
"Default Price". Provides a failsafe maximum price if pricing
rules are in effect for this product.
Minimum Price If defined, the price value will never fall below this value. Will
override the "Default Price" if value is less than default price.
Provides a failsafe minimum price if pricing rules are in effect
for this product.
Promotional Price May be used in conjunction with pricing rules to determine a
Special Promotional Price Used with price rules to determine a final "On Sale" price. For
an example of how this works, see Product ID GZ-2644
("Round Gizmo")
Wholesale Price May be used in conjunction with pricing rules to determine a

Figure 4.5.1 shows the "Demo Catalog" product listing entry for the "Round
Gizmo". Round Gizmo is one of several products within the "Featured
Products" category of the "Demo Catalog". All products in this category have
an "On Sale" price in addition to a "List Price".
Figure 4.5.1 "Round Gizmo" Category Product Listing w/ "Sale Price"
How do these prices find there way to the catalog's product listing entry? By
associating specific price types (as discussed above) and values to the
product. Using the Catalog Manager, you associate one or more price
"types" (see Table 4.5) to each product you want priced. To associate prices
with a product, select the Prices navigation tab from the top navigation links
on the product's configuration form. This will bring up a "Prices" configuration
form, as shown in Figure 4.5.2, for this product.
   
 


Figure 4.5.2 Product Pricing for "Round Gizmo"

Table 4.5.2
"Product Pricing for Round Gizmo" Feature Key
Key Feature Descriptions
 "Price Type". If you only want a single price to show up on the product
listing, assign only a "Default Price" to this product. Remove any other
prices types if they appear here. The value entered in the "Price" field
will be the price as displayed in the catalog's product listing.
 "Purpose". Select "Purchase/Initial" (default purpose) for this price to
show up on the product listing.
 "Thru Date". Last date/time that this price will be available and used.
Price expires on this date. No value indicates that this price will be valid
forever or until removed from the product or updated,
 Numeric value for price. This is the value that will be used in pricing
rules calculations if appropriate or as the offer price on the web store.
 "Product Store Group". Prices may vary between product store groups.
If they do, then limit this price to a product store group here.
 "TermUomId". Not often used. If listing of this price requires additional

unit of measure information (UOM), that UOM would be indicated here.
For example, if the price is based on a recurring monthly charge, then
the TermUomId may be set to: "Time/Frequency Time in Months"
 Use this portion of the "Price List" to add a new price to this product.
Complete fields as required and hit the Create button.
Certain combinations of "Price Types" trigger global price rules. For example,
using the "Demo Catalog" as distributed with the OFBiz download, all
products with a "List Price" associated with them and that are in the "Featured
Products" category are automatically subject to a global pricing rule. This rule
is used to derive the "Sale Price" shown.
The specific price rule that derives the sale price shown, is described in
Figure 4.5.3. This rule says that the any product in the "Product Category" of
"PROMOTIONS" [which the "Round Gizmo" is] will have a "Sale Price" of
20% off the "List Price". For more information on how global pricing works,
please see Chapter 5.

Figure 4.5.3
The Global Price Rule Used to Derive "Round Gizmo's" Sale Price

4.6 Product Features
OFBiz product "Features" are predefined properties that may be added to a

product to further delineate a product's nature and use. Examples of features
that may be added to a product include: "amount", "color", "size", "license",
"style" and "warranty".
Features are managed for an entire OFBiz instance and then applied to
products or other OFBiz objects as needed. To view predefined available
features, select the Features tab from the Catalog Manager top navigation
links to bring up a "Features" management screen as shown in Figure 4.6.a
below:
Figure 4.6.b
Feature Categories Configuration
Page
Figure 4.6.a Predefined Feature Types

Features may be grouped together into "Groups" or "Feature Category[s]".

Feature categories are used by the eCommerce application to build User
selectable drop down boxes for product variations as shown in Figure 4.6.1.

4.6.1 Using Product Features
The eCommerce store uses product features to make variant products from a
single virtual product. The virtual product is listed in one or more catalogs for
the demo store and the available variations are presented to the User as
selectable options. Figure 4.6.1 demonstrates the use of product features to
build a user selectable product variation from a single "virtual" product. [Note
that the User adds the variant as defined by feature selections to the
shopping cart and not the original product:]
Selecting this link brings up the Product Detail page.
The "Open Gizmo" Catalog Product Listing
Desired product variation is

selected here and then added to
the cart. This is an example of
using product features to show
one product, even though there
are at least four real products
available for sale (LGPL, GPL,
BSD, MIT).
Figure 4.6.1
Using Product "Features" to Present User Selectable Product Variants

To configure the User selectable features as shown above:
 Make the base product (in this case "GZ-1006) a "Virtual" product using
the "Product Configuration" Form for GZ-1006
 Apply "Features" to GZ-1006 by selecting the Features tab from the top
navigation tabs on the "Product Configuration" web page.
 From the lower portion of the "Features" web page, select a feature to
add.
Note:
"Features" are created and managed as part of an OFBiz instance. To add a
feature to a product, that feature must already exist and the variant target product
must already exist. In Figure 4.6.2, the features with IDs of 8000 - 8003 already
exist as products with product IDs of GZ-1006-1 thru GZ-1006-4 respectively.
Figure 4.6.2 Listing/Adding Features to a Product
Table 4.6.2
"Listing/Adding Features to a Product" Feature Key
Key Feature Description
 Note: This feature category (License Features) has already been added to this
Product. The Catalog Manager uses the same Form to both list existing feature
associations and add new ones.
 To add a feature from a category or group, select the desired feature from the pull
down box.
 Features may also be added as single items using either the "Add Product Feature
with Type and ID Code" or "Add Product Feature with ID" fields shown here. Again,
these features must already exist before they are added to a product.

4.7 Product IDs
Some products have identifiers that are industry specific. For example the
ISBN is used to uniquely identify commercially published books. You may
apply any of the predefined product IDs provided using the IDs tab on the
Products configuration page.

4.8 Products as Configurations
If you have requirements for products that are put together from other parts,
not necessarily other products, then you may want to use the OFBiz
"Configuration" tool. "Configurations" are used to offer products for sale that
are assembled from parts. The User selects the various parts (the
"Configuration") that make up the product as part of the process of adding the
product to the shopping cart. The final assembled product is what is placed in
the shopping cart and processed for checkout.
To create a product as a configuration, select the Create New Product link from
the Catalog Manager Main web page to bring up a "Product" configuration
form. From the "Product Type" drop down menu select "Configurable Good".
Enter in other product setting as desired and hit the Create button.
Once you have created a "Configurable" product, you may add configuration
options to it by selecting the Configurations tab from the product's
configuration form top navigation links. Figure 4.8 shows the "Configurations"
configuration web page for the "Configurable PC" demo product:

  


Figure 4.8
"Product as a Configuration" Settings for Demo Product PC001

Table 4.8
"Product as a Configuration Settings for Demo Product PC001"
Feature Key
 "Config Item". The parts that go into making a configurable product are
called "items". Configuration items must already exist before they are
added to a product. To create product configuration items, see Chapter
4.9 for more information. Figure 4.8 shows one line for each
configuration item that makes up the PC001 product configuration.
 "Sequence number". Items are listed on the product's configuration
page, within the product catalog where the product is listed, in
ascending order starting with the smallest "sequence number" as
defined here.
 "From Date". The effective date and time this item will be included in this
product's configuration.
 "Description", "Long Description". Any additional descriptive text.
"Description" may be up to 255 characters. "Long Description" has no
limit9 in the number of characters. The "Description" field (while not
shown in this listing for this configuration item)10 should contain the text
that accompanies the item's selection criteria. For example, within the
demonstration data and on the "Configurable PC" catalog web page,
this text is: "Select the memory configuration"
 "Config Type Id". Defaults to "Question". Selecting "Question" forces the
eCommerce screen to display all the choices for this item as either
HTML radio boxes or check boxes [depending on how the original item
was created. If you don't want the User to select anything for this item,
set the "Config Type Id" to "Standard".
 "Thru Date". Date and time this item expires or is no longer listed with
the product as a configurable part.
 "Is Mandatory". Is this item required as part of the configuration. "Y"

means it is, "N" means that it is not.
 Create button. Use this section of the form to add another configuration
item.
9
"Long Description" has been implemented as a CLOB. Effective limits may vary per physical
underlying database.
10
Possibly a bug. This field should show the following text as seen on the "Configurable PC"
product catalog listing web page: "Select the memory configuration:"

4.9 Product Configuration Items
Product configuration items are created and managed for the entire OFBiz
instance using the OFBiz "Configuration" tool. Once a configuration item is
created, it may be used to build "Products as Configurations" (See Section
4.8).
To access the "Configuration" tool, select the Configurations button from the
Catalog Manager application's top navigation bar to bring up a list of "Config
Items" as shown in Figure 4.9.1:
Edit an existing "Config Item" by
Create a new "Config Item" here. selecting this button. See Figure
4.9.2 below for more details.
Figure 4.9.1 "Config Item Found" web page
1 2




Figure 4.9.2
Edit an Existing Product Configuration Item

Table 4.9.2
"Edit an Existing Product Configuration Item" Feature Key
1 Link to "Config Options" form. Configure all option values for this
configuration item. (See Figure 4.9.3)
2 Link to "Content" form. Add or edit content for this configuration item.
(See Figure 4.9.4 for more information).
 "Config Item". Unique item identifier assigned to this item either by the
creator or OFBiz.
 "Single Choice". Defaults to "Single Choice". Indicates that only one of
the available values for this item may be selected by the User. "Single
Choice" will force the rendering of an HTML radio select box. If you want
an HTML checkbox with multiple selectable values, select the "Multi
Choice" options for this field.
 "Config Item Name". Internal name for this item. Not used on the product
listing.
 "Description". Used on the product configuration web page to label the
item.
 Update button used to submit any changes.


 
Figure 4.9.3
Add, Edit or Remove "Config Option" Values for This Configuration Item
Table 4.9.3
"Add Edit or Remove Option Values for This Configuration Item" Feature
Key
 "Name". Unique name for this option. Only used within the Catalog
Manager. This name is not displayed on the web page listing for this
option.
 "Sequence". Configuration item's optional values are displayed on the
product configuration web page in ascending order starting with the
smallest sequence value entered here.
 "Description". This is the content of the label that follows the option's
HTML selection element.
 Update Edit Remove Links to modify existing option values.
 Create To create a new option, enter values in the fields provided and
hit the Create button.

Figure 4.9.4 Add or Edit Content for This Configuration Item
Table 4.9.4
"Add or Edit Content for This Configuration Item" Features Key
 Use this section to add a "Description" or "Long Description" and when
you want either the "Description" and/or the "Long Description" to have
begin and end dates associated with them. Alternatively, use the
"Override Simple Fields"  to add descriptive text.
 "Override Simple Fields". An easier, and recommended way to add
descriptive labels to a configuration item's options.
 Convenience tools to help upload a small graphic that may be displayed
with this option.

5.0 Price Rules

OFBiz "pricing rules" are policies regarding how pricing shall be applied to
derive a final numeric value or "price" for a product. Pricing rules are global to
the entire instance of OFBiz. Rules may be applied to individual products,
categories of products, users, or one or more OFBiz stores.
Out-of-the-box, several example pricing rules are provided. To view these

rules, select the PriceRules tab from the Catalog Manager top navigation
links. This will bring up the "Global Price Rules" web page into the Catalog
Manager work space as shown in Figure 5.0:
To see rule details, click

here. Figure 5.1 shows rule
details.
Figure 5.0 "Global Price" Rules List
Pricing rules are built and enforced using a rules based engine. The engine
evaluates a set of conditions and then executes a set of actions. First, all the
defined conditions are run in the sequence specified. If all return true, then
the actions are executed, using one or more of the price types (for example,
"List Price", or "Wholesale Price") as defined in Chapter 4.5, to determine the
final price for a product. Predefined actions include:
 Flat Monthly Amount

 Flat Monthly Override
 Percentage of Average Cost
 Percent of Default Cost
 Percent of List Price
 Percent of Margin
 Promo Amount Override
 Wholesale Amount Override
 Multiple actions, when selected will override individual action selections.

Rules may also be designated as "Sale" rules, in which case the eCommerce
application's store where this product is being offered will add "On Sale" text
next to the product's rule derived price. Rules automatically apply to the
prices associated with a product by virtue of assigning the product one or
more "price types".


 
 
Figure 5.1 Details of a Global Price Rule

Table 5.1
"Details of a Global Price Rule" Feature Key
 Make rules effective by date. Both a "from" date and "thru" date are supported. "From"
date defaults to "now". "Thru" date defaults to never, meaning this rule never expires.
You may set future dates or past dates to expire rules at certain times and but not
remove them from the system. (You may want to do that for audit purposes.)
 If "Yes" is selected, the eCommerce store will add "On Sale" text to the product's
pricing as displayed in the product catalog.
 Rule conditions are created here. A rule may have any number of conditions.
Conditions are evaluated in the order shown here. All conditions must be true before
an action is taken.
A condition is of the form: <OFBiz Object> <Verb> <Value>.
Condition OFBiz "Objects" may be one of:

Product
Product Category
Product Catalog
Product Feature
Product Store Group
Website
Quantity
Party
Party Group Member
Party Classification
Role Type
List Price
Currency UomId
Condition "Verbs" may be one of:

Is
Is Not
Is Less Than
Is Less Than or Equal To
Is Greater Than
Is Greater Than or Equal To
This makes it easy to create new rules. For example, if you wanted a pricing rule that
said employees get an automatic 50% discount on all products in the "Demo Catalog"
then you might create two conditions:
1) "Role Type" "is" "Employee"
2) "Product Catalog" "is" "Demo Catalog"
 Actions are specified here. A rule may have any number of actions. Actions are
evaluated in the order shown.
Actions may be one of:

Action What it means
Flat Amount Override Always override price with amount entered

Flat Monthly Override Always override the price with the amount
entered.
Percent of Average Cost The entered amount is treated as a
percentage. This amount is multiplied by
the "Average Cost" price type (See
Section 11.5) to arrive at a final value. For
example, to arrive a 100% markup over
the cost of an item, you would enter in 200
here. [200 would be equal to 200% of the
average cost - where 100% is the
"Average Cost" value.
Percent of Default Price The entered amount is treated as a
percentage. Final value is derived by
multiplying the entered amount by the
"Default Price" type.
Percent of List Price The entered amount is treated as a
percentage. Final value is derived by
multiplying the entered amount by the "List
Price".
Percent of Margin Margin is defined as the ("List Price" -
"Average Cost"). The entered amount is
taken as a percentage multiplied by the
margin value.
Promo Amount Override Replacement of existing price with this
price. No other calculations are done. This
value overrides other actions.
Wholesale Amount Override Charge only the "Wholesale Price" for this
product.
 Create new conditions by entering in Object/Verb/Value combinations and then hitting
the Create button.
 Create new actions by selecting the action desired from the pull down menu and hitting
the Create button.

6.0 Promotions
OFBiz "Special Offers", called "Promotions" by the Catalog Manager, are
pricing adjustments made to the User's order based on predefined rules.
Promotional rules exist for the entire OFBiz instance and are applied to or
removed from each OFBiz store as desired using the Catalog Manager. Out-
of-the-box, OFBiz comes with a number of predefined promotions we can
examine to get some sense for how they work.
First consider how promotions are viewed by the store visitor. In Figure 6.0,
we show the "Special Offers" menu with an insert containing a list of all the
promotions in effect for this store. The User may select the details of any
promotion from either the list on the main landing page (if the promotion
happens to be listed here) or from the subsequent list provided using the
View All Promotions tab. Note that promotions listed on the "Special Offers"
menu, are randomly selected from all the promotions in effect for the store.
When a User processes through checkout, each store promotion will be

processed, that is the promotion's rules will be executed, in turn, and a final
adjustment will be made to the User's cart total based on the actions defined
for each applicable promotion. For example, if the User meets the conditions
of the "10% entire purchase" promotion, then the OFBiz eCommerce
checkout logic will automatically adjust the order totals accordingly.
Figure 6.0 Example Demo Store Special Offers and Detail

"10% off entire purchase".

Promotions may be added or removed from a store at any time. They may
also be set up to be effective at a future time or for only a set period of time.
In this chapter, we will briefly look at how to:
√ List all available promotions per an OFBiz instance.

√ List all promotions in effect for a given OFBiz store.
√ Add or remove a promotion from an OFBiz store.
√ Promotional rules and how to create a new promotion.

6.1 List All OFBiz Promotions
To list all promotions defined for an OFBiz instance:
 From the main Catalog Manager web page

 Select the PROMOS tab to bring up the "Product Promotions List"
Navigate to a promotion by selecting the either the promotion's name

or the edit button.
Figure 6.1
"Product Promotions List" Out-of-the-box List of All Promotions Defined
For This Instance of OFBiz

6.2 List Store Promotions

To list all the promotions that have been applied to a given OFBiz store:
 From the main Catalog Manager top navigation bar select Stores
 From the "Product Store List" click on the link for the store to view
 From the "Store" configuration settings form select the Promos tab
This will bring up a list of promotions for the selected store. Figure 6.2 shows
the "Promotions For" listing for the "Open Travel System Demo Site" store.


Figure 6.2
"Promotions For" List of Promotions Set On the "Open Travel system
Demo Site" store.
Table 6.2
"Promotions For List of Promotions Set On the "Open Travel system Demo
Site Store"
Feature Key
 Store identifier and toggles to filter the display based on expired or
active promotions.
 List of promotions based on filter setting. Each line represents a single promotion.
Links to the promotion's configuration page are provided along with the promotion's
name.
 Add promotions on this section of the web page. See Chapter 6.3.

6.3 Add/Remove Store Promotions
Store promotions are added or removed using the same "Promotions For"
web page that lists existing store promotions. The top of the page lists
existing promotions, the bottom of the page provides a section to add new
promotions to the store.
 From the main Catalog Manager top navigation bar select Stores .
 From the "Product Store List" click on the link for the store to view.
 From the "Store" configuration settings form select the Promos tab.
Calendar icon pops up a handy calendar to

help in selecting dates.

  
Figure 6.3
Add or Remove Store Promotions Using the "Promotions For" Web Page

Table 6.3
"Add or Remove Store Promotions Using the Promotions For Web Page"
Feature Key
 Active and Inactive tab: This tab cycles the display to list either active promotions,
that is promotions whose expiration date has not passed, or inactive promotions, that
is, promotions whose expiration dates have passed.
User/Auto Entered tab: This tab cycles the display to list either User entered or
automatically entered promotions.
Links to view the promotion overview web page. From the promotion's overview, you
may navigate to a promotions: rules, promotion code setting and stores where this
promotion has been applied.
 "From Date" and "Thru Date". When a promotion is applied to a store it must have a
"From Date" setting. The "From Date" is the date and time at which the promotion
takes effect. Empty "Thru Dates" indicate that the promotion is effective forever.
Changing the "Thru Date" to a date in the past will "expire" the promotion so that it is
no longer visible or applicable to the store it is set on. The change is effective
immediately. By expiring and then un-expiring a promotion, the store owner does not
need to remove or delete a promotion to put it into effect.
Use the handy calendar icon to quickly set dates for both of these fields. Don't forget to
hit the Update button after changing either the "From Date" or the "Thru Date".
 "Sequence". Promotional sequences indicate the order in which promotions will be
displayed when the User selects the View All Promotions button from the
eCommerce website store. Empty sequence fields are allowed. When sequences are
not set, a random order is used.
 The Update button is used to apply updates to the item inline with the button.
The Delete button is used to remove this promotion from the store.
 "Add Store Promotion". This section of the web page is used to add promotion to this
store. To add a promotion:
1) Select the desired promotion from the drop down list shown.
2) Either enter in a "from" date or use the calendar icon to select a date. This is the
date the promotion will be effective from. Any date will due. If you want the promotion
to be effective immediately, enter in the current date. If you want the promotion to take
effect in the future, enter that date here. Note: if you don't enter a date in this field, the
add operation will fail. The add does not default to the current date.
 After selecting the desired promotion and entering the "from" date, select the Add
button. If successful, you should see this promotion displayed when the screen is
refreshed.

6.4 Promotion Configuration
Promotions have a default set of behaviors that allow them to be applied to

the store "as-is", simply by adding to the store as shown in Chapter 6.3. If
you want to change the default behavior, for example, require a promotional
code or coupon to be applied before any promotional actions occur, then you
will need to configure the promotion beyond the default settings.
To configure a promotion for a store, select the Edit button for the promotion
from the "Product Promotions List". (See Figure 6.1) This will bring up a form
similar to Figure 6.4:


 
Figure 6.4 "Promotion For" Form to Edit a Promotion's Configuration

Table 6.4
"Promotion For Form to Edit a Promotion's Configuration"
Feature Key
 Name of the promotion and the description as entered when the promotion was
created. You may change the text here as desired. Any changes here will automatically
update the promotion for all store's using it. You may also enter in HTML elements
here for added styling.
 "User Entered". Defaults and always set to "Y".
 "Promo Show To Customer". If set to "Y" this promotion will be displayed on both the
right column "Special Offers" menu and the shopping cart page under "Special Offers".
If set to "N", this promotion will not be shown.
 "Require Code". If you want the User to enter a code or coupon for this promotion to be
effective, set this to "Y". The default setting is "N". If you set this to "Y", the User will
need to enter a code on the shopping cart web page to have this promotion applied.
See Chapter 6.4.1 for more information on creating promotion codes.
 The eCommerce application will track how many times a User has applied a
promotion. If you want to limit the use of this promotion, enter the desired values here.
 Update . Changes are effective immediately.

6.4.1 Promotional Codes
OFBiz supports codes (sometimes called coupons) that may be applied to a

promotion to make it effective. By default, promotions are always in effect and
do not require codes. Promotional codes are a way to control when and
where a promotion may be used and to track the effectiveness of other
collaborative marketing programs. For example, you may have a newsletter
that provides a dollars off coupon for certain products. Only those user's with
access to the newsletter will have knowledge of the coupon and may use it to
gain the special offer discount at checkout.
If a promotion has a code associated with it, the eCommerce store will
automatically alert the store visitor with a message as shown in Figure 6.4.
A promotion without a
promotion code
Same promotion with a promotion code. This text is

automatically added by OFBiz when the code is added to
the promotion.
Figure 6.4.1 eCommerce Application Automatically Adds Information About

Promotion Codes if Applicable.

To add a code to a promotion, select the promotion from the "Product Promotions
List" (see Figure 6.1) to bring up the "Promotion Code For" web screen as
shown in Figure 6.4.1.1 and select the New Promotion Code tab. This will bring up
a list of existing promotion codes for this promotion and a form to add new
promotion codes to this promotion as shown in Figure 6.4.1.2:
Figure 6.4.1.1
List Promotion Codes for Selected Promotion
Figure 6.4.1.2
Create a New Promotion Code For the Listed Promotion
Select the Update button to create a new code. The Catalog Manager
automatically creates code values and applies them to the promotion as shown in
Figure 6.4.1.3 below.

Figure 6.4.1.3
The Catalog Manager Automatically Creates a Promotion Code For This
Promotion
Promotion code required this

promotional adjustment for an order.
The Use must enter this value to make
the promotional adjustment effective.
Figure 6.4.1.4
New Code is Now Listed For This Promotion

6.5 Product Promotion Rules

Each OFBiz product promotion consists of one or more "rules". A rule
consists of one or more "conditions" and one or more "actions". Rules are
automatically processed by the OFBiz promotional rules engine as users
adds or remove items from the shopping cart.
Rule "conditions" are statements that define the "how to" of the rule. Each rule
condition has a subject ("Cart Sub-total, "X Amount of Product", "Order sub-
total X in last Y Months" etc.), a verb ("is", "is not", "is greater than", etc), and
an optional user supplied object. Objects may have optional qualifiers. For
example, the subject "Order sub-total X In last Y Months" has an object
qualifier that allows for the configuration of the number of months.
The subject is combined with the verb and compared to the object to arrive at
a conditional state of either true or false. The Catalog Manager provides
several predefined condition subjects and verbs in drop-down menus for use
in building a promotion's rules. Conditions may be applied to one or more
target products and/or categories in any combination.
Rule "actions" are the functions automatically executed if and only if all the
conditions that make up the rule are true. Actions may be pricing reductions
on all or part of the order or changes to the order such as adding "free"
products. Actions contain a subject ("Order Percent Discount", "Gift with
Purchase", etc.) and one or more optional qualifiers such as quantity, amount,
item, and party. The Catalog Manager provides several predefined action
subjects in drop-down menus for use in building a promotion's rules. Actions
may be applied to one or more product categories and/or individual products
as desired.

For example, to build a promotion that rewards a User for buying two
products together, such as in a marketing bundle or packaged deal, by
discounting the order 20%, the rule outlined in Table 6.5 may be used.
Table 6.5
A Promotional Rule for Order Discount When Two Products are
Purchased Together.
Condition # 1
Subject Verb Object Other Target Products Target
Categories
"X Quantity of Product" "Is 1 Not Enter the product Not Used
Greater Used Id for the first
Than or product.
Equal To"
Condition # 2
"X Quantity of Product" "is 1 Not Enter the product Not Used
Greater Used Id for the second
Than or product.
Equal To"
Action # 1
Action Qualifiers
Subject Quantity Amount Item Party Target Target
Products Categories
"Order Percent Not Used 20 Not Not Used Not Used Not Used
Discount" Used

To view or edit the rules for a particular promotion, select that promotion from
the "Product Promotions List" (See Figure 6.1 above) to bring up the "Rules
For" configuration form as shown in Figure 6.5:

 




Figure 6.5 Promotional Rules

Table 6.5
"Promotional Rules" Feature Key
 Name of the rule. In this case, the promotion has one rule and the rule name and
promotion name are the same. The name may be changed if desired by changing the
content of this field and then selecting the Update button.
 "Conditions" section of the rule. A promotional rule may have any number of
conditions. All conditions must be true in order for the action part of the rule to be
invoked. Conditions are of the form:
[Subject] [Verb] [Object] [Object Qualifier] where
Conditional Subjects must be one of the following:

Cart Sub-total
Total Amount of Product
X Amount of Product
X Quantity of Product
Account Days Since Created
Party
Party Group Member
Party Classification
Role Type
Order sub-total X in last Y Months
Conditional Verbs may be one of:

Is
Is Not
Is Less Than
Is Less Than or Equal To
Is Greater Than
Is Greater Than or Equal To
Object and Object Qualifiers are optional and depend on the Subject selected.
 The "Actions" section of the rule. Add or remove actions for this rule here.
Actions are defined with a [Subject] [Optional Qualifier] where Subjects are one of the
following:
Quantity Amount Item Party
Gift with Purchase 4 * 1 *
X Product for Y% Discount 4 2 ** ***
X Product for Y Discount 4 5 ** ***
X Product for Y Price 4 3 ** ***
Order Percent Discount * 3 ** ***
Order Flat Amount * 5 ** ***
Product for [Spec Promo] Price 4 5 1 ***
* Not used by this subject. Leave blank when configuring.

** Enter shipping method id for free shipping per method. Left blank, all shipping
methods are at no charge.

*** Used to indicate Party ID of the shipping provider for free shipping if applicable.
1 - Enter the product ID of the "Gift"
3 - Enter the % value without the % sign. For 20% off, enter "20".
4 - Enter how many of the product or gift are included in this rule.
5 - Enter discount amount (not a % but a dollar amount)
 Update/Add/Delete Actions here.
 Add a new rule to this promotion. Promotions may have many rules. Each rule will be
evaluated in turn.
 Add or remove this promotion to one or catalog categories by selecting the category
here and then hitting the Add button.
 To add to products enter in the productId or use the lookup icon and hit the Add the
button.

7.0 Product Catalogs and Categories

7.1 Introduction
OFBiz "Catalogs" provide a convenient way of grouping, organizing and
ultimately displaying lists of products. When you think of OFBiz catalogs,
think of the traditional printed catalogs you may have received in the mail.
Printed catalogs come in all sorts of formats and configurations, but in the
end, they are listings of products for sale organized in a way that makes
searching easy and viewing pleasurable.
In order to support the widest range of catalog configurations, catalog

versioning, product descriptions, organizational styles and viewing access
rights and usage, OFBiz implements a sophisticated catalog design model
wherein a catalog may consists of one or more sub-groupings called
"categories". Catalog categories help to further organize catalogs by giving
additional meaning to product groupings.
Categories are catalog organization aids. They may be added or removed

from a catalog as needed. Using categories, the eCommerce store does not
"hard-wire" products to the website. Instead, it automatically determines
which catalogs are active for a given store. From each active catalog, the
eCommerce application orders categories and product listings according to
the catalog's configuration settings.
For visitor browsing convenience, the OFBiz eCommerce application makes

further use of catalog and category organizational features by implementing
category hierarchies. Store catalogs have a single root category for browsing
and one or more subordinate child categories. Each child category may, in
turn, be a parent category for subsequent child categories. In this way, a tree
like navigation structure may be easily created by adding or removing
categories and collections of child categories without having to recreate
product lists.
By default, any catalog used to display product listings on an OFBiz store

must have a root category. This category must be defined as a "Product
Category Type" type of "Browse Root". The "Browse Root" category is not
directly selectable for visitor viewing. Instead, it acts as the head of the
browsing tree making it easier for the eCommerce application to determine
how to order the product listing displays. Other categories are rolled up under
the "Browse Root" category as desired.
While catalogs may exist without any categories associated with them,
catalogs without categories are not very useful. That is because products are

associated with categories. The ability to dynamically associate products with

categories and then, when needed, categories with catalogs, is a major
business advantage of OFBiz.
An OFBiz instance may have an unlimited number of catalogs and categories

defined. Any one catalog may have an unlimited number of categories
associated with it. And a product may appear in any number of categories
and catalogs.
The remainder of this section will look at how to use the Catalog Manager to:
√ List Product Catalogs and Categories

√ Add/Remove Catalogs From OFBiz Stores
√ Create new Product Catalogs
√ Add/Remove Products From Product Catalog Categories

7.2 List All Catalogs
A list of available catalogs is always present on the Main Catalog Manager

page on the left side bar as shown in Figure 7.2:
The "Browse Catalogs" menu presents all catalogs for this instance of
OFBiz with navigation links to the catalog's configuration form. "Top"
catalog categories may be easily revealed by selecting that catalog's link
from this list.
"Demo Catalog" w/ Parent Categories Shown
Test Catalog w/Categories Collapsed
Rental Catalog w/Categories Collapsed
Figure 7.2 Catalog Manger's Main Page

7.3 List Available Categories

There are several ways to list
existing categories. You can always
view a list of "top" categories per
associated catalog by going to the
main Catalog Manager web page
and observing the categories listed
per an expanded or collapsed
catalog. See Figure 7.2 for more
information. Note only the top most
"parent" categories are shown on
this portion of the menu. To see
categories that are "rolled up" that is
considered child categories of each
parent, click on the parent link to
reveal the category children in the
"Browse Categories" box. For
example, by clicking on the "Demo Figure 7.3 Expanded Demo
Browse Root" category in Figure 7.2 Browse Root Category List
we see a list, in Figure 7.3 of the
categories under the "Demo Browse
Root" parent category.

If you want a complete list of categories on one screen, you can use the
"Search Products" search box, category lookup icon to bring up a category
search form. From the category search form, select the lookup button without
entering in any fields. This will pop-up a screen with a list of all available
categories. See Figure 7.3.1 below:
"lookup" Icon. Select this to bring up a

category search form. From the search
form, select Lookup without entering in
any search criteria.
Unfortunately, the Catalog Manager is

not consistent in how it displays category
labels. The category name is not listed
here for easy identification. Rather, the
unique category identifier (category ID) is
used. This makes it incumbent on the
User to remember that "CATALOG1" for
example is also called "Demo Browse
Root"
Figure 7.3.1 Listing all Available Categories

7.4 Add/Remove Catalogs from Stores

To add or remove an existing catalog to an existing store:
 From the Main Catalog Manager "Browse Catalogs" search box, select
the catalog to add/remove from a store
 This will bring up the selected catalog's "Catalog Stores Form".
 From the "Catalog Stores Form", select the Stores navigation tab
This will bring up a list of stores where this catalog is set. From the "Catalog
Stores Form" you may remove a catalog by selecting the Delete button;
change the effective start and end date of the catalog11 and change the
sequence indicating in which order a catalog should be displayed and offered
in the drop-down selection menu (assuming there is more than one catalog
for the store.)
Set thru date if

You can set a start date after the you want the this
current date if you don't want a catalog to expire at some
Remove the
visible until a certain time. Defaults to future time.
catalog from the
"now". Defaults to never.
store by clicking
here
To add a this catalog "Demo Catalog"

to another store, select select the store
here. Then hit the Add button.
Figure 7.4
Stores Where Demo Catalog Is Available To Browse.
11
Effective start and end dates indicate by date when the catalog will be visible on the web site.
No end date means forever.

7.5 Creating New Catalogs
To create a new catalog, select the Create New Catalog button on the Catalog
Manager Main web page to bring up the "New Catalog Form" as shown in
Figure 7.5:
Figure 7.5 "New Catalog" Form
Table 7.5 "New Catalog Form" Form Field Key

Field Notes
Catalog [ID] Unique Catalog Identifier (ID). If left empty, OFBiz will assign one to this
Catalog.
Catalog Name Name for the catalog. This is the name shown on the store if the catalog
is associated and made active for a store.
Use Quick Add "Use Quick Add". "Y" allows the store to use this catalog as input for
"quick add" function.
Style Sheet "Style Sheet"/"Header Logo". Override store style sheet and or logo here
by entering in the location of alternate files.
Header Logo Specify a header logo to override the store logo when this catalog is
active.
Content Path Prefix Override default content location. Suggested to leave blank.
Template Path Override default Freemarker template location prefix. Suggested to
Prefix leave blank.
Permission required "Permission required to add products to ViewAllow category". Set to "Y"
to add product to the Catalog Manager will enforce access controls when a User attempts
"ViewAllow" to add products to a category of this type.
category
Permission required Set to "Y" the Catalog Manager will enforce access controls when a
to add product to User attempts to add products to a category of this type.
"Purchase Allow"
category

7.6 Creating New Categories
Categories exist to give product catalogs organizational structure. A

categories' type identifier indicates the organizational role it will play in any
catalog it is part of. Possible category types used by the eCommerce store to
build catalogs for browsing include:
Product Category Type eCommerce Web Store Usage

"Catalog" Most categories are of type "Catalog". Indicates standard
usage - sequential list of products - in a catalog. A catalog may
have an unlimited number of categories of "Product Category
Type" "Catalog".
"Search" Defines a category to use for assisting in searching for
products. A category of this type may be used for showing or
hiding specific products to be returned by a search operation.
A catalog may have any number of categories of type
"Search".
"Quick Add" A category used to display when the User selects the "Quick
Add" navigation link. A catalog may have an unlimited number
of "Quick Add" categories associated with it.
To create a new category, select the Create New Category button on the
Catalog Manager Main web page. This will bring up the "New Category"
configuration form as shown in Figure 7.6:
"Product Category Type" drop down. Most

eCommerce categories are of type
"Catalog", "Search" or "Quick Add".
Figure 7.6
Creating a New Category

Table 7.6
Creating a New Category Form Field Key
Field Notes
Product Category Unique identifier for the category. Leave this field blank if you want the
ID Catalog Manager to assign one for you.
Product Category Name for the catalog. This is the name shown on the store when the
Type catalog is associated and made active for a store.
Description "Use Quick Add". "Y" allows the store to use this catalog's product list as
input for "quick add" function.
Category Image Category web pages may have an image displayed under the Search
URL
in Category button and above the categories' product listings. [This is
not the same as the header logo image.] This is the URL relative to the
default OFBiz image directory for the image. Leave blank if you don't
want any image used for the category page. Note: the upload feature on
the "Category For" configuration page makes adding these images much
easier.
Link One Image Not Used.
URL
Link Two Image Not Used.
URL
Detail Screen Override default (Freemarker) template used to generate detailed
product listings.
Primary Parent Set the primary parent category here. This may be left blank and filled in
Category later. For categories that you want to fall directly under the Browse Root
top category, this is an easy and simple way to make that association
when creating a category.

7.7 Adding/Removing Categories From Catalogs
Categories may be added or removed from a catalog at any time. When

categories are associated with a catalog, they are given an association "type".
This type defines the role that the category will play in organizing the catalog
for as long as the category is associated with this catalog. Certain category
types may only be used once in any particular catalog. Table 7.7 describes all
the category to catalog type associations used by the eCommerce
application and how many times this category type may be included in a
catalog.
Table 7.7 Category to Catalog Association Usage Type

Product Catalog How Many Usage
Category Type Allowed per
Catalog
"Admin Allow" One Not Used.
"Browse Root" One Top level category for all categories used to display
product lists. Not directly visible to the on the website
page. Cannot be selected for viewing.
"Default Search" One If configured, only the products in this category will show
up in product search results.
"Most Popular" One Not Used.
"Other Search" Many Allows for selective category based search results
beyond the "Default Search" category.
"Promotions" One This category is the default browsing category for each
catalog configured for an eCommerce store. The
eCommerce expects that this category be configured for
a catalog. When a User first lands on the store's home
page or when switching between catalogs, this is the first
category displayed.
"Purchase Allow" One If configured, only products in this category will be
available for purchase when this category is active. If not
configured, all products in all categories are available for
purchase.
"View Allow" One If configured, only products in this category shall be
viewable when this category is active. If not configured,
all categories are, by default, viewable.
"Whats New" One Not Used.

The easiest way add or remove a category from a catalog:
 From the Catalog Manager "Main" web page, left column "Browse
Catalogs" selection menu, select the catalog you wish to configure This
will bring up the "Catalog" configuration page for the catalog you want to
work on.
 From the "Catalog" configuration web page for the catalog selected above,
select the Categories tab. This will bring up the "Categories" configuration
web page for this catalog.
Thru date may be used to add or remove the entire category from displayed. For
example, if you set the "thru" date to a date prior to the current date, then when the
User selects the category, a "No Category Found for Catalog" message will be
displayed. A null or empty "thru" date will keep the category displayed forever.
You may easily reset the display by setting the thru date field to blank and hitting the
Update button.
Figure 7.7
Categories Configuration Web Page for "Demo Catalog"

7.8 Building Category Hierarchies
The eCommerce store supports hierarchies of category browsing. Each

hierarchy has a parent category that acts as the starting point for category
navigation. Parent categories may have product listings and any number of
child categories configured under them. Child categories may contain
products, have any number of parents and have more child categories under
them.
There is one special parent category that defines the top most navigation
point for all eCommerce store catalogs. This category is called the "Browse
Root" category and it is used as the starting point for all browser navigation
for the catalog. The "Browse Root" category has no products in it. It has only
one or more child categories.
Manipulating category hierarchies makes it easy to automatically reconfigure

catalogs by adding and removing single catalogs or entire hierarchies without
rebuilding the catalog.
You can easily couple or decouple groups of child/parent categories using the
Catalog Manager roll up feature. To roll child categories under a parent,
navigate to the parent's "Category For" configuration form and select the
Rollup button as shown in Figure 7.8. Use this same form to roll up a parent
category on top of child. Note that a category may have any number of
parents and any number of children.

List of child categories for

this category. Note: No child
categories have been
configured for this category.
List of parent categories for
this category
Add new parent

categories for this
category by entering the
category Id of the
parent, the effective date
here.
Add new child categories for

this category by entering the
category Id of the child, the
effective date here.
Figure 7.8 Category Roll Up Form

7.9 Add/Remove Products from Catalogs
Products are not added or removed from catalogs directly. They are added
and removed from categories. Categories are then associated with one or
more catalog.
Since product and catalogs may exist independently from one another, there
are a number of different but equally effective methods for adding and
removing products from categories, depending on the situation.
If the product and category already exist then you may add the product to one
or more categories through the "Product" configuration web page:
 Bring up the desired product's "Product" configuration page
If a "Primary Category" has not been defined for this product, add this product
to a category by selecting an existing category from the "Primary Category"
drop down menu. The "Primary Category" will be the used to determine when
to display this product on the website based on its association with this
category. Note: If the product's "Primary Category" has been set to a
category type of "Search" then this product will not be displayed until a search
request is initiated. If the "Primary Category" is of type "Quick Add" then this
product will only show up on the quick add product lists.
Figure 7.9.0
"Product" Configuration Page for "Tiny Gizmo"
You may add this product to additional categories by selecting the Categories
tab as show in Figure 7.9.0.1

The "Tiny Gizmo" product is associated with the following categories:

100, 101, "Catalog1_Search" and TSTCSL Only categories 100 and
101 are directly viewable by selecting the appropriate "Browse
Categories" link(s) on the Demo web store.
Add the "Tiny Gizmo"

product to another
category here.
Figure 7.9.0.1
Product Categories Web Page for the "Tiny Gizmo" Product

7.9.1 Add/Remove Products Using Category Configuration
To add or remove products using the "Products For Category" configuration

web page:
 Bring up the "Category" configuration web page for the desired category.
 Select the Products tab from the top navigation tabs as show in Figure
7.9.1.
Aside from adding a single product to this category from this form and
removing products, you may also move products to another category; expire
all the products in this category (when expired, they will no longer show up
when the User selects this category for viewing); and remove/delete any
expired products from the category.
Note:
Deleting or removing products from the category does not remove them from
the database. Similarly, expiring and removing expired products does not
delete them from the database. When an expired product is removed from a
category it cannot be "unexpired".

Products currently configured in the category (with

the unique ID of 102.) Category 102 is also named
the "Large Gizmo" category. View this page as
you would on the
web store by clicking
here.
Configure
viewing
visibility date
here.
Jump directly to Add comments

this product's here.
configuration by
clicking here
Remove this product from

this category by clicking the
Delete button. Products are
not removed from the
database, just from the
category.
Add a new
product to
the category
here.
Copy a product
from another
category here
Expire and remove expired

products here.
Figure 7.9.1
Add/Remove Products To/From a Category

8.0 Miscellaneous Topics

8.1 Subscriptions
The Catalog Manager and the OFBiz eCommerce store support
configuration of subscription based services. For subscription based
services, OFBiz will track and manage access to one or more OFBiz
products (called a "Subscription Resource") for a given period of time.
An example out-of-the-box in the "Demo Catalog" of a subscription based

service is the "Gizmo Newsletter". Figure 8.1 is the catalog listing from the
eCommerce store for the "Gizmo Newsletter" which may only be purchased
as a subscription:
Figure 8.1
"Gizmo Newsletter" Subscription Catalog Listing
The "Gizmo Newsletter" is a product like any other OFBiz product. It is

configured as a "Digital Good", so that it may be downloaded (and not
shipped). This is shown in Figure 8.1.1.
Figure 8.1.1
Product Configuration for the "Gizmo Newsletter"

The newsletter also has a "Default Price" and a "List Price" price associated
with it. Assuming no global pricing rules have been applied to this product, the
"Default Price" will be the price charged when the User purchases the
product.
Note:
This product has been set up to have a single, one time fee associated with it.
If you wanted to have a recurring price associated with this product, you would
need to add another price of type "Recurring Charge" to this product.
Add "Recurring Charge" if you

want a price that is charged
monthly.
Figure 8.1.2
Product Pricing for Monthly Subscription
Once the "Gizmo Newsletter" is created as a product, it is added to one or

more categories so to be visible for customer browsing.

To make a product available as a subscription, it must also be associated with

a "Subscription Resource". To associate a "Subscription Resource" to a
product, select the Subscription Resource tab from the "Product Configuration"
screen as shown in Figure 8.1.3 to bring up a list of all associated
"Subscription Resources" and a Form to add a new "Subscription Resource"
to this product.




Figure 8.1.3
Subscription Resources Listing

Table 8.1.3
"Subscription Resources Listing" Feature Key
 List of all the Subscription Resources associated with this product.
 Dates for which this subscription association is valid. Empty "Thru" date
is forever.
 "Purchase From Date"/"Purchase Thru Date" defaults to always. You
may change these dates to reflect business rules.
 "Use Time". How often this subscription will be used per the purchased
product. If you want this subscription to be activated only one time, per
purchase select "1".
 "Use Time Uom Id". Frequency of the subscription renewal. In this case,
monthly renewals. You purchase the product "1" time and get monthly
renewals. [Note: this does not determine how the subscription is paid for
each month. This is the renewal term.]
 Default role none. You may add a role from the available list. When a
role is added to this subscription, OFBiz will check to make sure that
when the subscriber goes to access the subscription resource, they
have the proper role.

8.2 Catalog Thesaurus
The Catalog Manager Thesaurus is defined as:
"A tool for defining word substitutions for the search function. For example,
you may want users who search for 'lapptop' to see the same results as
those who search for 'laptop.' To do this, click on 'Thesaurus,' put in
'lapptop' in the box to the right of Keyword and 'laptop' in the box next to
'laptop.' Select the relationship of 'correct spelling' and click on 'add.' Now,
when someone searches for 'lapptop,' the Open for business search
function will automatically substitute 'laptop' for it before conducting the
search. You can also add 'computer' as another alternative for 'lapptop,'
using the relationship 'broader term.' Now searches for 'lapptop' will return
results for both 'laptop' and 'computer.'" 12
To add new Thesaurus entries select the Thesaurus tab from the top level
Catalog Manager navigation tabs to bring up the thesaurus work screen as
shown in Figure 8.2:
  
Figure 8.2 Catalog Manager Thesaurus Tool.
Table 8.2
"Catalog Manager Thesaurus Tool" Feature Key
 "Keyword". Word or phrase to use for matching during a search. Enter
common misspellings, nicknames or brand names in this field.
 "Alternate". Word or phrase to substitue keyword for.
 How to use the substitution.
12
OFBiz Wiki (http://docs.ofbiz.org/display/OFBENDUSER/Thesaurus), August 2009

8.3 Product Keywords
To aid in the search process, products may have "keywords" associated with
them. Keywords are automatically created for products based on the
product's name and content settings. To apply additional keywords, for
example, common misspellings, to a specific product, select the Keywords
button on top of the "Product" configuration web page for the target product.
This will bring up the "Keywords" configuration Form as shown in Figure 8.3:
Figure 8.3
Product Keywords Configuration Form

8.4 Product Reviews
By default, Users who register with an OFBiz store website and purchase one
or more products may provide product reviews. These reviews may be
automatically posted along with other product information [by default on the
shopping cart web page] or reviewed and approved prior to posting. Auto
approval is based on a store setting.
For sites where auto approval is turned off, the Catalog Manager provides an
interface to allow viewing and approval of reviews. To access the product
review work space, select the Reviews tab from the Catalog Manager top
navigation links.
If there are any reviews pending approval they will be listed as shown in
Figure 8.4. To approve or delete a review, select the desired status from the
drop down provided and hit the Save button.



Figure 8.4 List of Pending Product Reviews
Table 8.4
"List of Pending Product Reviews" Feature Key
 "Posted By". The User Name (Firstname, Lastname) of the User who posted this
review. (Not the login name).
 "Is Anonymous". Change this to force this review to be displayed as anonymous.

Defaults to initial capture state as set by the User making the review.
 "Status". Select one of the provided status indicators. To make this review visible on
the website, select "Approve" and the Save button.
 Content of the review. Change this if you want and hit the Save button.

Appendix A OFBiz Downloads

For the purposes of following along with this book, the author recommends
downloading one of the pre-built OFBiz packages available on the Apache
Open for Business Project website:
http://ofbiz.apache.org
Figure A.1 shows the current website home page (August 2009). Select the
DOWNLOAD OFBIZ button, circled in Figure A.1 to navigate to the download
page.
Figure A.1 Where to Find the OFBIZ Downloads
After selecting the download button from the main website page, you will be
directed to the web page with available download links. From here, you must
decide which download to get. There are three OFBiz releases featured on
this page: Release 4.0, Release 9.04 and a "Nightly Trunk Build". (Please see
Appendix B for more information on OFBiz releases.) The "Nightly Trunk"
release is what you get if you select the DOWNLOAD OFBIZ button. Most
extant OFBiz installations were built from the older Release 4.0 versions. All
the screenshots for this book are from a Release 4.0 version 765601. "Trunk
Builds" are suppose to be the more stable of the releases. The Release 9.04
builds are the latest and greatest additions to the code base.

The path of least resistance for new users is to select the DOWNLOAD
OFBiz button on the "Nightly Release Download Page", Figure A.2 to start a
download of the most current stable build. Builds are created nightly, so you
really do get the latest code.
For those who wish to follow along with a Release 4.0 version find a version
number that you like, for example, if you want a version close to the one used
for this book select the ofbiz-rel4.0-current.zip link to start the download.
Once the download is complete, follow the steps outlined on the "Nightly
Release Download Page" Figure A.2 to get up and running quickly.
One final note: you must already have Java 1.5 or greater running on your
computer before OFBiz will startup.

Recommended download. Select this link to get the latest

stable trunk release. While the web screens will look
different from screenshots in the book, the features,
functions and website usage is the same.
Not recommended for new

users, the latest and greatest
may be downloaded here. No
guarantees as to code stability.
Release 4.0 with bug fixes

from the trunk are here. To
follow along with the book,
select one of these nightly
releases.
Figure A.2 OFBiz Nightly Release Download Web Page

Appendix B OFBiz Versions

OFBiz is an open source, community-driven project. The community-driven
software process is the embodiment of free-market principals as applied to
software development. Features, functions and product enhancements get
added to the code base when the developers (all volunteers) working within
the community framework feel compelled to add them. Usually, this happens
based on market forces such as when existing end Users request a change
or contribute code. Under these conditions, only the very best enhancements
rise to the top of the heap and are implemented. It is always a challenge, in a
community-driven project to manage the software release cycle. But fear not,
one of the major benefits (as far as a User is concerned) of OFBiz being
accepted under the Apache Software Foundation umbrella, is support for
releases and version management in general.
As of this writing there are two major versions of OFBiz: the legacy version
labeled Release 4.0 and a most recent release from a branch in the code
base labeled Release 9.X13. Most, if not all real world OFBiz installations are
based on Release 4.0 or earlier code. Under the covers the structural
differences between Release 4.0 and Release 9.X are minor.
One major enhancement in Release 9.X only bears some mention as this
new feature is the reason that screen shots look different from the Release
4.x versions: "Themes" . "Themes" are templates (HTML, CSS and other
software) that, when applied to an OFBiz application change the visual look
and feel. The idea is to allow a developer or User, such as a store owner, to
easily change certain visual aspects of the website or other OFBiz application
interface (for example, the Catalog Manager) without changing the
underlying code.
Currently, if you visit the OFBiz site and decide to download a version, you
have several options. The easiest thing to do is follow the big download
button and get the "nightly build". This is a prepackaged version ready to
unzip and run. Nightly builds contain everything necessary to execute the
demonstrations discussed in this book. They also contain all the source code
and other artifacts including build scripts that are used to create the nightly
builds. In other words, you get "all that and the source too"!
13
Why 9.x? The powers that be have decided to start numbering releases based year (9) and
month (04) when a release takes place.


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Getting Started with

The Catalog Manager Application

"Getting Started with Apache OFBiz TM E-Commerce (Release 4.0)"

All rights reserved.

Java ™ and all Java-based marks are trademarks or registered trademarks of

ApacheTM, OFBiz TM, Apache Derby™ and the OFBiz

myOFBiz © and myOFBiz.com © are copy write marks of Adaptive Enterprise

Cover: Laurie Morrison

Editorial assistance: Sue Ridgeway (suewrites@mindspring.com)

Copyright, Ruth Hoffman 2009 2

About This Book.................................................................................5

Copyright, Ruth Hoffman 2009 3

6.4 Promotion Configuration..................................................................... 83

Copyright, Ruth Hoffman 2009 4

About This Book

Who Should Read This Book

If you are completely new to OFBiz, consider reading the introductory,

About The Author

Copyright, Ruth Hoffman 2009 5

"Cue balls" such as  are used to bring attention to certain areas of

Bolded Type indicates the name of a software product, an OFBiz application,

"e-commerce" is used as a generic term referring to online business

Copyright, Ruth Hoffman 2009 6

Organization of the Book

Chapter 3 begins with an overview of the OFBiz "Store". It continues with a

Chapter 4 is a basic introduction to OFBiz "Products". Products are a

Chapter 5 is an introduction to the OFBiz "Price Rules" engine. In this chapter

Chapter 6 discusses store based "Promotions". Promotions or "Special

Chapter 7 is all about OFBiz "Product Catalogs". Product catalogs are

Copyright, Ruth Hoffman 2009 7

Chapter 8 completes our tour of the OFBiz Catalog Manager with

Copyright, Ruth Hoffman 2009 8

What You Need to Know

There is no denying the importance of e-commerce and online retailing. If you

What should you be looking for in e-commerce software tools? At minimum:

√ An automated checkout, facilitating order placement and payment.

√ Integration with other business applications as needed. Accounting,

Copyright, Ruth Hoffman 2009 9

As an open source community-driven project OFBiz is maintained and

About OFBiz Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP)

"Open For Business (OFBiz) is a suite of enterprise applications built on a common

Finally a Note About OFBiz Versions

For more information on OFBiz project versioning, please see Appendix B

Copyright, Ruth Hoffman 2009 10

The Catalog Manager Application

1.0 Introducing the OFBiz Catalog Manager

Manage one or more OFBiz "Store" including: creating new stores;

Create and configure goods and services ("Products") that may be

Add, remove and expire products from display on the store by

Configure and enforce enterprise wide pricing rules. OFBiz pricing

Create and manage subscription services. The Catalog Manager

And much more.

Copyright, Ruth Hoffman 2009 11

The Catalog Manager is an OFBiz application in its own right. Out-of-the-box

Copyright, Ruth Hoffman 2009 12

Quick Search Menu Selections OFBiz Application Navigation Links

Catalog Manager Navigation Links

Catalog Manager "WorkSpace". This section of

Copyright, Ruth Hoffman 2009 13

2.0 Navigating the Catalog Manager User Interface

Copyright, Ruth Hoffman 2009 14

2.1 Quickly Find an Existing Product

Enter keyword (all or part of the