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- Get at least some programming skills and also some experience with database software (MySQL or MS SQL Server (which I use))
- Get familiar with delimited text files and their problems. You can use Excels import feature to import feeds. There you will see fairly quickly what some of the issues are
- never assume that the feed file is okay and that the columns are used for what they are supposed to be used
- Get familiar with FTP (basic FTP that comes with Windows is all you need)
- Get familiar with XMLHTTP to pull data via HTTP
- Get familiar with data validation and data normalization principles and problems
- Learn how to schedule things for automation. I use SQL Server Agent to schedule things, but the Windows scheduler would work for a lot of things too
- Basic XML knowledge would not hurt either
- Get familiar with web services and use them whenever you can.
- Amazon's and eBay's APIs are good for learning and getting experiences with web services
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Carsten, Thanks again......!
Could you explain more about XML and how to use XML datafeeds?
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1) Delete all records related to the feed in the database and then import it as if it was new. Depending on the feed is the key for the deletion filter usually the merchant ID on the network where you pull the feed from. The problem is that you can't use your own primary key for products in this case, because the key values would change and all your references to the old records would become invalid
2) Check if the product exists in the DB by doing a look-up with a unique identifier for the Merchant+Product combination and do an update if it exists (have a date stamp for "last updated" and update that as well). Insert all records you can't find in the DB. Delete all records where the "last updated" stamp was not updated. This requires more logic for the import script and takes longer to import data.
Hope that helps
Cheers
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Interesting! So here you are working directly withing the MySQL database. I suppose you have to either work fast or shut your site down while you are doing this work.....wouldn't you?
Charlie