Broken variable product images

Hi,

This is an extra reply at my #160980 previous ticket:

I am currently using the default WooCommerce CSV importer to upload my products on my shop but I had the following issue:

After the CSV import, all of them were uploaded normally (both simple & variable). The problem is that my variation multiple images were not uploaded and I got on my back-end only the first (main) image of each variation (the first one in order of my CSV file). This was caused because feature for Variation image galleries iss provided by your theme and any default importing functions didn’t import the variation galleries.

In order to to achieve this I purchased this official plugin from WooCommerce:

https://woocommerce.com/products/woocommerce-additional-variation-images/

After disabling your “Additional variations images” option and activating the new plugin, I used an extra column on my CSV called “Meta: _wc_additional_variation_images” as per plugin’s documentation and the variation images are now uploaded correctly via the CSV import. Please check my screenshot “screenshot-variation-images”. My only issue currently is that the images of my variable product are not appeared correctly currently at my front-end. Please check my screenshot “screenshot-front-end”.

After talking with WooCommerce support, they recommended me to get in contact with you for giving me advice on how to fix this. Could you maybe have a quick look on this and maybe recommend me a solution or give me some advice for having the desired appearance?

Thank you in advance,
Dimitris

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Hello,

This plugin is not compatible with our theme and will not work well with all our theme features. Could you please provide us your admin and FTP access and also send us an example of CSV import file so we can test why it doesn’t work with our variations images? Or create a development website where we can test this option.

Kind Regards

Hi,

Please find at private content your requested information. I also sent you a sample of my current CSV file. I personally use https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/ for my WooCommerce CSVs editing. You can also have a look at plugin’s documentation here:

https://docs.woocommerce.com/document/woocommerce-additional-variation-images/

On Third-Party Theme Support section, the below is mentioned:

“Themes that follow the default WooCommerce lightbox implementation will usually work with this plugin.However, some themes use an unorthodox method to add their own lightbox/slider, which breaks the hooks this plugin needs. Third-party theme authors can make this plugin work together by using the hooks and triggers available within the plugin. In addition, this plugin has incorporated its own lightbox so you can always choose to use it and turn off any lightbox options that are coming from your theme. Please consult with your theme author on how to disable the lightbox.”

They have also a list of hooks and a short description of what they do as well as Javascript Triggers.

I really hope to find a solution from your side for this incompatibility.

Thank you in advance.

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Please, prepare CSV file for our theme and our additional variations feature. We are not going to implement compatibility with this plugin since it is not possible with our current theme’s features.
Note that our theme stores additional variations images data as a post meta value for the PARENT product (not for each variation) and it is called woodmart_variation_gallery_data https://gyazo.com/2cf77ad1fa1a8d85f7ef8e899f94af62
It stores an array with IDs of variations and arrays with IDs of images for each variation.

I replaced at my CSV file the Meta: _wc_additional_variation_images with your Meta: woodmart_variation_gallery_data but after uploading it didn’t take the Variation Image Galleries.
How can I change my CSV in order to recognize the meta value for your variations images?

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But we don’t see the meta data in the following form in your CSV:

variation id: image ID 1, image ID 2...

I am a little confused, how can I set variation ID on my CSV? Could you be a little more specific?

We suggest you check how it is stored in the database first. Check our previous screenshot from the database https://gyazo.com/2cf77ad1fa1a8d85f7ef8e899f94af62

I just made the following test:

I deactivated https://woocommerce.com/products/woocommerce-additional-variation-images/ plugin and enabled again your additional variations feature. So I tried to create the below variable product on site:

https://www.giftsontop.gr/product/metavlito-proion-test/

As expected, variation image galleries work as desired on my front-end. After that, I exported all products to better understand how their column names are set on CSV. The strange thing is that I don’t see anywhere the column “Meta: _woodmart_variation_gallery_data” on export CSV. On the column “Images” I see the multiple images on variable product and only the first image of each variation ID.

Please check my attached export CSV.

You can download the wc-product-export.csv file from the following we-transfer link (as this file type is not permitted to add it at your attachements for security reasons):

https://we.tl/t-zOIZBukldJ

The Meta columns that I get on CSV export are the following:

1. Meta: woodmart_sguide_select
2. Meta: woodmart_total_stock_quantity
3. Meta: _product_360_image_gallery
4. Meta: _woodmart_main_layout
5. Meta: _woodmart_sidebar_width
6. Meta: _woodmart_custom_sidebar
7. Meta: _woodmart_product_design
8. Meta: _woodmart_single_product_style
9. Meta: _woodmart_thums_position
10. Meta: _woodmart_product-background
11. Meta: _woodmart_extra_content
12. Meta: _woodmart_extra_position
13. Meta: _woodmart_product_custom_tab_title
14. Meta: _woodmart_product_custom_tab_content
15. Meta: _woodmart_swatches_attribute
16. Meta: _woodmart_product_video
17. Meta: _woodmart_product_hashtag
18. Meta: _woodmart_new_label

Shouldn’t I get the Meta: _woodmart_variation_gallery_data too?

Yes, you should have it as a separate meta value. Try to check if this record exists in your database on the server via PhpMyAdmin interface. If it is there, then contact plugin’s developers to resolve the problem of why it is not exported.

I think you didn’t understand my last question. I told you that I de-activated the plugin and currently I use your additional variations feature. As you will see, the export CSV contains all Meta columns of woodmart except Meta: _woodmart_variation_gallery_data that you mentioned to me above. Why does this happen?

Yes, that is what we are trying to explain to you. It seems to be a problem with the export plugin. (we are not talking about plugin with variations images at all).
That is why we suggest you to check if this record exists in your database on the server via PhpMyAdmin interface. If it is there, then contact plugin’s developers to resolve the problem of why it is not exported.

Ok I understand now.

Where shall I search exactly on my DB for your record “Meta: _woodmart_variation_gallery_data”?

I attach you a screenshot of my DB.

I attach you again the screenshot of my DB because the previous file exceeded the limit.

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This record should be found in the postmeta table.

As told you above, I use the core export in WooCommerce and not an export plugin like you are saying above.

I tested the export in case that I have only https://woocommerce.com/products/woocommerce-additional-variation-images/ plugin activated and your theme feature for Variation Image Galleries disabled and I was able to see at the CSV the column “Meta: _wc_additional_variation_images” which adds normally the IDs of the variation images.

I also talked with plugin’s official support and they told me that non-exporting of your column “Meta: _woodmart_variation_gallery_data” is not related with core export of WooCommerce but only with your specific theme. They told me that you can submit the issue if you want to see what their developers will say here: https://github.com/woocommerce/woocommerce.

Can you be more specific of where exactly is your “Meta: _woodmart_variation_gallery_data” stored in the postmeta table? I can’t find it easily. Please check what I get on my end.

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I finally achieved to find “Meta: _woodmart_variation_gallery_data” in the postmeta table. I see this meta_value on my variable product https://www.giftsontop.gr/product/metavlito-proion-test/ (ID: 1421):

a:2:{i:1422;s:7:”975,971″;i:1423;s:7:”973,971″;}

IDs 1422 and 1423 are the SKUs of my variations and 975,971,973,971 the IDs of the images.

I am not sure if its easy to use such type of data at an extra column of my CSV with name “woodmart_variation_gallery_data” at all for importing my variation images.

Waiting for your further recommendation.

So you find this record in the database but you still can’t export it. And that means that the problem actually with the export mechanism since it skips this meta.

Yes but this is theme related issue and not core export’s issue in WooCommerce as it works without issues for other themes.

However, is it possible at last to have an extra column of my CSV with name “woodmart_variation_gallery_data”? If yes, how should I set my data (variation images) there in order to work correctly with the core CSV import of WooCommerce?

We saw that you opened an issue on github and also find another issue where WooCommerce developers say that it is not possible to import/export serialized data with a standard mechanism and you need to use some extra tool for that. Read more information here https://github.com/woocommerce/woocommerce/issues/18379

Ok thank you, I finally used the external plugin https://woocommerce.com/products/woocommerce-additional-variation-images/ and customized it in order to work correctly with your theme. This way I am able now to upload multiple variations images via my CSV. You must consider adding this feature in your theme updates as I think that it is very useful for shop owners.

Which one do you mean? If we will rework the way data stored in the database, then all our current customers will lose all these images uploaded and will have to upload them from scratch.

Then you will maybe consider making your theme compatible with https://woocommerce.com/products/woocommerce-additional-variation-images/ plugin as currently it seems to be the only way to upload multiple variation images via CSV file.

For example consider a shop owner with more than 1000 products. It’s really difficult for him to set manually the variation images for each product individually while using your theme’s default feature. With the above plugin, he just sets the IDs of the additional variation images at a separate column (Meta: _wc_additional_variation_images) for each variation and everything is uploaded normally via the core import of WooCommerce.

But we can’t do this plugin compatible with our theme since it is not possible to integrate it with our custom lightbox, zoom, and other functions. Moreover, if we will change the mechanisms, all current websites will lose the data and functionality.

Just to inform you that I have already customized it in order to work correctly with your theme. Please check the sample variable product at my private content to see that it works correctly (the product was uploaded via CSV with woocommerce-additional-variation-images plugin enabled). Both Zoom and Video icons work without issues and galleries are not appeared broken anymore at variable products.

Great, we are glad that you sorted it out.

Hi,

Please check the reply I got from github regarding non-export of your “woodmart_variation_gallery_data” with the default CSV Export of WooCommerce:

https://github.com/woocommerce/woocommerce/issues/25187

Thank you.

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