Simple Hardware Without Options

The goal of this administration use case is to add a new offer to the Service Request Shop. We will add a simple product without options, the product will belong to the Additional Hardware category.

1. Let's assume that a a suitable offer package for additional hardware already exists. Open the offer package. Make sure that the offer package is active (attribute 'Status' = 'Current') and valid (attributes 'Valid From' and 'Valid To' in relation to the current date). This is necessary for the offer(s) to be available in the Shop.

   In the 'Shop Offers' tab you can see a list of shop offers currently existing in the offer package. Note that belonging to a particular offer package does not determine the category in which the offer is found in the Shop. This is determined by a special 'Service Shop Categories' attribute on the shop offer.

2. Add a new offer to the offer package.

   The 'Shop Offers' section offers two buttons for offer creation: 'Create Common' and 'Create...'. Action 'Create Common' creates a simple offer of a default "common" item type. It is ideal e.g. for demonstration purposes where item type is not important. Action 'Create...' launches the full version of offer creation wizard.

   As we want to be able to select a "real" item type in this use case, we will use action 'Create...'.

3. The shop offer creation wizard starts. In the first step, select the shop offer model:
   • Simple Service - creation of a simple offer with no additional options. (Suitable for this use case.)
   • Service with Options - creation of a more complex offer with options or option groups. The Configurator page will be used to request this offer in the Shop. (See use cases 'Simple Hardware With Options' and 'Complex Hardware With Option Groups' for more details.)
   • Service with Change Details - creation of a complex offer which cannot be specified simply by choosing from predefined options. (See use case 'Service With Change Details' for more details.)

   To add a simple hardware product without options, double-click 'Simple Service' in the first step of the wizard.

4. Choose the source of the offer.

   In the next step, select what will be the source of the new offer:

   • Common Service - simplified offer creation as described in step 2 above (duplicate starting point)
   • From existing service item type - if a suitable item type already exists in the Valuemation database. The offer will be created on the basis of the selected item type.
   • From new service item type - if a suitable item type does not exist yet. A new item type will be created and the offer based on it.
   • Copy master offer - if a suitable master offer already exists. The new offer will be created as a copy of the master offer.
   • Copy existing offer - if a suitable similar offer already exists. The new offer will be created as a copy of the other offer.

   In this example use case, we will add an offer for which a new item type needs to be created. Select 'From new service item type' in the wizard and click 'Ok'.

5. Select item class for the offer. What type of product will it be?

   Item Types in your database should be grouped into Item Classes according to the type of product they represent. In this step we need to select an item class suitable for the product we are adding to the shop. Let's add a monitor cable. The closest suitable item type in our example database is 'PC Equipment'. (If need be, a new item type could be added in sidebar folder 'Classification Data' / catalog 'Item Classes' / action 'Create'. However, creation of this type of classification data should always be done by a responsible person in a way consistent with overall company processes.)

   Select 'PC Equipment' and click 'OK'. An editor for creation of a new item type opens.

6. Specify the item type.

   The Item Type object has many attributes. In this use case, we will consider those relevant for adding a service to the shop.

   • Item Type (main language) - name of the item type. Note that the actual name of the product displayed in the Shop can be specified independently - see next steps.
   • Class - item class already selected in the previous step, keep the value
   • Create Components - as we are adding a hardware product, 'Create Components' should be selected (default).

     With 'Create Components' selected, the item type editor will contain a 'Component Types' tab. Because we are creating a new item type for the product, no corresponding component type is likely to exist, either. To add one or more component types to the item type, use the 'Create' action in the reference catalog in the 'Component Types' tab. However, component types creation is not directly related to requesting - the assignment/creation of component types is not a necessary step in adding an offer to the Shop.

   • Orderable - make sure this check box is selected (default).
   • URL in Shop - link to a web page with additional product information (manufacturer web pages, internal company pages, etc.). It is recommended to provide a link to additional product information.
   • Description - product description or service description, as appropriate.
   • Shop Picture - picture used with all related offers which do not have their own specific picture. If there is no picture assigned to an item type, item class picture will be inherited.
7. Click 'Ok' in the item type editor to finalize the new item type creation. A warning message gets displayed. It informs you that the new offer has been added to the offer package but its actual creation must be finalized by saving the offer package itself. Click 'Ok' in the message and save the offer package.
8. Fine-tune the new shop offer.

   It is time to finalize the shop offer in the context of the offer package. Some of the edits can be done by inplace editing in the 'Shop Offers' reference catalog, for some it will be necessary to open the shop offer by double-clicking it in the catalog.

   • Name

     Name of the offer as displayed in the Shop. The default name is taken over from the item type.

   • Order of the shop offers

     It is possible to reorder the offers using the up & down arrows at the top of the 'Shop Offers' section.

   • Service Shop Category

     The default category has been taken over from the 'Default Offer Category' of the item class. If it is necessary to change the default, open the offer and change the category in the 'Categories' tab of the Shop Offer editor. One offer can belong to more than one categories. In the context of the Shop it means that the same product will be listed under several shop categories.

     In our 'Generic DVI Cable' use case, the default category was 'Extra Devices'. We want the cable to be listed under 'Additional Hardware'. It is necessary to open the offer for editing, go to the 'Categories' tab, remove 'Extra devices' from the list and use the 'Search and assign existing service Shop Category (+)' button to assign category 'Additional Hardware'. Click 'Ok' to save the offer and close the editor.

   • Tags

     It is possible to specify search tags for each offer. Tags are intended to broaden the scope of search terms leading to the product or service. For example, a notebook PC whose name does contain the word 'notebook' may benefit from having the word 'laptop' added as its tag.

     Notes:
     - The end user does not see the tags anywhere in the GUI, they are only used for searching.
     - No separators are necessary between individual tags in the 'Tags' field of the shop offer editor.
     - Standard Valuemation translations are not used for the tags. It is necessary to supply tags for all relevant languages together with tags in the main language.

   • Price and Conditions

     This offer editor section contains all relevant price, quantity and validity attributes.

   • BPM Correlation Key

     This attribute is related to underlying BPM processes. In this use case, let's specify the same correlation key as the one used for offers in the same category - hardware.

   Click 'Apply' in the offer package editor to save the changes.

9. Check Offers

   It is recommended to run Valuemation Data Check on the newly created offer. Button 'Check Offers' at the bottom of the offer package editor calls Valuemation Data Check functionality for the shop offers belonging to the offer package.

   1. In the offer package editor, call button 'Check All...'.
   2. A browser listing relevant defined data checks opens.
   3. Select which data checks should be performed and click 'Ok'.
   4. Data check runs and a dialog informing about the results gets displayed.

   Note that in addition to the standard defined data checks for offer, new data checks can be defined. See the 'Data Check' topic for more information.

   It is also possible to run data check only for one or more selected shop offer(s). To do so, select the offer(s) in the 'Shop Offers' tab and use right-click context menu action 'Data Check - Selected'.

   At this point, the product has been successfully added to the Shop.

Test the result

There are two ways to test the result:

• Right-click the newly created offer in the 'Shop Offers' tab and use right-click context menu action 'Preview in Shop'. Action 'Preview in Shop' makes it possible to preview a newly created shop offer directly during the process of its creation. See 'Customization Preview' for more information.
• Open the Service Request Shop and locate the newly created offer.
  1. Still in the 'SRM Catalogue Manager' business view, open the Shop by calling the 'Request Product or Service' sidebar action.
  2. Go to the 'Additional Hardware' category. You should see 'Generic DVI Cable' as the third product in the category.
  3. Click 'Select' to open the product in the Configurator.

  In the Configurator you should see:

  • 'Generic DVI Cable' - name specified for the shop offer in the 'Shop Offers' reference catalog on offer package or directly in the shop offer editor. (Step 8)
  • Product image - entered as 'Shop Picture' for the item type
  • Product page link - the link is displayed because a hyperlink has been entered as 'Product Page in Shop' for the item type
  • Product description - the text entered for the item type
  • Base Price - price specified for the offer or possibly inherited from the item type