Plugin features

1. Import of catalog with subcategories and products.
2. Import of pictures, videos and product descriptions.
3. Import of product attributes.
4. Import of product configurations with aliases and pictures.
5. Import of product price ranges and old/discount price.
6. Import of product reviews and ratings.

System requirements

1. Otapiphpclient library (https://github.com/OTCommerce/otapiphpclient.git). Already available installation archive of the module with all dependencies for php 7.4.
2. PHP 7.4 for OpenCart3.
3. To automatically update products on a schedule: scheduler (cron). 
4. MySQL Database.

Installation

Before plugin installation it is strongly recommended to create backup copy of website and database files.

Go to “Extensions” section → “Installer” in admin panel of your OpenCart store and click “Upload” button.

Select downloaded module archive and confirm installation. Wait for a message about successful installation.

Go to "Sуstem" section → "Users" → "User Groups"

Go to administrator group settings and check boxes extension/module/otapi_import and extension/module/otapi_import_cron in “Access Permission” and “Modify Permission” sections. Save settings.

Go to “Extensions” section → “Extensions”.

Choose extension type "Modules" in drop-down menu.

Click "Install" button for "OT API Import" module.

Go to “Extensions” section → “Modifications” and click "Refresh" button on top right.

Module is installed.

Scheduled product update

1. Manually copy cli directory from the module archive to the directory where admin folder is located.
2. To automatically update products on a schedule, you need to set up cron job to run with a frequency equal to or less than the value of product update launch period (this is Update interval parameter in module settings - update interval in minutes).
3. Example of running cron job every hour:
   @hourly cd "opencart directory"/cli && php7.4 otapi_import_cli.php > /dev/null 2>&1
4. Importing a large number of goods can take a long time - from several hours to several days, depending on server computing resources, especially database server. Therefore, too frequent launch intervals do not make sense: if the previous import has not yet been completed, the new one will still not be launched.

Work with plugin

Go to “Extensions” section → “Extensions”.

1. Click "Edit" button for "OT API Import" module. (A shorter path to the module settings is also available through “Catalog” → “OT API Import”.)
2. Make necessary settings and click "Save settings".
3. To quickly fill catalogs with products, it is recommended to check “Test category filling” box and set “Frame size” parameter - 5-10 products. This is the number of uploaded products for each category.
4. Make initial uploading of product catalogue: go to "Catalog" → "OT API Import" and click "Catalog import".
5. After the test import is completed, check that all directories of catalog are downloaded and contain goods. Remove check mark «Test category filling» after that, set «Frame size» 200-500 and make full import of catalog.
6. Once the import is complete, a message that catalog has been successfully loaded will be displayed.

Important notes:

1. Import will continue as long as the page is open in the browser.
2. If you refresh the page or log in again, you must click "Catalog import" button again to resume importing.
3. In this case system will prompt you to select “New import” (Start import from the beginning) or “Continue import” (continue work from the point where the import was suspended).
4. In some cases, “Failed to get "otapi_import_lock" on sql connection, another import is running" message may appear when import starts - this means that import has already started by another process, for example, via cron, or was launched earlier in another browser tab.
5. Import via cron works cyclically, i.e. once completed, import will be started again. If you don’t need this behavior, you can disable import in module settings after a complete catalogue import: status field or simply set cron to a larger interval, for example, 1 week.

Removal

1. Remove the task from cron to run product updates.
2. Go to “Extensions” section → “Extensions” and click "Uninstall" button for "OT API Import" module.
3. Go to “Extensions” section → “Installer" and click "Uninstall" button for "OT API Import" module.
4. Go to “Extensions” section → “Modifications" and click "Update" button.
5. Delete cli directory if you added it.