Introduction

The items you select in the left-side navigation- and search pane are loaded in the main grid. This article explains how you use the main grid to manage items and data.

Open

Main grid toolbar

The toolbar at the top of main grid allows you to customize what you see in the grid and how you see it. We will go through these options first because they are essential tools to understand before you start to manage data.

Open

Expand all/Collapse all

Expand all will expand the item hierarchy to the deepest level. Collapse all will collapse the item hierarchy to the highest level (“roots”).

Layout

Four different Layout options are available.

Table layout is the most condensed layout leaving room for max number of items in the grid. Table layout shows data for each item in a single line. Images are not shown; they are listed with their file name. All data can be edited in table layout.

Grid layout reserves extra height to present each item. This extra height makes it possible to show images visually rather than their file names. All data can be edited in grid layout.

Dynamic layout automatically adjusts the height of each row to make sure all content is shown. This is valuable when working with texts or multivalue features with many values.

Card layout presents items in a single-column card format that respects hierarchies. A card can show up to four values for each item (in this example, an image, the item’s base value and the item name). Data cannot be edited in card layout. The purpose of having cards will become clear when drag-drop and work modes are explained later in this user guide.

Cards are presented differently when base feature is an image AND the image feature does not allow hierarchies. In this case, cards show larger images in a multi-column format like this:

Views

Views are known from the Windows client. They are basically sets of columns grouped together for specific purposes. To select a view, click the View drop-down in the toolbar and find the view you need:

The following view types can be selected:

From the 3-dot menu inside the view selector you have the option to Manage Customized Views:

This opens a grid overlay where you can organize or delete existing views. You can even modify the API query that controls the features included in the view:

Column Chooser

With the Column Chooser you can customize the columns you see in grid. Start by clicking the Column Choose icon in the toolbar:

In the Column Chooser dialogue, you see all available features in the left pane and all selected columns (corresponding to the current view in grid) in the right pane. In this dialogue you have the following option:

Saving a new view

When a view has been changed with the Column Chooser, the View drop-down will show a * and a Save-icon will appear. Click the Save-icon to save the view under a new name (or type the current name again to overwrite the existing view).

Show Family

If you search or filter for specific items, they will be shown in grid without their parent(s) if parent(s) do not match the search criteria. In these situations, Show Family comes in handy. It has two options to bring parent(s) into the grid like this:

Actual search result

Only items specifically matching the search result are shown:

Show Parents

With Show Parents activated, all parents up to highest level are added to the grid. Base value of added parents are shown in italics:

Show Parents and Siblings

With Show Parents and Siblings activated, all parents up to highest level + all direct siblings to items in the original search result are added to the grid. Base value of added parents and siblings are shown in italics:

Filters

With the filter buttons, you can apply and remove a predefined filter or build your own filter. Click “Select Filter” or use shortcut CTRL+ALT+K to open the filter editor:

From the left panel, you can select a predefined filter. Click the filter name to see filter criteria in the right panel:

In this example, three criteria are included in the filter:

• Brand = 0                         // Only normal items will be returned (virtual items are excluded)

• String != DUMMY // Base value must not be equal to DUMMY

• Website HAS                 // A value exists in the Website feature

When you click “Apply”, the item list in the grid is filtered accordingly:

Notice that the View selector shows “Defined by Filter”. This means that the predefined filter contains information about which columns to load in grid when the filter is applied.

To clear the applied filter, click the Clear Filter button or use shortcut CTRL+ALT+L.

Build your own filter

As an alternative to applying a predefined filter, you can build your own filter. Start by clicking the Select Filter button in the toolbar. This opens the Filter editor and preselect “[New]” in the left panel:

In the right panel you see an empty criteria row. You must now select a feature in the first column, an operator in the second column and specify a value in the third column (depending on the selected operator). In the operator column, you can choose between these operators:

Manage Filters

From the 3-dot menu inside the filter selector you have the option to Manage Filters:

This opens a grid overlay where you can organize or delete existing filters. You can even modify the API query that controls the filter:

Multilanguage in grid

By default, the grid only shows data in your data language (see chapter User Settings). This saves space and is useful in many work scenarios. It looks like this (notice how Dynamic layout has been selected to see full texts):

Localized explicit features

If you need to manage translations for localized explicit features, you can add additional languages to grid. This is done with the language selector in the toolbar (the Globe-icon). Check the additional languages you need to add them to the grid. Notice how Subheader and Description now appears in English and German:

Localized selectable features

If you need to verify translations for localized selectable features, you can add localized selectables to grid. This is done with the language selector in the toolbar (the Globe-icon) by checking Selectables together with the languages you need.

This loads localized selectable values as read-only columns in grid. Notice how Color is shown in English and German:

3-dot menu

From the 3-dot menu in the toolbar you have access to a number of functions related to content in grid.

Add New items

Add Item / Add Virtual Item / Add Catalog Item adds a new row of the selected type to the grid. The base value cell of the new item is preselected so you can immediately enter a base value:

Output to file

This option exports all data in grid (rows and columns) in Excel or XML-format. Please refer to the general Feature Data Export for details.

Download Images

This option downloads all images in the grid to a zip-file. Duplicated images in grid are only downloaded once.

The following options are available in the download dialogue:

Download Files

This option downloads all files in the grid to a zip-file. Duplicated files in grid are only downloaded once.

Select all cells

This option simply selects all rows and cells in the grid. It can be useful if you need to perform an operation on all items or if you want to copy all data in grid to Excel (see chapter Copy-Paste Values).

Recycle Bin

This option shows a list of deleted items with same base feature as current grid (e.g. Product). Items can be restored individually.

Please refer to the guide Logging and Recycle Bin for details.

Main grid caption bar

The main grid caption bar displays the captions (names) of the features in the grid:

Change order of features

To move a feature left or right in the grid, simply grab the “handle” that appears when you hover a feature caption and drag it to its new position:

Change column widths

To change the width of a column, simply drag the column by the icon in the bottom right corner:

Managing items

Items can be added, copied, organized in hierarchies, moved, grouped and deleted in a grid.

Add new item

In the previous chapter it was explained how items can be added at root level via the 3-dot menu in the grid toolbar. Items can also be added relative to existing items in a grid. This is done via the right-click menu at item level:

The principle is simple:

• If you add a new item from a Catalog or Virtual item, the new item will be added as a child to the selected item

• If you add a new item from a normal item, the new item will be added as a sibling to the selected item

Copy item

You can copy an item with or without its children via the right-click menu at item level:

The principle is simple:

• If you choose Copy Item, the selected item will be copied without its children

• If you choose Copy Item and Children, the selected virtual item will be copied with its children

Notice that the copy function only copies values determined by your administrator. If a value in a certain feature is not copied from the source to the new item, it is typically because the new item is not allowed to have the same value as the source.

Organize items in hierarchies

If you use hierarchies to manage products and variants, you can move a child item to a new parent with drag and drop.

Consider this example. The item 1210-PEBO clearly has the wrong parent. It should have the virtual item PEBO as parent. To move it, simply click any cell to select the item, drag it to the new parent and drop it. This will remove the item from its current parent and place it under the new parent.

If you want to remove an item from its parents (effectively moving it to root level) you must use the right-click menu. You can’t do this via drag and drop:

Move items

When you have a categorizer in the left panel, you can move items from one category to another by dragging and dropping.

Here is what you do:

• Select an item by clicking any cell in the main grid (selecting a cell automatically also selects the item)

• Select additional items by holding down SHIFT or CTRL and clicking another cell in the same column

• Drag the selected items from right to left and hover the desired new category in the left panel

• Drop the items on the category => items now disappear from the main grid and appear in the new category

Remove item(s) from [categorizer value]

When you have a categorizer in the left panel, you can remove the item from the current categorizer value via the right-click menu. This will effectively move the item to Untagged:

Convert items

Items in grid can be converted to another type (Normal, Virtual or Catalog) via the right-click menu:

Available options in Convert Item(s) dialogue depend on selected items:

• Normal items can be converted to Virtual items

• Normal items can be converted to Catalog items when working in Channels

• Virtual items can be converted to Normal items provided they have no existing children

• Virtual items can be converted to Catalog items when working in Channels

• Catalog items can be converted to Normal and Virtual items provided they have no existing children

Group items

Items in grid can be grouped under a new virtual via the right-click menu:

The new virtual item will have the same parent as the selected items had before they were grouped:

Delete items

If you need to delete one or more items completely from the system, you can do this via the right-click menu at item level:

Managing item data - single-cell editing

In the main grid you can edit data in many ways. The most basic method is single-cell editing where you manage values in one cell at the time. In this section we will go through the different editing options you will meet.

Freeze column

Before you begin editing data in grid, you may want to freeze one or more of the left-most columns. This will help you identify items when you scroll right in large grid.

To freeze one or more columns, simply select a cell in the column you want to freeze, and select Freeze Column in the right-click menu (or use shortcut ALT+Z):

This will introduce a thick line between frozen columns and remaining grid. You can now scroll horizontally without the moving the frozen columns:

To unfreeze columns, simply select Unfreeze columns in the right-click menu or use shortcut ALT+Z.

Edit single-value, explicit features

Single-value, explicit features are typically short texts (strings) and numbers. These can be edited directly in the cell:

To activate edit-mode you can:

• Press F2

• Double-click in the cell

• Simply start typing (will remove current value)

When you are done editing, you can:

• Press Enter to save new value

• Click once in another cell to save new value

• Press Esc to revert to original value

Edit date features

Dates are edited and displayed according to your user settings (see chapter User Options). In this example we assume you use the format dd/mm/yyyy.

When editing a date feature, you can type the following “short versions” in the cell:

• 12 (two digits) + Enter:                        Saved as the 12^th of this month of this year

• 2412 (four digits) + Enter:                   Saved as the 24^th December of this year

• 311224 (six digits) + Enter:                 Saved as the 31^st December 2024

Edit booleans

Booleans can be edited in two ways:

• Click once on the boolean slider icon

• Select the cell and press the Space key

Edit text features

To activate edit-mode for text features you can press F2 or Double-click in the cell.

If Table or Grid layout is selected, the text editor opens in an overlay. If Dynamic layout is selected, text is edited inside the cell.

Edit formulas

Formula features are string or text feature configured to use formulas. Please refer to separate documentation for how to manage formulas.

Edit explicit images and files

Explicit images and files are edited in a model overlay. To activate edit mode, press F2 or double-click the cell:

In edit mode, you have the following options:

Edit selectable features

Selectable features are edited in modal overlays. These open when you:

• Press F2

• Double-click in the cell

• Type the first letter in the value you need

The modal overlay can either be a two-panel selector looking like this:

…or it can be a so called “scene selector” with an added categorizer/search panel to the left:

In the overlay, you will by default see a list of available values in the left (middle) panel, and the selected value(s) in the right panel. You have these options in the overlay:

Filtered values

When you open a modal overlay with selectable values, you may sometimes see a limited set of available values and sometime no available values at all. This will most often mean that the selected features uses filtered values.

With filtered values, the list of available values in one feature can be controlled by the value in another feature. Example:

• The value in the Category feature controls available values in the Color feature:

Filtered values can also be set up to in “chains”. Example:

• The value in the Country feature controls available values in the Region feature

• The value in the Region feature controls available values in the City feature

In this case, the list of available cities could be empty because a region has not been selected:

If a filtered value has a red border in grid, it means that the current value is invalid. This can happen if the validation rule was applied on an existing feature, or via special imports and actions.

In case of invalid values, the modal overlay shows the current value as invalid. You can either remove it or select a valid value from the left panel:

Edit “swapped” data

Swapped data (also known as “Swap Relation Direction” or “SRD”) is a feature type that allows users to manage two-dimensional data in a single feature. This could be the light configuration of an industrial lamp or ingredients on a food product. Two-dimensional data simply means, that data is managed in a grid and not in one of the normal Perfion controls.

Example:

The light configuration of an industrial lamp consists of hundreds of colored lightbulbs. You need to manage how many of each color is in each lamp. There are hundreds of different potential colors, so you do not want one feature per color. In stead, you want to define the Light Configuration feature as a “swapped” feature and manage light configurations in a grid.

When you do this, the Light Configuration feature is shown in grid as a link:

When you click the link, the swapped feature opens in a grid overlay:

In the overlay grid you can manage the two-dimensional light configuration data:

• Add/delete row to create new colors

• For each color, specify the number of light bulbs

The overlay grid works exactly like all other grids. You can use all the tools described in this and related articles.

Previous values

Perfion keeps a full log of all value changes. You can access the list of previous values on any feature and any item by selecting the cell and selecting Previous Values in the right-click menu. In the Previous Values dialogue that appears, you can see all previous values for the selected item and cell. You can restore any value by selecting it and clicking Restore:

View/Download Image(s)

If selected cell(s) in grid include one or more images, you can view these in larger size and download them by selecting View/Download Image(s) from the right-click menu. The overlay that appears shows the first image in the selection. Remaining images in selection can be seen by clicking the arrow or directly on an image thumbnail. Note that duplicate images in grid selection are removed.

From the overlay you have the option to Download All or Download selected image. Both will activate the Download Options overlay. The first option will start a background job that will generate a zip-file with all images. The zip-file can be downloaded from the Jobs menu in the top right corner. The second option will download the selected image directly to the browsers download line.

Download File(s)

If selected cell(s) in grid include one or more files, you can download these by selecting Download File(s) from the right-click menu.

If multiple files are included in grid selection, a background job will start and generate a zip-file with all files. Zip-file can be downloaded from the Jobs menu in the top right corner. If a single file was selected in grid, this will be downloaded directly to the browser's download line.

Open selectable item

Selectable values (i.e. a brand or a color) are themselves items in Perfion. These items can have configured data which you can’t see in the grid. If you need to see or edit this data, you can select Open selectable item from the right-click menu. This will open the selectable item in an item editor overlay and enable you to edit values according to your user rights. Please refer to chapter Item Editor for further information.

Managing item data - Multi-cell editing

You can use multi-cell editing when you need to update multiple items with identical value(s) in the same feature.

Multi-cell editing works with all feature types described above.

Adding values to multiple items

Consider this example. You would like to apply the weight 10.5 kg to all five items in the grid:

Here is what you do:

• Click the top cell in the column to select it

• Hold down SHIFT and click the bottom cell in the column to select all cells

• Hit F2 or simply start typing the value you want to apply

• Hit Enter to save the value => this will apply the value to all selected cells

Deleting multiple values

You can delete values in multiple cells (in the same column) by selecting multiple cells as above and pressing Delete.

Managing item data – Google or DeepL translations

With Perfion you can use built-in integrations with Google Translate or DeepL to translate texts very effectively.

Prerequisite

Your administrator must acquire a license key from Google Translate or DeepL and activate the service in the Perfion backend for the built-in integration to work.

Translating texts in grid

Translating texts in grid is simple. All you need to do is add the target language to grid, select the target cells you want translations for, and choose Translate from the right-click menu (or press ALT+T):

This operation will send the corresponding “master language” texts to the translation service and bring back the translations:

Naturally, you can modify translations just like any other values in Perfion.

Things you need to know about translations:

Feature types that can be translated (localized features only):

Translating texts in item editor

You can also translate texts in the item editor. Please refer to Item Editor for details. 

Copy-paste values

Copying and pasting values can be an effective way to manage product data. Fortunately, this is supported in the main grid, and it works with all feature types.

Copy within grid

As a general rule, only content in one grid cell can be copied within grid. If multiple cells are selected, on content from the cell in focus is copied.

Consider this example. You would like to copy the deadline from the first item to the other four items in grid:

Here is what you do:

• Click the top cell with the deadline you want to copy and press CTRL+C

• Select the four cells below

• Press CTRL+V => this will apply the value to all selected cells

Values can always be copied within same feature (also between languages), but not freely across features. The following cross-feature copy-pasting is allowed:

Copy external value into grid

It is possible to copy a value from an external source (excel, notepad, etc) into a grid cell. To do this, the grid cell must be in edit mode. Here is what you must do:

• Copy the external value to clipboard by pressing CTRL+C

• Select the grid cell you want to paste it into

• Press Delete to delete existing content in cell

• Put the cell in edit mode by pressing F2 or double-clicking in cell

• Press CTRL+V

• Click Enter to save copied value

Copy from grid to external application

You can copy anything from a single cell to an entire grid to an external application. Here is what you must do:

• Select one or more cells in grid

  • Click first cell, hold down shift and then click last cell in range, OR

  • Click first cell, hold down shift and use arrow keya to navigate to last cell in range

• Copy values to clipboard by pressing CTRL+C

• Open external application (e.g. Excel)

• Place cursor where you want to paste values

• Press CTRL+V

Example

Select cells in grid and press CTRL+C:

Paste into Excel:

Grid sorting

You can sort items by each column in the grid (provided that custom sorting is not allowed). Sorting grid data can follow both ascending and descending order, and it can be done by clicking any of the column headers.

A small icon placed on the right side of the column name indicates that sorting is active. It works as follows:

1. Click once to sort in ascending order

2. Click again to sort in descending order

3. Click once more to clear sorting and return to the default grid sorting

Filter items

You can filter items in grid in three different ways.

Select filter from toolbar

See Filters.

Filter by specific value(s)

You can filter items in grid by selecting a cell and choosing Filter by value in the right-click menu:

The above selection will result in a grid showing only items with Color = Aluminium:

This operation can be repeated multiple times. Example: If you filter the above grid by Weight = 1.6, you will end up with a grid showing a single product (#1924-16) that has the color Aluminium and its weight is 1.6 kg.

Filter by any value

This filter option allows you to find items in a grid that match a certain filter string in any feature. All items with a value that matches the input will be shown. If matching items are part of a hierarchy, all its parents will also be shown. This allows you to observe which root the result belongs to.

The figure below shows an example on how to filter right grid items.

Paging

Paging is activated when a grid contains more than 1000 items.

Paging works like this:

• The grid starts by showing the first 1000 root items

  • Items are sorted alphabetically by base value and can thus be both virtual and normal items

• Further items can be reached via the paging buttons

• The Expand All button in toolbar is deactivated if items are in hierarchies

• Individual virtual items can still be expanded

Image and file libraries

In the Items section of the main menu, you may also find image and file libraries (depends on configuration).

Images and files are generally considered as “normal” items in Perfion. This means you can use all the standard tools in the grid toolbar and editing principles as described above when you manage images and files.

A few extra options are however available for images and files.

Add new image(s) or file(s)

You can add new image(s) or file(s) to the library via the 3-dot menu in the toolbar:

This option will promt an “Open” dialogue where you can select one or more images or files:

Perfion will create a new item for each selected image or file and add the image/file as base value:

Drag and drop images or files to grid

As an alternative to using Add from the 3-dot menu, you can also drag and drop (multiple) images/files from Windows Explorer into the grid. This will upload all selected files and link each of them to a new item.

Execute Action on items

Perfion Actions are powerful tools used for a variery of purposes in most Perfion implementations. Actions can import products and data from external sources, export data in many formats, send emails, automate data management inside Perfion and many other things. Actions are custom built to meet the needs of each organization.

Actions can be executed “globally” from the Tools menu (see chapter Execute Actions). In these cases, Actions work independently of user context. But Action can also be executed on user selected items and perform a predefined set of activities only on the selected items (or on items related to the selected items). It works in grids and categorizers.

Execute Action on grid item(s)

Select the grid items you want to execute an action on and choose Execute action on [grid feature] in the right-click menu.

This opens a dialogue where you choose the action you want to execute and whether you want to execute on selected items or on all items in current grid:

The action is now executed by the application server and progress can be monitored in the Jobs list:

When the job is completed, you may need to refresh the grid in the background to see changes done by the action.

Execute Action on categorizer item(s)

Actions can also be executed on categorizer items. This works with item categorizers and channel categorizers. Procedure is the same as described above.

Execute action is found in the right-click menu: