Order editing conflicts (multiple users)

[Jörgen]

Editing joomla articles is NOT the sane as editing a VM order. The VM order has a lot of related tables, ,the Joomla article usually none. A joomla article is not beeing updated by a user in front end. Tables related to VM order table are beeing updated from the front end at runtime. Every new order updates a lot of VM tables related to VM order table. Locking these tables out may cause conflicts that have greaterd impact than just two staff editing the same order.

Just my two cents.

Jörgen

[EvanGR]

Perhaps the problem can be minimized by better business process (i.e. better communication between staff), but it's still there.

We split order pages to employees for processing...
Person 1 does page 1.
Person 2 does page 2.
etc...

But it's not foolproof... as orders keep coming in, the content changes.


I am not saying this is a simple issue to solve! (it's not)... I am only saying that it's a real issue, and definitely becomes larger as the company scales up.

If not at 5.... then 10 employees handling orders? Without double-processing mistakes? Not a chance.

A simpler (but not simple) way to solve this is by showing an indication (through AJAX, with background checks) that an order is being processed by someone else. Not enforcing locks or anything.

The current implementation cannot scale. It is suitable for a one-man show, or a small team with good communication on order processing.

[Jörgen]

There is a way of getting around this in some way. Before the editted record is updated you will make a test and see if the recird that originally was read has been modified. If it has the update will not ne executed. To minimize any loopholes this should be done in the same server request that is used for the update. And the result should be checked. If the update went through noone else has updated the record before this call. Otherwise your update is rejected.

The solution will stop the background data from being overwritten. This may be worth considering by the VM team, but I have no idea of the size of scope for this task.

Jörgen @ Kreativ Fotografi

[pinochico]

then 10 employees handling orders?

is question, why this company not using ERP (SAP, Helios,...) but edit order in VM admin?
Because if 10 people editing orders, then must be big big company, and then process with editing order only in administration are by my think is wrong

We have 8 shop for one customer (max 30 people working in company) and for editing orders have easy solutions:

Orders edit 3-4 people by status
- staff if status is status1 or status2 - then create labels, orders for shipping companies and next change status to status3
- invoicing peoples edit order if status is status3 (creating invoice in ERP) and then change status to status4
- sales manager edit order anytime
- automatic process edit order after order is payied, then change status from basic to status1 or status2
- admin edit order anytime

Of course, everything develop is possible, but back to start - is convertible for customer develop 30-100 hours for creating system for editing order?
I think the best option is using SAP or other ERP.

[EvanGR]

is question, why this company not using ERP (SAP, Helios,...) but edit order in VM admin?
Because if 10 people editing orders, then must be big big company, and then process with editing order only in administration are by my think is wrong

Thank you pinochico. Yes, for a big company they need a different solution.
We had problems (=human mistakes) with editing orders, and we only have 3 employees managing the order processing.

We use an ERP also, but for other logistical tasks. It is not great for order processing, because it is too complex... Virtuemart is a lot better, and easy to understand.
And it can get very expensive for a small business to use a powerful ERP like SAP.

We have 8 shop for one customer (max 30 people working in company) and for editing orders have easy solutions:
Orders edit 3-4 people by status

This is probably a smart way to do it!


Thank you very much (everyone) for the feedback.

[pinochico]

yep,

edit order by status - for this solution we use color for order.
Very simple  - aopen Order list, edit only order with color = XXX

##EDIT by admin - removed image - potential customer data disclosure