1. Contents
  2. Getting started
  3. Your first transfer

Your first transfer

The channel is in place, and the connection checks out. Now something runs for the first time: this page guides you through your first transfer, from choosing the right task through starting it by hand to reading the result in the traces.

Prerequisites

  • A connected channel whose Connect button reports success. Connecting your first channel shows the way there.
  • The tasks for that channel. We created those together with it, so there is nothing for you to do.

If the task you expect is not in the list, ask us. We create the tasks you actually need for a channel: whoever puts their range from TRADElube into the shop rarely needs a Products Download next to it, because staying with one direction spares you the question of which side is right when the two disagree. There are exceptions, and we set those up.

Choosing the right task

The navigation entry Tasks holds one row per task.

Task list with the Execute button active and the columns up to the state of the last execution

A task is named after its Channel and its Action, and those two are the first columns. You cannot give it a name of your own. The Performance column says how often the task runs by itself, or Manually if it is waiting for you to start it. The columns further right record when the last execution happened and how it ended. On a task that has never run they stay empty. Channels and tasks covers every column of the list.

An export writes into the connected system, and nobody tidies up after you there. Start with a task that fetches data, if the channel has one, an import of orders for instance: an import only ever writes into your own client.

Stock has a task of its own and does not travel with the products, in an online shop Stocks Upload next to Products Upload. That is deliberate: a stock level changes many times more often than an article description, which is why its Performance sits at Fastests while the products run at Normal. If the stock levels are missing in the shop after a product upload, that is the first task to look at.

Starting the task

Select the row. That activates the button Execute, and clicking it starts the task right away.

If the execution takes a while, you watch the progress run along, with the share of records already handled. Next to it sits Cancel.

Task list with the progress of a running execution and the Cancel button

Canceling does no damage. The task stops where it stands, and the next execution carries on from there. The reason lies in the way it is built: the state belongs to the individual record, not to the execution.

At the end TRADElube shows a short message: Execution finished, No changes done. or the failure. If the execution changed anything, the dialog Traces opens as well, holding exactly its records, one row per record. Your first result comes to you, there is no need to go looking for it.

The Traces dialog after an execution, with one row per modified record

Why start by hand when there is a schedule? Because you want to be there the first time. A schedule is there so that you no longer have to think about it later, and that is a different matter from the first execution of a freshly configured task. Starting by hand stays useful afterwards too: it picks up everything that failed last time instead of waiting for the next scheduled slot. Why that is so is explained under tasks.

Checking the result in the traces

The dialog after the execution shows that one only, and it is gone as soon as you close it. What has been transferred altogether sits under the navigation entry Traces, and there it stays available.

Traces with all five states ticked and one row per record

It holds one row per record and run, with State, Context (channel and task), Details (which record) and the two points in time Executed At and Changes At.

On opening, the traces show only the failed transfers, because that is the order to read them in: first, whatever did not get through. The checkboxes above, Neutral, Created, Modified, Removed and Failed, add the remaining states. After a first execution without failures the list is therefore empty, and that is the good news.

The state belongs to the individual record, not to the execution. A task can sit in the list as Successful and still have left individual failed records behind. That is deliberate: an execution is not all-or-nothing. Whatever did not get through stays open and is attempted again next time. The full account is under traces.

Common stumbling blocks

  • The execution succeeded but nothing was transferred. The message No changes done. is the normal case as soon as everything has been transferred once: TRADElube only transfers what has changed. Start the same task twice in a row and the second one does nothing, and that is why an execution over thousands of products takes seconds instead of hours.
  • The execution succeeded but individual records failed. See above: the state belongs to the record. The failed ones sit in the traces, and troubleshooting explains what to make of them.
  • The execution fails immediately and completely. That usually comes down to the credentials or to the target system being unreachable. The button Connect on the channel answers both in seconds, see connecting your first channel.

Further reading