Product Management Component
I organized and designed a new way of managing products technical specifications (500+ items) by developing a multi-language component for the company's website (PHP/MySQL) that uses .csv files to import all the products specifications on the website (in a MySQL db as JSON data), .csv file that is also in Indesign, where the data is used to generate catalogs and brochures.
Working with technology products that have many technical specifications may be challenging for people in marketing or R&D, especially when the company has 500+ medical devices with lots of precise specifications, and where a few millimeters is the only difference between one product and another.
In this cases, having all the specifications for all the products in one place and getting all the data for both marketing and R&D from the same source is crucial in eliminating any human error and any miscorrelations between various marketing materials and documents, like having a diameter of 1.5mm showing on a product leafleat, 1.4mm showing in the paper datasheet and 1.6mm showing on the website.
This component allows multiple products to be imported and exported as a .csv file in the MYSQl database. Each product was stored in a row in the table and each specification was added as label and value field in that row. The .csv file was used as a common source for both online media, such as website products page or various landing pages, and for offline media, such as printed datasheets, brochures, product catalog, s.o.
The csv type of file was choosed because it's easy to use with Adobe Indesign, wich is a widely used software for the design of documents, catalogs and brochures.
Adobe Indesign has a function called Data Merge that allows you to use a csv or a text file as a source for the data you add in the document. You then create a template of the document, where you add the field name in the template and Indesign will generate separate design files, images or pdfs for each row in the csv file.
REST API technology is implemented to allow multiple landing pages and partner websites to get the product data and display the same specifications on their website.
This component is currently redesigned and will be available in 2023 as a Joomla Component and as a plain MVC project.
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