Reuse your settings with a mapping template

Example: Atelier Démo exports its WooCommerce products in three files, one per category (ceramics, textiles, stationery), to convert them to Shopify. On the first file, it changes the destination of two columns with Edit and adds a transformation in Edit the data. It wants the same settings for the other two files.

What a template keeps

• It keeps: the mappings of the table at the Mapping step, the changes made in Edit the data and in Edit the output file (cells edited by hand included), and where your custom fields go.
• It does not keep: the Variant stock, the collection tags for Shopify, the SKU generator, or changes made on a known or learned format.
• It applies to one pair of platforms, for example from WooCommerce to Shopify, and it is saved on this computer.

On a platform export, a choice made with Edit for a column the Converter reads by default only applies to the current file: to get it back on the next file, you need a template. A choice made for another column is remembered on this computer, for every column with the same name. A template is also useful to replay your changes in one go, and to pass your settings to another computer.

Save a template

1. Set up the Mapping step on the first file: mappings, transformations, custom fields.
2. At the top of the screen, click Save as template.
3. In the Template name field, keep the suggested name, the file’s name, or type another one, for example “Woo to Shopify, catalogue”.
4. Click Save: the message “Template saved.” confirms it.

Apply the template to the next file

1. Start a new conversion with the same pair of platforms, and drop the next file at the File step.
2. At the Mapping step, click Apply a template.
3. Read the warning in the window: “Your column mappings and changes are replaced by those of the template you pick.”
4. Click your template’s name.

If the file lacks some of the template’s columns, a message names them, for example “Columns missing from this file: Meta: matiere”. If no template exists for this pair of platforms, a message under the buttons says so and reminds you how to create one.

Check the result

Look at Preview of converted rows and the First row as Shopify will receive it box: they follow the applied template, like the exported file. Today, when the template holds no data changes, the table of columns may still show the old mapping: it updates at your next choice with Edit. Rely on the preview.

Manage your templates

The Mapping templates screen, in the side bar, shows one card per template: its name, the number of saved mappings, the pair of platforms and the date it was changed. A template also keeps the changes to the data and to the output file, and where your custom fields go. The number on a card only counts the saved mappings.

• Duplicate adds a copy of the template to the list.
• Export saves the template to a .eloshon.json file, where you choose.
• Import a template, at the top of the screen, reads a .eloshon.json file made with Export, on this computer or another. If the chosen file is not a template, a technical error message in English appears today.
• The bin icon (Delete) opens the Delete this template? window: Conversions already done are unchanged. This cannot be undone.

A template can only be applied from the Mapping step. The Mapping templates screen lets you neither rename nor edit a template. To change one, apply it at the Mapping step, make your changes, save it under a new name with Save as template, then delete the old one. Saving under a name already taken creates a second template, without replacing the first.