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dpw13
(stranger )
06/01/07 08:31 PM
Auction consolidation between installations  

Hi everyone,

My mom has used Auction Wizard for quite a few years now and she loves it. I've also been tech support since quite a while before that =). She and my stepfather already have a small staff to do some basic listing for them so that they can enjoy the best parts of selling on eBay (buying neat stuff and getting money for it). They go on buying trips while the staff at home creates new listings. The problem is that the auctions have gotten all split up between three Auction Wizard installations.

So my question is this: is there any way (currently or planned for the future) to integrate auctions from several installations into a single installation or backup? They recently bought a new computer and I was considering using that as a central server, but they have to have the ability to access their auction data when they're out of town. They would also need to be able to list new auctions that would get re-integrated back into the central database when they returned home.

They could of course just use various methods to access the networked drive while traveling (VPN, etc), but if they were going to do that they might as well remote desktop. In either case, they wouldn't be able to check previous auctions unless they had an internet connection. Even if that problem was solved, there's still the problem of integrating the three sets of auction items into one easier-to-manage-and-backup database.

So is there any chance of integrating auction items from different databases into a single database, either now or in the future?

Thanks!



bluepennylady
(veteran)
06/01/07 08:43 PM
Re: Auction consolidation between installations new [re: dpw13]  

Hi,

Glad to hear your auction business is growing. That is good news!

There isn't a method to merge several databases into one. And I am not aware of any plans in the future. But there may very well be a solution to the problem.

Are all three using different user id's? Well, even if they are not, you can always set up the server, add all their user id's and then import the auctions. I am sure you are aware that no images are imported and so there is some clean up work to do. But all the information would be on the server. And you could move forward.

As far as access. I finally went ahead and got remote access. And I went with http://www.logmein.com

It is dogcheap and super fast. As long as I have internet access, I can work. And frankly, there is hardly a place in any town that doesn't have internet access. And for those places that do not, we have a cell phone internet card with unlimited minutes on it through Verizon. My husband uses that all of the time.

Logmein has a free edition if you don't need the ability to remote print and file share. My daughter in law uses the free edition for running her Aw2000. I have the Pro but only because I need remote printing and file sharing when I travel.

Does that give you any help at all??

Judy/blue



Ned
(member)
06/02/07 11:55 AM
Re: Auction consolidation between installations new [re: dpw13]  

It should be possible to integrate Inventory by exporting from one DB and importing to another. The imported Inventory would have different Inventory Item #s, but I think if you do the prep on things like inventory categories, it ought to work.

I speak with some confidence about the Inventory merging because I've recently been doing that kind of thing.

Facilities to export and import Inventory records, auction lots, and invoice data exist. See Tools/Database Tools/Export and /Import.

Facilities to export but not import Buyer Data and some other stuff exist.

If you have enough records to justify the development effort, a macro generator like Auto Hot Key might be able to read the exported data and key it in to AW2K. This is really cool, but making it work right is real work.

Personally, if we're talking about merging a 100 records into a DB, I'd just do it by hand. 1,000 or more, and I'd work on an automated approach. In between, your call. Keep in mind that you can hire someone to key stuff in. You could also choose to let the old data run down in an existing database and do all new stuff in the consolidated machine, thus gradually "moving" the database.

This is no toy effort. You can do it, but you'll have to plan, test ideas, take notes, and be careful. It would be useful to set up an entirely separate machine for the project so that day-to-day activities aren't affected. That project machine could end up being the server for the consolidated database.

I can't stress this highly enough--make copies of all the databases, especially the one to be the consolidated one, and work on those copies. Even if everything works, you'll make a few missteps along the way. If it doesn't work, you want the easiest possible way out of it.

If it sounds like I'm overstating the situation ("Those pros think everything is tough."), I'm not. I know what I'm talking about, having done this sort of thing right a couple of times and wrong a few more. In one case, merging 45,000 large and complicated records into an existing 2.5 million record database required 7 full-time weeks of preparation for the run. And this was a situation where I was considerably more efficient than I would have been in most corporations, so the time reflects real work being done, not coping with Dilbert's pals.


Something you will want to look into if the 3 existing databases implement eBay Stores. The AW2K help says "Note: The Store Category list is shared by all Auction Profiles".

Good luck, and keep us posted on this,
Ned




AuctionWizardAdministrator
(Auction Wizard Team)
06/04/07 09:01 AM
Re: Auction consolidation between installations new [re: dpw13]  

There isn't a way to fully merge two databases together into a single database. You should be able to get some basic Auction Lot information, such as the Description and category, from one database into another database. However, some important information such as images and buyer information cannot be included. The process is basically a work around for manually re-creating the Auction Lots in a different database.

Export the Auction Lot data from one database to a CSV file, then import the data from that CSV file into the other database. See Exporting, Auction Lot Records to a CSV File and Importing, Auction Lots from a CSV File in the help index for more information.

Remember to backup both databases before you begin. That way you can revert back to your original databases if the process does not work the way you intended.

Auction Wizard 2000 will not run over a VPN. You can use remote control software such as Windows Remote Desktop, PC Anywhere, or GoToMyPC.com. See Networking Auction Wizard 2000 in the help index for more information.

-- The Auction Wizard Team


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