Product option exceptions

When using more than one option groups of the price modifier or product variant types for one product, not all the possible combinations of the options may be actually available. This problem can be handled by setting up exceptions. An exception is a combination of options with which a product cannot be added to the shopping cart.

Example:

You sell t-shirts available in two colors: white and blue. White t-shirts are available in four sizes: S, M, L and XL. Blue t-shirts are available in the sizes S, M, L, but not available in XL.

You set up product variants for the product T-shirt, defining the product option groups as follows:

This leaves you with all the t-shirts available in all the sizes. However, you do not want to allow your customers to order blue XL t-shirts, as there is not such a thing. So, you need to disable the combination 'blue + XL'.

A good way to handle that is to add the said combination to the list of product option exceptions. Then, when a customer selects the color blue and the size XL for a t-shirt, the page will display a message saying that the selected combination of options is unavailable. If, regardless of the message, the customer attempts to add the product to the cart without first changing the options, he or she will get a JavaScript warning pop-up with the same message and will not be allowed to proceed to checkout until the options are readjusted.

Adding product option exceptions

To add a combination of options to the list of product option exceptions:

The 'Add exception' section of the dialog box contains some drop-down boxes titled by the names of the defined option groups.

The combination gets added to the list of unavailable option combinations in the upper section of the 'Product option exceptions' dialog box:

Deleting product option exceptions

To delete one or more product option exceptions:

Product options validation

The dialog box titled 'Validation script (Javascript)', which is located in the 'Product Options' section, allows you to provide JavaScript validation for product options. The text area provided in this dialog box is intended for adding JavaScript code that you wish to be called when a customer selects a certain combination of options.

Validation JavaScript code can be typed into the text area of the 'Validation script (Javascript)' dialog box directly or pasted from clipboard. To save the code entered into the text area, click the Update button.

For example, talking about the same t-shirts and the combination of options that we chose to be unavailable (Blue + XL), you may wish to add some code that would produce a JavaScript warning (like "Sorry, the combination of Blue and XL is not available currently. Please check back later") on the screen when someone tries to add a blue XL t-shirt to the cart.

The following code sample highlights the use of JavaScript for creating a JavaScript warning:

var value = product_option_value("Color");

var value2 = product_option_value("Size");

if (value !== false && value == "Blue" && value2 !== false && value2 == 'XL') {

    alert("Sorry, the combination of Blue and XL is not available currently. Please 

check back later");

    return false;

}

In the above code sample, Color and Size are option group names in the default admin language, Blue and XL - names of specific option values in the default admin language (Note that some users may prefer using ClassId numbers instead of option group names).

The return false statement at the end stops the submission of the form, which results in the product not getting added to the cart. However, if we use return true instead, the warning message becomes merely informative and the customer is allowed to proceed to checkout.