sharedlists replacement

[lentschi]

Referring to @RayOei 's questions here:
#1073 (comment)

There is now a ‘Synchronisation source’ field in the settings of a supplier. A hint is needed as to what form of input is expected there (a URL) and what common URLs to be used in this field look like.

I don't really think we need to describe how the URL may look like - it can be any site really. All it needs to do is respond compliant with the OpenAPI definition - see the description here.

But I do agree, that in this case some explanatory text or even a link to the documentation next to the field might be helpful. If there are any specific suggestions, we could create an issue for it.

Is it only intended for the Foodsoft internal share links?

It's not just internal - any application with the link may use the supplier shared through this link. (Again, see the description linked above.)

The use case for the share link feature is unclear to me: Is it about one foodcoop maintaining the items of one supplier, another relying on it and synchronising with the item list of the first? Are there such cases?

The idea is that you could have both: A central instance of foodsoft, that serves for nothing but sharing suppliers (just as sharedlists currently does) or you could have "normal" foodsoft instances, which share single suppliers amongst them.)

As far as I understand Sharedlists, it is mainly about synchronising article lists without an intermediate step using the wholesaler's lists (in the sense of a merchandise management system).

You could be right. To be honest, we could never reliably who uses it for what. 😅 From an architectural point of view I think it was meant to do what its name suggests: Provide a centralized list of suppliers with their articles, that can be synchronized to an infinite number of foodsoft instances. That's the part that, which we reimplemented - this time directly in foodsoft itself. How the foodcoops usually filled in the lists (whether they used the import formats it provided or just manually entered them), we do not know.

In the installation I am familiar with, Sharedlists mainly uses mail import (e.g. Antakya, Odin) and FTP import in BNN format (e.g. Terra and possibly others such as Kornkraft/ Naturkost Nord). The Terra BNN, XLS or CSV files, for example, are also available via HTTPS, but a login is required first. The synchronisation feature is therefore unlikely to be usable in its current form for many existing food coops. This does not affect the manual import of files, provided Foodsoft supports the format.

I suggest implementing the previous FTP-BNN and mail functionality directly in Foodsoft (without Sharedlists) after consultation with existing foodcoops or wholesalers. (If we agree on this, we should open an issue.)

Yes, this is one of the things we thought, we could do after the merge (to not further bloat the PR) - see the old issue about it:
#1100

[RayOei]

@lentschi I think you meant @robwa?

[lentschi]

Ah, whoops - I did, yes - sorry, got confused 😊

[robwa]

But I do agree, that in this case some explanatory text or even a link to the documentation next to the field might be helpful. If there are any specific suggestions, we could create an issue for it.

Do we want to change this in the MR or as a separate issue afterwards? I ask because this is only a very small improvement. If an issue is the right place, I'll open one. Otherwise I can describe the suggested changes in more detail here.

[lentschi]

I personally think an issue would be the right place (labelled extended units PR of course)

It's just possible it might become superseded, if the ongoing discussion leads to the input field being changed to something else. Still - the issue can't hurt, we can still just close it in the worst case.

[robwa]

Done with #1116

[robwa]

A note is required in the release notes or a comparable document that the existing links to the external sharedlists suppliers will be lost.

And one further question: Is there a place where we can record this information? Is there anything like "release notes" or similar? Some place that might be read when updating to a new version?

[lentschi]

Yes, I think we should just add it to the CHANGELOG.

Or as you have experience actually doing foodsoft releases, @yksflip, is there any better/other place to add it?

[robwa]

Added this as a TODO in #1073.