The standard integrations cover most e-commerce processes. If your business process deviates from them, a customization extends the integration exactly where you need your own rule. The standard itself remains unchanged.
A customization adapts a standard integration. This article does not describe your own automations with Xentral Flows that do not extend an integration.
A customization is a custom flow in Xentral Flows that hooks into a standard integration at a designated point. Examples of such extension points are before or after the assignment of an order, after the order import, when creating a customer, for product master data, images, and custom fields, as well as for stock levels, prices, and tracking.
When the standard integration reaches such a point, it calls your customization, applies its changes to the data, and then continues as usual. This way, you do not have to rebuild the standard integration. You only add your own rule.
Typical examples from practice:
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Filtering orders: Exclude certain orders from the import, for example based on tags in the shop.
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Converting discounts: Convert percentage discounts from the sales channel into fixed discount amounts during the import.
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Completing addresses: Use the shipping address as the billing address if the sales channel does not send a billing address.
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Adjusting taxes regionally: Recognize orders from special regions and import them with the tax rate that applies there, for example Corsica within France.
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Adjusting stock levels: Subtract a safety buffer from the transferred stock level or apply your own warehouse logic.
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Adjusting product data: Change the product name, description, or properties before they are transferred to the sales channel.
If your products are particularly individual, for example configurable products, personalized products with engraving or printing, or variable bills of materials, a customization is usually required.
Note
Smarty templates from the previous shop interfaces do not work with the new integrations. You implement individual adjustments with customizations in Xentral Flows.
Depending on whether you want to build it yourself or need support, you have two options:
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Having it created: The Xentral Consulting team or your Xentral partner analyzes your requirement, creates a quote for you, and implements the customization.
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Building it yourself: You create customizations yourself with the Flow Editor. For this, you need the new service description. Basic technical experience is important, for example with API concepts, JSON, or other automation tools.
For both options, describe as specifically as possible the point of the integration where you need a different rule and what should happen to the data. A sample order or sample product helps with this.
Customizations can create their own entries in the import/export journal under Automation > Journal using the journal component. This way, you see their transfers in the same place as those of your standard integrations. See the article Import/export journal.