Persistent Filtered Search on Brand Pages

Hi,
Can you tell me where we are at with being able to safely use Persistent Filtered Search panel on a brand page? My understanding is it is supposed to be in the Early Adopters version but it doesn’t work. I have tried to get it to work on our demo store which is on beta version but no panel pops up on that either.
This is limiting us getting suppliers to link to our site as the brand landing pages contain hundreds if not thousands of products.
When can I expect filters to work with brands?
Thanks,
Emma

Can we see an example page that isn’t working on a beta store, please, Emma?

Hi Donogh,

Sure: http://broughtons.demostore.nitrosell.com/store/search/brand/From-The-Anvil/

I turned on a couple of the filter groups yesterday to test this, so I’ve given enough time to propagate I assume. I see you have now turned on all groups anyway, but we wouldn’t want that in the real world.

Emma

Hi Donogh,

So it started working in the last couple of mins - but with ALL groups showing. Can we work backwards and only select some of the filter groups please - you can see we wouldn’t want all of them in the real world.

Emma

Emma,

I’ve unrestricted the display of PFS on search pages. This was restricted by an If Statement in your Design Templates.

Please see it working here: http://broughtons.demostore.nitrosell.com/store/search/brand/Edwardian-Electrical-Switches-%26-Sockets/

Emma,

I enabled all of them to confirm their display. You may disable individual filters in your WSM here: http://broughtons.demostore.nitrosell.com/store/administration/config_filteredsearch.nsc

Hi guys,

Understood - so “search pages” unfortunately include brand. Neil put that in for us because of the bugs we were getting on our live store on the site search results page with the wrong filters coming up and it just behaved terribly. I will test that then on beta. Thanks for the prompt response.

Emma

Hi Guys,

So I’ve tested the site search results page and it still has the same bug:

To see go to http://broughtons.demostore.nitrosell.com/store/search.asp

Type in “black door knob” (without the quotes) into the search box.

22 black door knobs are returned - fantastic.

The filters however are a nonsense and if you try and use them it gets worse.

@Donogh knowing what I know now, I would say its done a boolean search but the filters are showing results for an OR based search. This was why Neil hid the panel.

We really need that fixing if we are to be able to leverage the filters on the brand page - can you see my problem?

Emma

Hi @donogh,

So how can we move forward with this - to get PFS on our brand pages. Is there any way to give me brand filtering but mask out site search filtering or when are you going to look at the site search filter bug?

Thanks,
Emma

Hi Emma,

This needs to be added to the dev queue for investigation. We have a long queue currently. We’ll update you when we can.

Regards,
Donogh

Hi @donogh,

Thanks for the reply. I am surprised you say it needs to be added to the dev queue for investigation. This was raised as an issue on ticket #81144 way back in January 2014 and was “raised with the development team” back then. So its been in the queue for 16 months already as far as I’m concerned and I’ve already waited more than long enough by any standards.

Just as a general point, can I ask if you put bug fixes in the same dev queue as enhancements? It seems unfair if you do - shouldn’t bugs be fast tracked?

I appreciate you’re keeping many plates spinning and have a diverse set of demands on your dev teams time, but from my point of view as a customer I don’t think I should be made to wait indefinitely for bug fixes to features that you sell your solution on the basis of.

Emma

I hadn’t realised you were referring to ticket #81144. Frankly, this feature was released in beta and never functioned as expected so it should not have graduated out of beta. I will ensure it gets removed for now, until it can be entirely re-written in a future PFS release. Sorry for the misunderstanding.

That feature has been disabled now. We regret that it did not meet your expectations, Emma, and we will endeavour to release a more fully functional version when our dev schedule allows.

Hi @donogh,

Just to clarify, what feature has been disabled - filters on brands or filters on site search?

If the answer is both, can I just ask one final time to double check because the frustrating thing is the bit I want does actually seem to work - is there any way to decouple site search PFS and brand PFS, along the lines of:

IF pageID = search
{
IF myURL contains “brand” show filter panel
ELSE hide filter panel
}

(Not proper Nitroscript but you get my meaning :slight_smile: )

Thanks,
Emma

Hi Emma,

We disabled filters on search pages in general. So you’d rather we left filters on brand and theme pages in place, but not filters on site search?

Regards,
Donogh

Hi @donogh,

That is correct I am only interested in filters on brand pages - I couldn’t care less about filters on site search (but if they are there, they absolutely need to work). On themes I am indifferent - we have no need for them
but if they were there and worked, that would be fine.

So if you can give me brand filters without site search filters I would be happy.

And to ask the initial question I asked again - is it safe to use them on brand pages or are there known bugs with using them?

Thanks,
Emma

Let me bounce this to the support team because I’m not aware of any issues.

@michael_rosa, @brian_twomey, @conor_harding: are you guys aware of any outstanding bugs with PFS filters on brand and theme pages, please?

Thanks,
Donogh

None off the top of my head - maybe Mike would be the guy with the highest chance of spotting bugs on recent implementations?

Conor.

Hi @donogh,

Any news on this one year on?

We are still desperate to have filters on brand pages - we have brands with hundreds and even thousands of products and its harming our online relationship with suppliers because although we can present a brand page, its practically impossible to shop from.

This will be an even more visible issue on our new responsive design as we are choosing to keep the default brand dropdown in the header.

Thanks,
Emma

Hi,

Can @donogh or anyone on the dev team please update me on this issue and let me know how we can move forward with it. Thanks.

Emma