Tired of walking down malls to find a shop that sells the item you want or finding customers for your shops? Introducing Entropia Service Directory

[miniduetter]

Hey guys!

I remember looking for weapons a few months ago when I needed them quickly for an event, and didn’t want to pay auction prices for it. I ended up wasting a lot of time finding a shop that had the weapon I wanted - and wasn’t out of stock - so I thought myself there had to be a better way.

Are you a shopper and don’t know which shops have the items you desire?
Do you own a shop and are you tired of advertising your shop on #calytrade nonstop?
Or maybe your shop is just a shopkeeper pad in an apartment building without the foot traffic a mall provides?

Let me introduce you to the Entropia Service Directory.

https://www.entropiaservicedirectory.com/ is a project I created during the last few months from scratch, which aims to make life easier for shop owners to advertise their shops free of charge, and for shoppers to quickly locate the shops that fill their needs.

If you own a shop you can register an account and add your shops to the website.
If you are a shopper you can filter the existing shops for their items, location and category to find a shop nearby, without the need to stroll around malls for hours.

If you own a shop, you are free to add it to the site. I wrote a quick manual to help you setting it up

https://docs.google.com/document/d/10XpArgC0xZrs0NZbzsc_fkhq-CN9uFpTYD7UagOUhCc/edit?usp=sharing

I consider the project’s current state as a beta version. The basic functionality is tested and should work. The design is not mobile friendly (maybe that will change once i stop sucking at CSS) and will be improved in the coming days.

Here’s an overview of the planned updates in the future:

next update (approx next week):

• add email password reset (mail server is not set up yet)
• first design improvements (the current css sucks)
• hotfixes if reported by users

in the foreseeable future:

• filter improvements (right now search results are filtered by the most recent shop update, more flexibility would be good)
• analytics integrated in shop owner dashboard so you can see how many people were viewing your listings
• CSV import to enable shop owners to quickly add their shops from their excel sheets

Feedback about functionality and bug reports are welcome. If you feel that the process of adding shops is clunky or should be changed, let me know. I’m open to make changes if they make sense.

You can give feedback either in this thread, forum pm, or in-game pm to my avatar: Mad miniduetter Lad

Have fun!

 

[miniduetter]

September 7 2020:

added CSV import for one-click inventory upload, reduces shop creation to a minute

video demonstration of shop creation via CSV upload:

shop_creation.mp4

drive.google.com

google sheet template for CSV file creation (link also in the google doc manual):

Entropia Service Directory Excel Template for CSV Import

Sheet1 item_name,stack_size,tt_value,sell_price,markup lysterium ingot,1,10,11,110 belkar ingot,12,0,0,0 armatrix lr-10(l),1,0,0,0 force nexus,1,0,0,0 neurostim-a,1,0,0,0 easter strongbox,1,0,0,0

docs.google.com

added option to delete whole inventory in one click - this gives you the option to update your shop by just deleting the inventory and reuploading the updated version through CSV import again.... means you'll only have to make changes in your excel sheet instead of deleting single items on the site



next update (in the works):

- add estate "containers" to the inventory so people with more than one shop don't end up with a huge mess

 

[Orion]

FYI:

Beta Testing Entropia Shop Directory

Divinity and I are looking to expand the Beta for a project that we've been working on. We believe it would be better for everyone if shops were easier to use. https://entropiasales.com 2019-01-29 - We're going to make an investment service as it seems to have a bigger impact on the...

www.planetcalypsoforum.com

too few people use it, because it is too complicated and too time consuming to enter your items.

i suggested a solution for this, but i am not a coder, hence i have no idea how complicated it may be to realize my suggestion. see it here:

Beta Testing Entropia Shop Directory

would be a great service - shops work better than they used to (with no rent needing to be paid) and I notice I can find things at better prices or not otherwise available. Having said that though - I do enjoy exploring and "window shopping" is one of the few free activities to do in the game...

www.planetcalypsoforum.com

if your project works out, i'd be a thankful user, but i wont enter 150 items manually one by one, and then update it every other day manually, too.
the project stands and falls with an automated solution to maintain the shop's item lists.

good luck.

 

[kingofaces]

Just to piggyback on the above, I can currently just copy and paste my Excel spreadsheet on my shop items and prices to a table on the forum. If it's around that ease of use and quickness, it might get some use. Otherwise if it's just one-by-one entering, that's partly why people don't bother with doing the same with listing items in their shop on the wiki.

 

[miniduetter]

Hey guys, thanks for the feedback so far

I'm aware that the manual submission for every item would be too much for people to bother. I just released a new version where you can upload your shop inventory from a CSV file.

In my post above i shared the google sheet template where you can paste your items and stuff from your own sheet and export it to CSV.

There's also a video of me demonstrating how to add your shop there (google drive link). Without having to manually enter each of your items, shop creation should take a cpl minutes max.

 

[miniduetter]

Just to piggyback on the above, I can currently just copy and paste my Excel spreadsheet on my shop items and prices to a table on the forum. If it's around that ease of use and quickness, it might get some use. Otherwise if it's just one-by-one entering, that's partly why people don't bother wi

Quick question: If you update your table in the forum, do you delete the old one (including the items that are still in stock) and just paste the new one from your sheet?

 

[Orion]

I just released a new version where you can upload your shop inventory from a CSV file.

Before i run into trouble, can the converted item list distinguish between items, which lay around in my apartments (not for sale), the content (for sale) of my shop keepers (not for sale) and the content of my shop (for sale)?

Sorry for asking such dumb questions. When i grew up, computers were still made of wood, glass and stainless steel and software was written in punched paper tape.

 

[kingofaces]

Quick question: If you update your table in the forum, do you delete the old one (including the items that are still in stock) and just paste the new one from your sheet?

Pretty much. In my Excel sheet, I have the master list of what's in my shop, price, etc. If I see an item sells, it gets removed from that sheet. When I want to update what's on the forum, I just delete the old table and copy paste whatever my current stock/prices are on the Excel sheet. When it comes to updating the forum post, that only takes me about 30 seconds to do. I used to update my shop post daily to show what's in stock, but I'll admit I've kind of slacked off and mostly just update it whenever I do restocks now.

 

[miniduetter]

Before i run into trouble, can the converted item list distinguish between items, which lay around in my apartments (not for sale), the content (for sale) of my shop keepers (not for sale) and the content of my shop (for sale)?

Sorry for asking such dumb questions. When i grew up, computers were still made of wood, glass and stainless steel and software was written in punched paper tape.

I'm not sure if I got your question right.

When you create your shop, all your uploaded items are listed within the shop creation interface. To add them to your shop you can select the ones you want to have listed for sale with your mouse (you can just click and drag down the whole list to add all of them). Everything you've uploaded will be in that list (it won't distinguish)

What does your situation look like?

Do you have multiple shops (e.g. a brick and mortar shop and a shopkeeper somewhere else?)

If that's the case, do they have the same items listed in some instances?

What's the reason for uploading the items laying around in your apartment (if you're not planning to sell them it makes no sense to upload them - or maybe i'm missing a point, if that's the case let me know your intention so i can work on a system that takes such situations into consideration)

p.s. I've sent you a friends request in-game, might be the best thing if i can walk you through in real-time through the in-game chat if the post here didn't answer your questions

 

[miniduetter]

Pretty much. In my Excel sheet, I have the master list of what's in my shop, price, etc. If I see an item sells, it gets removed from that sheet. When I want to update what's on the forum, I just delete the old table and copy paste whatever my current stock/prices are on the Excel sheet. When it comes to updating the forum post, that only takes me about 30 seconds to do. I used to update my shop post daily to show what's in stock, but I'll admit I've kind of slacked off and mostly just update it whenever I do restocks now.

Thanks I'll work out an option to delete the whole inventory list, so people can just ditch the whole list and re-upload the new one from their sheet - which takes a cpl seconds instead of deleting single entries.

edit: got it working, changes will be live within a few minutes --- live now

 

[mastermesh]

Thanks I'll work out an option to delete the whole inventory list, so people can just ditch the whole list and re-upload the new one from their sheet - which takes a cpl seconds instead of deleting single entries.

edit: got it working, changes will be live within a few minutes --- live now

Don't put in a requirement to put in markup... sometimes many shopkeepers adjust markup daily from day to day... If you do the copy paste thing maybe study how the my items section works currently... so...
currenly when we log in to planetcalypso.com or appropriate website for planet partner an estate owner gets a listing of items under my items...

if you hit the 'container' thing it'll put all items in any container together... ESTATE is one of the containers.
When you highlight it to copy paste it'll do something like this:

A large trout (L)

1

0.81

ESTATE

First column is the item. second is the quantity, third the tt value, fourth the container...
the TT value also has a PED word next to it but if you just copy paste that doesn't copy over...

another example...

Calypso Bone Sample

6928

0.06

ESTATE

As you see you'll want to put multiple thousands as possible values in quantity value, and possibly in the tt value, depending on what it is in question...

It's very important as you do this type of thing to study the way the my items section looks and works since it does change...

Also, sadly it DOES NOT differentiate between any ESTATE... it lists ALL ITEMS IN EVERY ESTATE YOUR AVATAR OWNS AS BEING IN ESTATE container... so if you have stuff in an apartment on one planet, a shop in another planet, a booth in a third planet, it'll all still be listed nice and neat in ESTATE container since Mindark has never figured out how to differentiate one from another yet even though in game they are in different estates and each deed for each estate has a different unique name... You'd think Mindark's website developers would be smart enough to pull from the unique deed name when compiling the my items list on website, but despite repeated requests for that they still have not done so...

If you need help in this type of stuff talk to Snow Leapord who created Tree View https://www.planetcalypsoforum.com/...tropia-inventory-treeview.149997/post-2211205 (which sadly no longer works for me since it gives me the message "
PROBLEM: No top-level containers (STORAGE,CARRIED,etc).
Are you sure you've pasted Entropia Inventory
into the box on the left?" Up til they updated the website to the current system that app was awesome in seeing what item is where... but sadly it doesn't work... it basically parsed the entire enventory sorting by container to tell you what items where in which container so you could copy/paste it out to a spreadsheet, etc. It also had tick marks to allow you to pick items in just one container or multiple but not everything, etc.

Also maybe look up some of the other folks in community that started similar type stuff in the past... there's been several attempts... entropia directory, entropia auction (I think sbi used to run that?), and a few others...

Mindark itself should do something like what you are doing using data from in game database tied to shops... but alas it has not and probably will not ever... they'd have the most complete picture and should do a shop directory in game, but that request still falls on deaf ears at Mindark despite being made over and over and over again...

Since most active shop owners have websites already and/or forum threads for their shops, maybe just let them link to the shop and add a logo/icon on what not so your site links to their site where most active info is instead of requiring shop owners to do hassle of updating an inventory list on your site?

 

[miniduetter]

First of all thanks for your feedback.

Don't put in a requirement to put in markup... sometimes many shopkeepers adjust markup daily from day to day... If you do the copy paste thing maybe study how the my items section works currently... so...
currenly when we log in to planetcalypso.com or appropriate website for planet partner an estate owner gets a listing of items under my items...

If you don't want to enter the markup, simply put a 0 there and it will display it as "n/a" on the site. Same goes for TT value and sell price. I can't make it optional because it needs at least something when importing, else the system will throw an error because the database expects some kind of value in that field. If the vast majority of shop owners don't want to disclose their markup or find it too much of a hassle I might ditch that option altogether tho.

urrenly when we log in to planetcalypso.com or appropriate website for planet partner an estate owner gets a listing of items under my items...

if you hit the 'container' thing it'll put all items in any container together... ESTATE is one of the containers.
When you highlight it to copy paste it'll do something like this:

A large trout (L)10.81ESTATE

This is very interesting, I didn't know about that as I don't own any shops/estates myself. Is that the way every shop owner creates his/her sheets? If yes, is the format the same for every planet partner? If it is styled the same everywhere I can use that to readjust the the system.

Also, sadly it DOES NOT differentiate between any ESTATE... it lists ALL ITEMS IN EVERY ESTATE YOUR AVATAR OWNS AS BEING IN ESTATE container... so if you have stuff in an apartment on one planet, a shop in another planet, a booth in a third planet, it'll all still be listed nice and neat in ESTATE container since Mindark has never figured out how to differentiate one from another yet even though in game they are in different estates and each deed for each estate has a different unique name... You'd think Mindark's website developers would be smart enough to pull from the unique deed name when compiling the my items list on website, but despite repeated requests for that they still have not done so...

This is a valid point. I should be able to implement that by the next update. Given that your export has an unique estate name for every different estate it should not be a big problem to add that feature.

So just to confirm that I understood it correctly. When you paste it from the mindark website the field you called ESTATE does have different names for different estates (e.g.

A large trout (L)

1

0.81

ESTATE_XYZ

and

Calypso Bone Sample

6928

0.06

ESTATE_ABC

but the website itself just doesn't keep seperate lists for each estate?

If that's the case it should be very doable to implement containers for estate differentiation... if you have a screenshot example it'd help enormously.

If you need help in this type of stuff talk to Snow Leapord who created Tree View https://www.planetcalypsoforum.com/...tropia-inventory-treeview.149997/post-2211205 (which sadly no longer works for me since it gives me the message "
PROBLEM: No top-level containers (STORAGE,CARRIED,etc).
Are you sure you've pasted Entropia Inventory
into the box on the left?" Up til they updated the website to the current system that app was awesome in seeing what item is where... but sadly it doesn't work... it basically parsed the entire enventory sorting by container to tell you what items where in which container so you could copy/paste it out to a spreadsheet, etc. It also had tick marks to allow you to pick items in just one container or multiple but not everything, etc.

Also maybe look up some of the other folks in community that started similar type stuff in the past... there's been several attempts... entropia directory, entropia auction (I think sbi used to run that?), and a few others...

I haven't checked out any of the other projects so far, as I'm pretty new to the game and didn't get around much yet but thanks for pointing me to where I have to look.

Mindark itself should do something like what you are doing using data from in game database tied to shops... but alas it has not and probably will not ever... they'd have the most complete picture and should do a shop directory in game, but that request still falls on deaf ears at Mindark despite being made over and over and over again...

I totally agree, that's the reason I even started the project.

Since most active shop owners have websites already and/or forum threads for their shops, maybe just let them link to the shop and add a logo/icon on what not so your site links to their site where most active info is instead of requiring shop owners to do hassle of updating an inventory list on your site?

Shop owners already have the option to link to their own website through the shop description but I totally get your point. The way I see it - as a paying customer who'd like to spend PED on someone's shop - I would prefer to have a central hub (like a search engine) for shops. This reduces the time to find a shop from browsing the forum for ages to a couple seconds.

I'd also like to expand the site beyond shops in the future, once I have the system nailed down somewhat pleasurable for the actual users/listing creators.
e.g. for healing services, LA events/auctions, warps etc., everything under one hood.

Who knows if this project will ever take off, but I'm confident if I can adjust the listing process to make it pain free for everyone there could be some potential.

 

[NevadaJake]

This service is sorely needed. I will add the Shopkeeper Pad in my house.

 

[mastermesh]

This is very interesting, I didn't know about that as I don't own any shops/estates myself. Is that the way every shop owner creates his/her sheets? If yes, is the format the same for every planet partner? If it is styled the same everywhere I can use that to readjust the the system.

Yes, format is same... if you log in to your my items section now you'll see same type of format... just a different 'container' than ESTATE if you don't own an estate...

So just to confirm that I understood it correctly. When you paste it from the mindark website the field you called ESTATE does have different names for different estates (e.g.

NO, I WISH that it did have different names it does not... it just says ESTATE as the container for ALL estates you own.... so all apartment items, shop items, booth items, etc. are all lumped together under the ESTATE container in MY ITEMS on the website... I wish they would seperate it out so each had its own name as there are in game deeds or each estate, so Mindark devs that read this could make that happen, but unfortunately it's not happening now... everything is in ESTATE (which is part of the reason I don't put any items in my apartment, only in my shop - too much hassle to seperate it out)

 

[miniduetter]

NO, I WISH that it did have different names it does not... it just says ESTATE as the container for ALL estates you own.... so all apartment items, shop items, booth items, etc. are all lumped together under the ESTATE container in MY ITEMS on the website... I wish they would seperate it out so each had its own name as there are in game deeds or each estate, so Mindark devs that read this could make that happen, but unfortunately it's not happening now... everything is in ESTATE (which is part of the reason I don't put any items in my apartment, only in my shop - too much hassle to seperate it out)

Thanks! I finally found it on the website. Now the question from @Orion above makes sense.

Can any other shop owner chime in and enlighten me if that's the method of keeping track of their shops? If yes, how do you manage to differentiate between your estates?

I've got the new system prototype in the workings that allows you to put your uploaded items into different containers so you will be able to label them, but I may have to adjust that system depending on people's strategy to deal with the issue from pulling their data from MA.

 

[xxPriestxx]

This is an amazing idea. Should have been done ages ago by Mindark, but once again, players to the rescue . If anyone will figure it out, miniduetter will figure it out. Loving the suggestions also, completely agree.

 

[kingofaces]

Can any other shop owner chime in and enlighten me if that's the method of keeping track of their shops? If yes, how do you manage to differentiate between your estates?

If it wasn't clear from my posts above, I don't do this. At least for me, there's no benefit to using the Items page for shop stock since I still need to manually figure out a price anyways and use a spreadsheet. If the page told you what your MU was set at, then I might go that route.

For your purposes though, just having someone list only that they have an item in their shop without MU seems to defeat the purpose of a directory. If someone is really intent on not listing their prices, I guess that can be an option, but if you're setting up basically the ability to upload a single stock/price list, it wouldn't matter if someone updates their prices often. Heck, back when I used to update my shop stock daily, I only needed a few seconds to update my forum post for that.

It's all depends on what you want to do really. I'd say don't worry about the Items page too much, but rather just have a clear template you want in the file being uploaded. If it's just Item name, TT, and Shop price (theoretically could be optional), anyone can quickly modify their own personal lists or Items page to fit and upload it. When everyone does things different on the user end, keeping it simple on your end will probably be less headaches for you.

 

[Legends]

Thanks! I finally found it on the website. Now the question from @Orion above makes sense.

Can any other shop owner chime in and enlighten me if that's the method of keeping track of their shops? If yes, how do you manage to differentiate between your estates?

I've got the new system prototype in the workings that allows you to put your uploaded items into different containers so you will be able to label them, but I may have to adjust that system depending on people's strategy to deal with the issue from pulling their data from MA.

You should know that this isn't the first time that someone attempts to do this. The latest effort was made by morey kenbi and has been abandonned shortly after inception.

It would probably be very insightful for you to have a chat with him to find out what happened to his endeavor, he still is quite active in the game so it should be easy to find him and have a chat.

As for I, if it's too much work, I won't partake. I already have 3 shop threads on this forum that I need to update, this requires quite a bit of time on my part as my shops are always expanding and my inventory always evolving. So either make it super easy for shop owners to add their inventory in there, or market the website so widely that it becomes the main tool that everyone uses when looking for things, otherwise I and many others probably won't bother.

I don't use spreadsheets, I use the old noodle for everything. I have about 5 years of shop running experience to draw from and I know all markups and associated 'costs' for my inventory like the palm of my own hand so I'm not going to run a spreadsheet on top of all the promotion and inventory buying I have to do almost on a daily basis.

My own assessment: until MA provides an external API for things like this, it probably won't be worth the effort required from all parties. Shops don't get that much traffic, even when the price is better than auction, and most long-term players in Entropia value their time very highly, so asking someone to navigate outside the game to go look for something on a website, which might or might not be up-to-date, is a bit much to ask imo.

I'm just being grounded here, sorry if this isn't what you want to hear.

Legends

 

[miniduetter]

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Quick preview of the new version in work. It'll give you the option to copy paste from "my items" from the PP sites instead of taking the extra step of csv import.

I need to tweak some background processes before I can launch it tho.

 

[Orion]

great news!

 

[miniduetter]

Quick update: I had some medical issues in RL the last couple weeks. I will slowly start getting back to developing the project in the coming days as I've been released from hospital yesterday.