First of all, please read the following knowledge base article, in order to understand the impacts of the new structure paradigm: Structure Types

It is important, that the following steps are executed before the migration to Version 8.0 of the Product 360 system itself. The reason for this is, that with Product 360 8.0 former existing structures are handled as output structures by default, and output structures in Product 360 8.0 do not have the same characteristics and behaviour as structures in former Product 360 Versions (especially concerning the inheritance of structure features to items/variants/products, see also the linked article about the new structure paradigm above).

With the Structure Migration Preparation Tool you can validate structures to be migrated to maintenance structures in Product 360 8.0. Therefor this tool generates assortments for invalid item/variant/product mappings. In the next step any user can use these assortments for correcting the invalid object mappings (also on those clients without having the Structure Migration Preparation Tool installed).

Download Structure Migration Preparation Tool

Structure Migration Preparation Tool is available for the newest hotfix release of Product 360 7.1. Find the download packages on the corresponding Hotfix wiki pages. The following artifacts are needed:

HPM_x.x.xx.xx_Rev-xxxxx_server_migration_structure.zip
HPM_x.x.xx.xx_Rev-xxxxx_client_migration_structure.zip

Please be aware that this tool was tested and released only for the newest hotfix release of Product 360 7.1. You can use this tool also with older Product 360 hotfix releases 7.0 and 7.1, it should be downwards compatible for these major versions. If you run into problems thereby, please contact Product 360 Support. Please also contact Product 360 Support, if you need this tool for Product 360 5.3 or Product 360 6.0. Thanks.

For custom ArticleType-based entities please ensure, that there is also a corresponding AssortmentType-based entity existing.

Install Structure Migration Preparation tool

The Structure Migration Preparation Tool consists of a Product 360 server feature and a Product 360 Desktop client feature. It is a tool for administrative purpose only. Because of that it is recommended to install the client feature only on those Product 360 client(s), which are used by the users performing the structure migration itself.

The Product 360 server feature can simply be installed by copying content of the HPM_x.x.xx.xx_Rev-xxxxx_server_migration_structure.zip package into Product 360 Server folder (into features and plugins folders respectively). After this you have to restart the Product 360 Server.
The Product 360 client feature can simply be installed by copying content of the HPM_x.x.xx.xx_Rev-xxxxx_client_migration_structure.zip package into Product 360 Desktop Client folder (into features and plugins folders respectively). After this you have to restart the Product 360 Desktop Client.

The following permissions are needed, when using the Structure Migration Preparation tool:

Interface visibility "Structure systems"
Action right "Create item/variant/product assortments" (depending on which data types are used in the Product 360 system)
Action right "Delete item/variant/product assortments" (depending on which data types are used in the Product 360 system)

Run Structure Migration Preparation Tool

Open the view "Structure systems".
Select all the structures you want to migrate to maintenance structures.
Right-click and choose "Validate for migration"
The validation process is scheduled as a background server job.
You can view the results of this job in the "Process overview" perspective. Here choose the job catego ry "Data maintenance", the job type "Migrate structures" and then your currently scheduled job.
In the "Log" view you can see the results of the validation job.
If all the selected structures can be migrated to maintenance structures, you see a corresponding info and everything is fine. You can then proceed with the migration of the Product 360 System.
If the selected structures can not be migrated, you see a corresponding warning. Please then continue with the following step:

Correct invalid item/variant/product mappings

If objects (items/variants/products) are existing, which have invalid mappings to structure groups and structure group features in the selected structures (see last step above), several assortments with these objects are created.

The assortment name has the following format:

<catalog_label>_<object_type>_<cause>

For each supplier catalog and the master catalog separate assortments are created. Also for each object type (item, variant, product) separate assortments are created.

And at last for each of the following causes (for invalid mappings) separate assortments are created:

attributemapping: objects, that have attribute(s) with multiple mappings to structure group features within the given structures.
nodelevel: objects, that are classified to node-level structure groups of the given structures.
multiclassified: objects, that are multi-classified to one of the given structures.

All assortments are created in an assortment category named "__MIGRATION_STRUCTURE_VALIDATION" and are visible for all users (also on those clients without having the Structure Migration Preparation Tool installed).

Now, the task is, to go through each assortment, and correct the invalid mappings.

Versioning

Structures are only validated in the working version, because the migration is only done in the working version. This is because possibly invalid object mappings in a version other than the working versions are not correctable. All affected versions (other than the working version) will later be closed by the Structure Migration Tool (see also Product 360 Server and Desktop Migration).

You can recheck the structures as often as you want by simply running the Structure Migration Preparation Tool again with the same structures (see last chapter above) until eventually you get a positive result of the validation job. But please be aware, that all existing assortments in the category "__MIGRATION_STRUCTURE_VALIDATION" will be automatically deleted, when executing the "Validate structures for migration" action again.