Using Procurement Module: How do you source an item based on options selected?

[akaupisch]

I'm using default OOB procurement right now, I'm trying to order and iPhone 5 using the demo data...which has the following options:

Option 1: gigs (64, 256)

Option 2: color (gold, black, white)

When you go to source the request, how do you source the proper one? There is no indication of what they want, nor which vendor option they should select?

[Uncle Rob]

Greetings!
This one threw me for a loop the first time I deconstructed procurement as well.  
"WTF" says I "I used a specific Catalog Item, so how does it know to allow different vendors, when a CatItem has one defined?"

The answer is in the Product Catalog, under "Vendor Items"

Here you'll see that several vendors can be defined to sell the same Product Model.   The Procurement solution is highly dependent on this, which will be a big change for people who have thus far used only the Service Catalog.

If that helps you out, please remember to SMASH ALL THE THINGS!

[akaupisch]

Thanks, this is helpful, but my original question still remains... When you are on the Request, you can drill into the item to view the config choices of that item. However, when you click 'Source Request' UI Action, it pops up the image I included. In that image, you don't see the config choices that the user selected, just the main catalog item. Nowhere in there is the 32/64/256 gb, nor the color selected. So how are they supposed to source that?

Furthermore, how do you go about expanding that dropdown to show more than vendor? Let me explain...it would appear to me that if you hd 3 GB options and 2 color options, you'd need 6 Vendor Items for 1 phone, each with their own SKU/Product ID. Assuming you just used 1 vendor....if you had more, it would be multiplicative in nature. 3 vendors means you have 18 items for 1 phone. Regardless, even if that's the case (not a huge one), how do you get it to display all those items in a way that show what those items represent (i.e. short descript, or combo of things?). And, getting back to the original question, how would the procurement officer know what to select if they don't see the config of the item right there?

Is this making sense?

Thanks

Adam

[akaupisch]

I opened a ticket with HI, there is no way to currently do this and they have submitted an enhancement request. If you wish to know more about this, ask HI to add you on the notifications for FTASK33036

[Cary5]

Do you recall what you ended up doing here?

As I also looked at the OOB Portal, the Executive Desktop can't be sourced because a Model wasn't defined on the catalog item. The item has 3 CPU options. Here within lies the problem. The dialog to source an item is all based on the catalog item pointing to one product model. However, it didn't take into account that the catalog is designed to have one item with multiple options (in this case, this item really consists of 3). I haven't looked to see if the Source Request dialog can be modified or if protected.

My client is wanting me to consolidate items but doing so while trying to use Stockrooms/procurement is proving to be challenging.