My new images aren't showing on the site
There are several things to consider when you have added new item images or edited existing ones, but they aren't showing up on the site. You can read our article on 'E-Commerce Item Image Management' for a detailed look at how item images work with the WebAlliance system.
The image is not in Raw_Images\Items
Regardless of which image linking method you are using, the image itself must be located in the Raw_Images\Items folder on your gateway server or it will not display on the site.
Once the image is in Raw_Images\Items, the system will still have to move the new image from the gateway server to the website. In most cases, image updates only run once a day - in the evening. Once you have placed an image in Raw_Images, it will generally show up on the site the following morning.
The image doesn't have the correct file extension
Make sure the image in question has a file extension, and make sure it's one of the file extensions that's accepted by the site. The file extensions that are accepted by the system are .jpg, .png, .gif, and .webp. If an image does not have one of those file extensions, it will not display on the site.
Note: The .jpeg file extension is not one of the allowed image file extensions. The system will not process images with the .jpeg extension. Use a .jpg extension instead.
There are unusual characters in the item number
If the image file name contains any unusual characters, the image application on the gateway will not be able to process it. Examples of characters that would cause issues are:
- Slash /
- Pound sign #
- Asterisk *
- Quotes "
- Exclamation point !
Any characters other than letters or numbers may cause problems. Dashes are an exception to the rule and can be used as part of item numbers, and will be accepted by the system.
The item image link is incorrect
There are three methods of linking images to items. Regardless of which method you use, if an image isn't making it over to the site, make sure the images are attached to their items correctly.
Make sure with Automatic Links, that the image name of your new image matches exactly with the item number of the item you are associating it with. If the image name even has an extra space in it, it will not display on the site.
For P21 Item Maintenance Links and P21 Custom Field Links, the name of the image in the link is the key to making sure the site shows the image you want. This name must match the image name that is in Raw_Images\Items exactly, including the extension.
Another image is already attached to the item with a different linking method
If you have more than one image linked to the same item using different methods, the system will choose which image to show based on an order of preference in the linking methods. The images will be preferred in the following order:
- P21 Item Maintenance Link images
- P21 Custom Field Links images
- Automatic Links images
For Example:
If you use an Automatic Link to attach an image to an item, and that item has a different image set using a P21 Item Maintenance Link, it will show the P21 Item Maintenance Link image.
The image is cached
If you replace an image on an item with an image of the same name, WebAlliance will not know that a new image has been used and will continue to allow the image cached by your browser to be shown. In this instance, you can do a hard refresh with CTRL+F5 to see the new image.
To prevent caching issues, you should modify the file name slightly when replacing images. For example, we would recommend if your old image was image1.jpg and you need to update the picture, that you use a name such as image1-b.jpg