What is the bulk editor and how do I use it?

Modified on Sat, 11 May at 6:25 PM

Intro
Accessing the editor
Data filtering system
Configuring a bulk action
Supported types of bulk edits

Intro

In this tutorial, you will learn about our bulk editor and what real-world goals you can accomplish using this tool.

Let's start with a quick overview. A bulk editor is a tool that allows you to create, update, or delete metafields in bulk for all resources (products, collections, etc.) or a filtered selection in just a couple of clicks. For example, it might be a perfect solution if you want to add the availability date as a metafield for all products associated with a certain vendor or delete a preorder metafield for all products tagged with "NEW". Sounds great, right? Let's see how it works!

Accessing the bulk editor

Go to the Apps section of your Shopify admin panel (1) and select our app from the list of installed apps (2):

Next, navigate to the Bulk Actions tab of our menu (3) and go to Bulk Editor (4):

Good job! Now, we can get familiar with the user interface.

Data filtering system

The resource selector is the first element you'd usually interact with. The default value is set to Products as this resource type is the most popular among our users, but you can click on it and reveal more options to choose from:

Please note that it's not possible to use the bulk editor for pages, blogs, and blog posts (articles) as the GraphQL API does not support those resource types.

Next, there's the filtering area, where you can switch between the simple and advanced modes. By default, the "simple" mode is active, but you can switch to the advanced mode by pressing this button:

When in the simple mode, you can select items from the grid (it supports pagination and you can also sort items to your convenience) with your mouse (1), use the search bar to find the items to edit (2), use saved searches (3), and reveal the menu for additional filters (4):

Here's an example showing the results of multiple filters combined:

If your task requires even more precise filtering, you can build your very own configurable queries using the use advanced filter.

Press the Use advanced filter button we discussed earlier to switch the editor mode:

Next, press the Add new filter button to create a filter:

Each filter condition consists of three main components: the field/property to filter by (1), the condition type (2), and the value (3):

Multiple conditions can be applied to a single filter. The conditions can be joined with "AND" or "OR" logical operators, for the filter to match ALL and ANY of the conditions respectfully. To add another condition to your filter, click on the Add new condition button (1) and configure the additional condition:

In addition to this, you can combine multiple filters. To add another filter for the same bulk action, press the Add new filter button (1), select the connection type (filters can be joined with "AND" or "OR") (2), and configure conditions (3):

You can preview the results by pressing the Show filtered products (or other resource type) button:

When you are done with the configuration, press the Edit filtered products (Edit filtered collections/orders/etc.) button to proceed to the next step.

Configuring a bulk action

You can run up to 3 concurrent bulk actions. To add one, select the type that fits your needs from the drop-down menu:

Next, you can specify the details for a metafield to be created/updated. Press the Select metafield button (1) to reveal the available options (2):

Here you can:

1) Select a metafield from an existing definition or set.

2) Copy a metafield that belongs to another resource (product, collection, etc.) including its value.

3) Enter the namespace, key, and type for the future metafield manually.

Selecting metafields from a definition/set

If this option is selected, a pop-up window will be opened, where you can see the complete list of all metafield definitions and sets configured for your store. You can also search for specific items (1) or filter them by the parent definition/set (2):

Copying metafields from another resource (product, collection, etc.)

If this option is selected, a pop-up window will be opened, where you can search for products (or entities of another resource type) and select the one you want to copy a metafield from (1):

When you select a resource to copy metafields from, press Done (2). You will be able to see the complete list of its metafields, select the one you'd like to have copied (3), and confirm the selection (4). If needed, you can also go back to select another resource by pressing the Change button (5):

Entering the namespace, key, and type manually

You can also specify all the required attributes manually:

It might be useful if you know the exact specs of a metafield to be created or if you are dealing with some unique data that is not presented by a definition/set or associated with other resources.