Product clusters

This page explains how to use and configure product clusters and their data source types.

Product cluster

The product cluster component is a component that shows a number of catalog products defined in a data source. This data source must be of one of the types listed below. Make sure you create the product selection type before you place such a component on your page.

Product selection types

These three product selection types are available for usage with a product cluster. The one thing they have in common is the field Exclude Out Of Stock Products. Product selection types can be found in this location by default: /sitecore/content/<website name>/Catalog content/Product Selections.

• Product selection Handpicked (Base)
  As the name suggests, this type lets you select the products by hand. You can use the search box or the navigation controls above the listboxes to find the products.

• Product selection Relationship (Base)
  This type accumulates a list of products based on one of the fields of the product in the current context. Therefore a product cluster using this type of product selection can only be used on a product details page. This relationship can be the color for instance. In that case you would select that field as the Relation. For a blue product the product cluster will then be filled with other blue products.
  NB. The Relation field is a text field, so you must pay attention when filling it in.

• Product selection Dynamic selection (Base)
  This type lets you build a standard Sitecore query to put your selection together. On top of the standard Sitecore query functionality, it also supports Product catalog field variables for usage on a product details page. This works in the same fashion as the formatted value of a catalog field.
  Example:
  +custom:category|{category}
  This query will return all products with the same category as the product in the current context. The current product will be excluded.