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User Guide
The information contained in this section applies to WebSphere Commerce Version 8. The documentation also applies to all subsequent releases and modifications until otherwise indicated in a newer section.WebSphere Commerce is a single, unified e-commerce platform that offers the ability to do business directly with consumers (B2C), directly with businesses (B2B), and indirectly through channel partners (indirect business models). WebSphere Commerce is designed to be a customizable, scalable, and high availability solution that is built to leverage open standards. It provides easy-to-use tools for business users to centrally manage a cross-channel strategy. Business users can create and manage precision marketing campaigns, promotions, catalog, and merchandising across all sales channels.
Operating
IBM Management Center for WebSphere Commerce
The IBM Management Center for WebSphere Commerce, or Management Center, is a suite of tools to support store management, merchandising, and marketing tasks for business users (Sellers, Marketing Managers, Product Managers, Catalog Managers, and others).
Workspace Management tool
You can use the Workspace Management tool in Management Center to manage and edit workspaces and its tasks and task groups that you are authorized to work with.
Managing roles in workspaces, task groups, and tasks
Workspace managers, task group approvers, and content contributors can only perform tasks associated with their role.
Managing task groups
Your workspace role defines the authorities that you have in relation to task groups. For example, you must be assigned the Workspace Task Group Approver role to approve a task group.
Activating task groups
You must activate a task group so that contributors can work on their tasks. You can activate task groups that are in the inactive state.

User Guide
The information contained in this section applies to WebSphere Commerce Version 8. The documentation also applies to all subsequent releases and modifications until otherwise indicated in a newer section.WebSphere Commerce is a single, unified e-commerce platform that offers the ability to do business directly with consumers (B2C), directly with businesses (B2B), and indirectly through channel partners (indirect business models). WebSphere Commerce is designed to be a customizable, scalable, and high availability solution that is built to leverage open standards. It provides easy-to-use tools for business users to centrally manage a cross-channel strategy. Business users can create and manage precision marketing campaigns, promotions, catalog, and merchandising across all sales channels.
- Planning
  Creating a custom implementation of a WebSphere Commerce store requires a significant amount of planning. From gathering client needs, to deploying the live solution, much work is needed to successfully deploy a custom client store. Use the resources in here to help you plan every phase of store creation.
- Installing
  Review the following sections for information about installing the WebSphere Commerce product, associated maintenance, and WebSphere Commerce enhancements.
- Migrating
  Before you migrate to WebSphere Commerce Version 8.0, review this information to help plan and execute your migration.
- Deploying
  The topics in this section describe how to publish stores to either a test or production environment, and how to deploy customized code.
- Operating
  - IBM Management Center for WebSphere Commerce
    The IBM Management Center for WebSphere Commerce, or Management Center, is a suite of tools to support store management, merchandising, and marketing tasks for business users (Sellers, Marketing Managers, Product Managers, Catalog Managers, and others).
    - Planning to use Management Center
      If you are using WebSphere Commerce Accelerator, consider using Management Center to manage your store.
    - management-center/refs/rtfgetstart.htm
    - Management Center keyboard shortcuts
      Use the Management Center keyboard shortcuts to access user interface functions or complete tasks, using a single key or combination of keys.
    - Working in extended site stores in Management Center
      If your company operates an extended site, you can perform certain tasks directly from your extended site store within Management Center.
    - Manage content externally for use in Management Center
      If content management capabilities other than the functionality that is provided by default with WebSphere Commerce is required, WebSphere Commerce can be integrated with IBM Web Content Manager. If WebSphere Commerce is integrated with IBM Web Content Manager, you can use content from IBM Web Content Manager content libraries with Management Center objects.
    - Manage marketing externally with IBM Marketing Center
      If your site is integrated with IBM Marketing Center, Management Center users can open IBM Marketing Center from Management Center to upload promotion codes and to create and manage marketing campaigns.
    - Management Center user interface
      The Management Center user interface provides a usable, intuitive, and efficient way to complete your business tasks.
    - Using the Management Center
      The starting point for all Management Center tasks is to open the tooling. Afterward, you can use several methods to complete a task: by selecting menu options, by clicking toolbar buttons, by right-clicking and selecting menus, or by keyboard shortcuts.
    - Catalogs tool
      Use the Catalogs tool in Management Center to manage catalogs, categories, catalog entries, merchandising associations, product attributes, and attachments in your store. The Catalogs tool lets business users create, and manage online catalogs. Catalogs provide a way of organizing the products that you want to sell. You define catalog data in groups of categories and products. Catalog data contains descriptions and pricing information for products and services.
    - Marketing tool
      Use the Marketing tool in Management Center to create and manage marketing campaigns and other store content, excluding catalog content. You can use the extensive precision marketing features in the tool to deliver targeted marketing messages to customers.
    - Promotions tool
      Use the Promotions tool in Management Center to create and manage promotions that support the marketing campaigns for your site.
    - Assets tool
      As a Product Manager, Marketing Manager, or Category Manager, you can use the Assets tool to upload and manage your store assets. The term assets refers to web content that you use on your storefront and in marketing campaigns, such as marketing image files, catalog image files, PDF documents, and multimedia files.
    - Catalog Filter and Pricing tool
      Use the Catalog Filter and Pricing tool in Management Center to create and manage catalog filters, price lists, and price rules. Sellers, Sales Managers, and Account Representatives can use the tool's flexible features to implement catalog filtering and pricing strategies that meet the site's business needs over time.
    - Installments tool
      Use the Installments tool in Management Center to create and manage installment rules that support the payment methods for your site.
    - Commerce Composer tool
      Create pages and build layouts for your store directly in Management Center without involving IT by using the Commerce Composer tool. Take advantage of the tool's page design and management functions to improve your productivity and give you more control over the customer experience.
    - Store Management tool
      As a Seller, Site Administrator, or Channel Manager, you can use the Store Management tool in Management Center to manage your stores. The Store Management tool in Management Center replaces all of the store management features in WebSphere Commerce Accelerator, except store creation and the ability to suspend and resume stores. Continue to use the Store Creation wizard in WebSphere Commerce Accelerator to create new stores; continue to use WebSphere Commerce Accelerator to suspend and resume stores.
    - Workspace Management tool
      You can use the Workspace Management tool in Management Center to manage and edit workspaces and its tasks and task groups that you are authorized to work with.
      - Workspace management
        You can use the Workspace Management tool in Management Center to manage and edit workspaces and its tasks and task groups you are authorized to work with.
      - Managing roles in workspaces, task groups, and tasks
        Workspace managers, task group approvers, and content contributors can only perform tasks associated with their role.
        Working on approved content
        If workspaces are enabled, you might have to work on content outside of a workspace. For instance, if you have changes or additions that must be made quickly without the need for approvals.
        Managing workspaces
        You can only perform tasks associated with your role in workspaces.
        Managing task groups
        Your workspace role defines the authorities that you have in relation to task groups. For example, you must be assigned the Workspace Task Group Approver role to approve a task group.
        Creating task groups
        Create a task group to manage one or more store changes that you want to publish at the same time.
        Changing task groups
        You can update a task group once one has been created. For example, you can update a task group to include new approvers or schedule the commit date.
        Canceling task groups
        A task group can be cancelled only when its status is inactive, working, ready for approval, or commit failed.
        Deleting task groups
        You cannot delete a task group once it has been activated. To prevent users from working on a task group after it has been activated, cancel the task group. When you delete an inactive task group, the task group and its tasks are deleted from the system.
        Activating task groups
        You must activate a task group so that contributors can work on their tasks. You can activate task groups that are in the inactive state.
        Reactivating task groups
        You can reactivate task groups that are in the ready for approval, approved, ready to commit, or failed commit states.
        Approving and rejecting task groups
        If you are a task group approver, you can approve or reject a task group. When all of the tasks in the task group are marked as complete by the contributors, you receive an approval task in your To Do folder. Use the approval task to review and then approve or reject the task group.
        Viewing task groups
        After creating a task group, you can view the task group in the Workspace Management tool. You can also view the workspace and tasks that are associated with the task group.
        Searching for task groups
        After you create a task group, you can search for task groups in the Workspace Management tool. You can search for task groups by using quick search or advanced search.
        Adding comments to task groups
        Add comments to communicate with other workspace managers and contributors, and to track the details of changes made as contributors work on their assigned tasks. You can add a comment to a task group as a reminder to finish something later, a note to state what actions you performed, or extra instructions. All comments are added to the task group, not the individual task.
        Viewing task group comments
        View task group comments to read comments from workspace managers, and to track the details of changes made by contributors.
        Viewing task group changes
        All changes that are made to business objects within a task group are listed in the History tab as either create, modify, or delete history records. You can view all changes that are made under a task group by viewing the History tab of the corresponding task group.
        Opening task group changes
        All changes that are made to business objects within a task group are captured as either create, modify, or delete history records. Once a history record is open, you can check the history record to ensure that the business object was properly updated.
        Comparing task group changes with approved content
        All changes that are made to business objects within a task group are listed in the History pane as either create, modify, or delete history records. Comparing a modified business object with the approved content displays both versions of the object side by side for quick comparison.
        Undoing task group changes
        All changes made within a task group are captured as either create, modify, or delete history records. Task group approvers can undo task group history records. Undoing task group changes gives task group approvers more control over how they can manage tasks and task groups.
        Managing tasks
        Your workspace role defines the authorities you have in relation to tasks. For example, you must be assigned the Workspace Manager role to create a task.
    - Previewing a store
      Preview your store to ensure that changes made in Management Center show up in your store as expected. You can use store preview in production, authoring, and staging environments.
    - Management Center frequently asked questions (FAQ)
      Find answers to some of the most frequently asked questions about the Management Center.
    - Management Center Troubleshooting
      If you encounter issues with the Management Center that are not related to any specific tool, review this troubleshooting topic to solve common problems.
  - WebSphere Commerce Accelerator
    Use the WebSphere Commerce Accelerator to maintain online stores.
- Integrating
  Topics in the Integrating category highlight the tasks that are commonly performed for using WebSphere Commerce in combination with other products.
- Administering
- Tutorials
  WebSphere Commerce provides many tutorials to help you customize and understand your WebSphere Commerce instance and stores.
- Samples
- Developing
  The topics in the Developing section describe tasks performed by an application developer.
- Compliance
  The following section describes how you can leverage WebSphere Commerce features and functionality to help your site be compliant with different privacy and security standards.
- Securing
  These topics describe the security features of WebSphere Commerce and how to configure these features.
- Performance
- Troubleshooting

Activating task groups

You must activate a task group so that contributors can work on their tasks. You can activate task groups that are in the inactive state.

Before you begin

Ensure that you are logged in to the Workspace Management tool as one of the following roles:

Workspace manager

Procedure

Open the Workspace Management tool.
In the explorer filter, select the Current view.
In the explorer view, click the workspace that contains the task group that you want to activate.
The list of task groups is displayed.
Right-click the task group that you want to activate, and click Activate.
Contributors can now work on tasks in this task group using Management Center tools.