Tell me more ×
Magento Stack Exchange is a question and answer site for users of the Magento e-Commerce platform. It's 100% free, no registration required.
up vote 3 down vote favorite

Can someone explain the importance/relevance of the backend_type static for an attribute?

I am having some problems with an attribute not being loaded and im wondering whether this backend_type has anything to do with it?

Also, is this related in some way as to what is put in the flat tables?

share|improve this question

2 Answers

up vote 7 down vote accepted

Static attributes are attributes stored in the main table of an entity - for catalog products, catalog_product_entity. For example, the attribute sku of catalog products is defined as static. Static attributes are always loaded by Magento, and are useful especially if you want to retrieve information quickly or to optimize lookup of data. A drawback of this type of attributes is that you can't have store-specific values, which is one of the advantages of Magento EAV system.

Even if you define an attribute as static, Magento won't treat it as such unless you have a corresponding column in the main entity table. If the column is not there, Magento treats the attribute as varchar by default and looks for it in the varchar EAV table for the model - for products, catalog_product_entity_varchar.

If you want to use static attributes in your project, you have to do 2 things in your install/upgrade scripts. First, you need to add a column to the main entity table, with the correct column definition. Next, you need to install your attribute using the addAttribute() method, and define your attribute as static. Please refer to the install scripts of Mage_Catalog to better understand how things work in this case.

If you plan to run often queries based on your custom static attributes, consider adding an index on the new column to speed up data fetching.

share|improve this answer
up vote -1 down vote

Here is the sample from core:

$installer->run("
    ALTER TABLE `{$installer->getTable('catalog/product')}` ADD `has_options` SMALLINT(1) NOT NULL DEFAULT '0';
");

$installer->addAttribute('catalog_product', 'has_options', array(
    'type' => 'static',
    'visible'=>false,
    'default' => false
));
share|improve this answer
 
What's this have to do with the question? –  Marius Sep 19 at 10:39
 
@Marius this is just a sample of how to add a static attribute. –  Roman Snitko Sep 19 at 15:57

Your Answer

 
discard

By posting your answer, you agree to the privacy policy and terms of service.

Not the answer you're looking for? Browse other questions tagged or ask your own question.