The list file layout: format, grid and column order

What it is

Once the list is generated, the file still has three decisions: what format it comes out in, with what layout and with which columns, in what order. All three are requested in a sentence, in the conversation with Dri, and they also work on a list you have already generated.

The starting point is always the template your company set up; what you ask for in the conversation applies to that list, on top of the template.

Format: Excel or PDF

If you say nothing, Dri shows the 📊 Excel and 📄 PDF buttons and you choose. If you say it in the sentence ("send it to me in Excel"), she delivers it straight away, without the buttons: saying the format is already choosing.

After you get the file, any adjustment ("remove the price") comes back in the same format as the last delivery, without asking again.

Layout: table or grid

• Table is the usual one: one line per product.
• Prepack is a catalog: one card per product, with a large photo. Ask for "as a grid", "like a catalog" or "with a large photo". You can say how many cards per row: 2, 3 or 4 ("three per row").

⚠️ The grid only exists in PDF. In Excel the list always comes out as a table; if you ask for a grid in Excel, Dri warns "the grid is for PDF; in Excel the list goes as a table".

Items per page cannot be chosen. The list PDF puts on the page whatever fits. What you choose is how many cards go per line, in the grid: 2, 3 or 4. With 2 per row the cards are bigger and the page roomier. If you only ask for "6 per page", Dri explains this and asks how many per row you want, without generating the file. If the same sentence also says which products go in, the list comes out and the reply includes the same explanation.

"PDF with 4 items" is read as a grid with 4 per row, not as a list of 4 products. To limit how many products go in, say how many in the sentence: "the 4 cheapest".

Photo: how it comes out and when it is empty

The photo comes out when you ask for it, when your company's template already has the photo column, and always in the grid.

• In the table, the photo is a column like any other, in Excel and in PDF: "with photo" or "add the photo" adds the column, "without photo" removes it. If your company's template already has the photo column, it comes without you asking.
• In the grid, the photo is the card, so it comes out no matter what: asking for "without photo" on a grid brings a warning that the photo still appears.
• A product without a registered photo comes out with the photo space empty, and the reply counts how many, for example: "📷 3 of 40 items have no registered photo. Their photo space comes out empty." That comes from the product record, not a defect in the file. See Importar as fotos dos produtos.

To list exactly those products, ask for "the products without a photo": it is a filter, and the list brings only those with no registered photo.

Columns: add, remove, reorder, position

Speak the way you would to a person. You do not need to know the column's technical name:

• add: "put in the NCM", "with the barcode", "add the photo"; without saying where, the column goes at the end;
• remove: "remove the price", "without the description";
• dictate the whole order: "first the code, then the description, then the price"; whatever you do not mention goes at the end, in the previous order;
• position a column: "put the NCM as the third column", "the price before the stock", "the ABC curve at the start", "move the price to the end";
• rename a header: "rename Price to Unit price".

⚠️ The renamed header applies only to that list; it does not change the company's template.

The columns you can ask for

Besides the ones the template already has (code, description, price, stock), you can ask for:

• the piece's barcode, as a number or as a drawn barcode;
• the closed box barcode (the one the receiver scans on receipt), also as a number or drawn;
• stock in boxes;
• pre-sale in pieces or in boxes (both, if you want);
• photo;
• NCM, the IPI rate and other catalog attributes, depending on what the store registers (color, line, height, width).

Catalog attributes are requested by the name shown on that store's product sheet. If the store has no attribute called "size" or "dimensions", Dri may reply that she did not find it; if it registers "Packaging height" and "Width", ask that way.

Barcode: number or drawn barcode

They are different things, and both exist. The number is for pasting into a system; the drawn barcode is for scanning at the counter.

Asking for "the barcode only as a number" is two things at once: the number goes in and the drawn barcode comes out. Dri understands it that way.

The three rules that bite

1. A column is not a filter. "with the barcodes" asks for a column; "only the ones that have a barcode" would change how many products go in. With photos it is the same: "send it without photo" removes the column and keeps all products; "the products without a photo" brings only those with no registered photo. The same word, two effects.
2. Code and description cannot both come out. The file needs one of them to identify the product; if you ask to remove both, Dri keeps one and warns: "I kept …, because the file needs a code or description to identify the product".
3. The request accumulates and never replaces the company's template. Asking for the color after the barcode gives you both, and what your company set up still applies underneath.

A column that store does not have

It is discarded with a warning, never silently: for example "I didn't find … in this store's catalog. Tell me another name and I'll add it". The warning already appears in the list reply, before you choose the format.

Other warnings that may come: the column you wanted to move or rename is not in the list, or the new header already exists on another column: in that case the previous header is kept.

When the PDF does not fit on the page

With many columns, the PDF adapts on its own instead of cutting information: it turns the sheet to landscape, reduces the font size, removes the photo column when it does not fit at a readable size and turns the drawn barcode into a number when the column gets too narrow. The reply says what was done, for example, "I removed the photo column (it didn't fit at a readable size)", so you can decide whether to send it like that or ask for fewer columns.

The spreadsheet does not go through this: in Excel, an extra column only widens the sheet.

Common questions

I asked for a grid and got a table. Why? The file was in Excel, and the grid only exists in PDF. Ask for "in PDF, as a grid".

I removed the photo and it is still in the PDF. Why? The layout is a grid, and in the grid the photo is the card. Ask for "as a table, without photo".

Can I choose how many items go on each page of the PDF? No. The list PDF puts on the page whatever fits. In the grid you choose 2, 3 or 4 cards per row, and with 2 the cards are bigger.

The photo column came, but several photos are empty. Is that a defect? No. Read the footer with 📷: it says how many products have no registered photo. The one who fixes it is whoever registers the photos in the catalog.

I asked for "size" and got "I didn't find it". What do I do? Dri only recognizes the attributes that are in the store's records. Ask by the name shown on the product sheet, for example "packaging height" or "width".

The column I asked for did not come. Why? Read the warning in the reply: the store may not have that attribute, or the name was not recognized. Say it in other words.

Can I make this layout the default? You cannot save a default through the conversation; see List file templates: whose layout is it.

For the list filters, see Generate a product list on WhatsApp. For the quote file, whose columns do not change through the conversation, see Export the quote as Excel or PDF on WhatsApp.