from Jan Griesel
We are pleased to report a continuous increase in the amount of plentymarkets SOAP API users and have already begun to work on a few new calls for the upcoming version. Unfortunately, we noticed that the SOAP API was sometimes being used incorrectly or ineffectively. Therefore, we saw the need to intervene technically and correct these errors in order to increase the quality and speed of the processes.
Some information never changes. Other information changes very rarely or only once per day. As such, it makes sense to store such information in the external software solution that is connected with the SOAP API.
Example 1
In order to exchange data with the SOAP API, a token (character string) has to be transferred as well. This token is valid for one day and is generated with its own call. As such, it is not efficient to have a new token provided for every single API request that is carried out. It makes more sense to generate the token once and then use it until the plentymarkets SOAP API returns an error message, telling you that the token has expired. Only then, it is time to generate a new token. This reduces the number of API calls that are needed by 50% and saves you both time and resources.
Example 2
You want a sales order to be created with the SOAP API. We found a few instances where lists of payment methods, shipping profiles, sales order statuses, warehouses and countries of delivery were being loaded before one single sales order was created. However, this information can also be stored in the external solution for some time (a few hours, one day).
As such, we have expanded the overview of all available SOAP API calls by adding a column called limitation. This column indicates the calls that SOAP users can carry out a maximum of 30 times per day.
It should be possible to implement these rules with a minor amount of time and effort.