Setting up Automated Ebook Feeds

If you are looking for guidance on uploading Ebooks, please see here.

Please note that in order to send Ebooks, they must be assigned to an asset section. Our guidance on this can be found here.

To setup automated Ebook feeds you will need to navigate to Onix/Dest menu and click on Destinations. 

Click on Create New. 

You will then be taken to the General Tab 

Note: Make sure to choose the correct Task, both options for E-book feeds have been marked by arrows. 

General:

This is the first tab that you will be placed within. The fields are as follows: (items marked with * are mandatory fields). 

• Destination Name*: The organisation receiving your feeds, eg. Nielsen Book Data.
• Task*: Using the drop-down menu, select either E-content distribution (e-books, covers and xml) which will send an Onix file as well as the cover images or E-content distribution (e-books only) which will only send the E-book files. 
• Sender Details: This drop-down menu will be populated on your system by Stison and is based on the people in your company responsible for sending ONIX messages. Choose the relevant name, and then add the email address in the box below. 
• Destination Type*: You can send ONIX messages direct to FTP sites or over email.
• Host*: This is where you put the FTP site URL.
• User Name*: This must be provided by the recipient of your files.
• Password*: This must be provided by the recipient of your files.
• Path: This relates to specific folders within a recipient's FTP site. Nielsen, for instance, has a folder for Images and a folder for Data. You should be given the path by the organisation receiving your files.
• Notify email(s): If there are recipients who need to be informed when a feed is uploaded to their FTP site, add their details here and an email will go out as a matter of course.
• Encoding*: The default is UTF 8. This is generic coding and can take on any character set. The recipients of your ONIX messages will tell you what they prefer.
• Onix Version*: You can choose between 2.1 and 3.0 it is recommended where possible the 3.0 is sent. 
• Tag Format*: Recipients will tell you whether they prefer Short or Long.
• File Name Prefix: You can customise the file name here.  
• Unicode Accepted: This will automatically be ticked; leave as is.
• Clear Last Timestamp: This is the date/time when a feed was last sent and ensures subsequent feeds include only new titles or titles that have had changes made to their records. By ticking this option, you are telling your system to send a full file on next send, regardless of data changes.
• Send Empty Files: Some organisations require a file sent every time the feed is scheduled, even if there have been no changes. Checking this option will allow this to be sent. 
• Send Updates: Establish how often your system generates and sends feeds out. The Once option is used for test files to establish your ONIX compatibility. After a feed goes out once, the system will update this field to Off. When your files are approved, then you can set a feed to go out either Daily, Weekly or Monthly. Please note that Weekly refers to the working week and does not include weekends. It will send updates at 6 am on any day between Monday - Friday depending on what day you began the first weekly feed.

Click on UPDATE and you will be taken to the next tab to complete the relevant information where necessary.

Filters:

Here is where you can establish specific filters and requirements for the regular feed you are setting up. This tab will enable to include digital formats, as well as excluding traditional formats. 

Under Send Forms uncheck the Traditional checkbox , and check the Digital checkbox. You can select Selected digital to select or deselect various digital formats. Next, you need to select 'Selected Sections' under Asset sections, and choose your ebook asset section.

When you have completed this tab according to the requirements of the feed, click Update to save the information and you will be taken to the next tab.

Options:

If you are going to be sending out localised ONIX for certain markets, then this the part of the ONIX destination where this will be specified. Here is an example, where we've ensured that the UK Price is sent only, along with other localised data for the Commonwealth such as market-specific descriptions.

Here is another screenshot of this full tab. Helpful descriptions of all items available appear are written beside the field names. Tick the items you need.

Ingram filenames option does a number of things:

• Use filename conventions: _FC.jpg, _mobi.mobi, _epub.epub, _pdf.pdf for front cover, mobi & epub files.
• Copy stock qty codes to supplier identifier if StockQtyCodeName = "ipsuk.supcode".
• Copy expected ship date to on sale date, if no on sale date is currently set.
• Changes price type code from [2,42] to [1,41] if that price type does not exist.
• Adds product form description for ebooks to "Web PDF", "EPUB", "Kindle" respectively. Adds "Print PDF" for Pbk & Hbk. The product form description must be empty.

Ingram POD:

This option is not currently active. There is an additional forms tab where you can fill in the POD specifications. The logic is in place to add this to the onix data but Ingram cannot accept the data at the present time.

Remember to click Update in order to save the information. 

Also, if a title's ONIX traffic light is not green, a title will be excluded from your feeds. You can view more information about adjusting a title's status.

As with the traffic light, the system will automatically generate an ONIX preflight report before adding the title to the feed. If the title has issues with its mandatory data, then the system will not let you add it to ONIX until that is corrected. If the issues are non-mandatory, the system will allow you to Add to Onix anyway.