Categories

Summary: Categories are the tree you use to organize your catalog. They serve to filter products, group reports, and link the usual supplier of a group of products. They support parent/child hierarchy.

Reading time: ~4 min

When to use this

Read this article if you need to:

• Create the initial category tree of your catalog (for example Beverages → Soft drinks → Cola).
• Reassign products to another category.
• Link a category to a default supplier to speed up purchase orders.
• Delete a category you no longer use.

Before you start

• You need the categories:create or categories:update permission.
• If you are going to link a supplier to the category, create it first in Suppliers.
• To build a tree, plan the parent categories before the children.

Step by step

Create a category

1. Enter the module. In the sidebar press Operations → Categories. (screenshot: category tree)
2. Press "New category" in the header.
3. Fill in the form.
   • Name (required) - visible text (e.g. Beverages).
   • Slug (required) - URL-friendly identifier. It is generated automatically from the name (beverages); you can edit it. Only letters, numbers, and hyphens.
   • Description (optional) - internal note for the team.
   • Parent category (optional) - select another existing category. Leave it empty if it is top-level. This creates the hierarchy.
   • Supplier (optional) - usual supplier of the products in this category. Pre-fills the supplier on purchase orders when you select products from this category.
   • Display order - integer (0, 1, 2…). Categories with a lower number are shown first.
   • Active - turn off the switch to hide the category without deleting it.
4. Press "Create".

Build a hierarchy

Mosce ERP supports a category tree with no depth limit. To create Beverages → Soft drinks:

1. First create Beverages (no parent).
2. Create Soft drinks and, in Parent category, select Beverages.
3. Repeat the pattern for the levels you need.

When editing a category, it cannot be its own parent or descendant (the selector excludes it automatically).

Assign products to a category

Assignment is done from the product, not from the category:

1. Go to Operations → Products and open the product you want to classify.
2. In the Categorization section, select the category.
3. Save the changes.

To reassign many products, edit them one by one; there is no bulk action in this version.

Edit a category

Press the pencil icon in the list. Change the name, parent, supplier, or status and press Update.

Delete a category

Press the trash icon. Deletion has two explicit restrictions:

• It cannot be deleted if it has subcategories. The system responds with CATEGORY_HAS_CHILDREN. Reassign or delete the children first.
• It cannot be deleted if it has associated products. The system responds with CATEGORY_HAS_PRODUCTS. Reassign those products to another category (or remove the category from them) first.

When it no longer has children or products, deletion is permanent (not a soft delete).

Expected result

• The category appears in the selector when you create or edit a product.
• The tree is respected in filters and reports that group by category.
• If you linked a supplier, purchase orders for products in that category preselect that supplier.

Common errors

Notes

• The profit margin is configured per tenant (in Settings) and optionally per product or per client. There is no margin per category in this version.
• Inactive categories do not appear in the product selector, but already assigned products keep the reference.

Related

• Products
• Suppliers