Preview a sync before anything is written

A preview is a dry run. Everstock fetches your supplier's feed, works out exactly what a real sync would change, and writes nothing at all to Shopify, so you can check the result before any stock or price moves.

Start a preview

You can start one from two places.

• On a connection's page, click Preview changes in the header, next to Sync now.
• On Connections, open the overflow menu at the end of a row and click Preview changes.

Either way the run is queued for a background worker, and you see a toast confirming it: "Preview queued. Nothing will be written." Started from Connections, the toast names the connection it queued and still ends with "Nothing will be written."

The rest of the progress reporting only happens on the connection's own page. There, a spinner labelled Preview running appears while the run works. When it finishes you get "Preview ready. Nothing was written." and the results open on their own. If the run could not complete, the toast reads "Preview failed" and no modal opens, so open the run in Sync history to read why. Started from Connections, there is no spinner and no results modal at all, so read the outcome in Sync history or on the connection's page.

The modal is a convenience, not the record. If you navigate away, or the page gives up waiting, the run carries on and its results are still in Sync history.

Reading "Preview: proposed changes"

The modal is headed Preview: proposed changes and opens with an information banner: "Nothing has been written to Shopify" / "These are the changes a real sync would make now."

Below it is one row per record, with six columns.

• SKU / barcode identifies the record, using its SKU when there is one and its barcode otherwise.
• Action is what a real run would do to it: inventory-set, price-update, inventory-and-price, product-update, create, or review.
• Quantity shows the move as a before and after pair, for example "5 → 12".
• Price shows the same before and after shape.
• Fields changed lists any product field the run would overwrite, with its old and new value. This stays empty unless you have switched something on under "Product fields (advanced)".
• Status is Planned for a would-be write, which is the dry-run equivalent of Applied, and Review for a record a person needs to look at.

The list holds only records that would change plus records flagged for review. Anything already in sync is left out, so a short list is normal and good. If everything matches, the modal says so directly: "Everything is in sync. A real run would change nothing." Very large previews are trimmed in the modal, and a note tells you how many rows are shown and points you at the CSV for the rest.

Two buttons sit in the modal footer. Download CSV saves the full audit for the run, with twelve columns from matching_key through changes, and prices in major units to two decimals. Close dismisses the modal, which never changes anything either way. Above them, at the end of the list, Open full run details links to the same run in Sync history, where the per-record audit has more columns and an "Item status" filter.

A preview is never counted as a sync

Everstock keeps preview runs separate from real ones on purpose, so your reporting is not inflated by rehearsals.

• The Last run column on Connections ignores it. The footer note there says: "Last run shows the most recent real sync. Preview runs and supplier write-back runs are excluded."
• The dashboard totals exclude it, and the dashboard tells you how many preview runs it left out.
• In Sync history the run appears with a Preview badge beside its status, and you can narrow the Kind filter to "Preview only" or "Real only".
• On the run detail page the heading reads "Preview · " followed by the connection name, with a banner confirming the run was a preview.
• It never satisfies the schedule. A preview does not update the connection's last-synced time, so Next sync does not move and your next scheduled sync still runs when it is due.

When the preview looks right, click Sync now on the connection to apply it for real. A preview is a snapshot, not a saved plan: Sync now fetches the feed again and works the changes out again, so a supplier update in between can make the real run differ from what you read.

Need help? Visit the support page or email hello@usenormalize.com.