When feature and attribute are the same?

[watou]

Hello,

 

I have imported products, some of which have a feature called Finish and no combinations, and others have combinations based on different Finish attribute values.  It seemed logical when I was setting up the import, but now that I see the layered navigation block, it's confusing:

 

 

The top set of Finish are the attribute values, and the bottom set are the feature values.  In a perfect world, there would be a single Finish filter that applied to all attribute and feature values for Finish.  But since I don't live in such a world, what is the expert opinion about how to make the choice not confusing?  Renaming either the attribute or the feature to Color or something else seems like it would not really solve the problem cleanly.

 

I've searched and not found answers to this question, but it strikes me that it must not be an uncommon situation.

 

Many thanks for your thoughts.

 

Regards,

John

 

[vekia]

if the products have the same attributes as features they have, maybe just disable option to filter by features? it's a kind of redundancy, i think

[watou]

if the products have the same attributes as features they have, maybe just disable option to filter by features? it's a kind of redundancy, i think

 

Thank you so much for replying, @vekia.  I would never have gotten as far as I have without having read a long list of your previous replies to people.

 

The issue is that many products have no combinations: a single product available in, say, Antique Brass.  So I made Antique Brass a product Feature called Finish.  And then there are other products that vary by Finish, meaning that Finish must be a product Attribute for those products.

 

Is it possible and sensible to have a product with a single Combination based on a Finish Attribute?  It seems silly to set it up that way, but it would eliminate the Feature called Finish and hence the duplication in the layered navigation block.  But I'm looking to an expert for the best practice here!

 

Kind regards and thanks,

John