wpsc-product custom post type admin list can cause out of memory fatal errors

[JeffPyeBrook]

Because the wpsc-product custom post type is hierarchical, the admin list table for products will override any posts per page settings and request all posts from the database when the list table is first displayed. See wp_edit_posts_query().

This causes out of memory fatal errors on sites with large product catalogs or small amounts of memory as each post is read into memory and cached with it's properties and meta.

Either the hierarchical post type needs to be overridden, or a default sort order needs to be set to avoid the out of memory condition.

Even when a fatal out of memory condition does not get triggered, this has a easily measurable negative impact on site performance and resource utilization.

[benhuson]

Is it possible to set the post type as non-hierarchical but still include the variation products as products with a parent?

[JeffPyeBrook]

It is possible to change the hierarchical, but I won't say that I know all of the side effects of still setting a parent on a non-hierarchical. Right now the only issues I can confirm are the admin UI.

But I wouldn't do it for fear of a future incompatibility. It might be easier to make sure that there always is an explicit sort order on that admin page.

I set to non-hierarchical on my sites because I completely disable all variation functionality. I haven't had any issues yet.

[JustinSainton]

We should investigate ramifications and potential performance improvements of changing this.