Magento 2 problem importing external images from csv

Question

I have Magento 2.2.8 and need to import lots of products, the problem is with images (I would rather not import all image files, but a reference via link). They are in an external URL and CSV file check complaints:

Imported resource (image) could not be downloaded from an external resource due to timeout or access permissions in a row(s): 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10

Csv has base_images like:

http://otherdomain.com/images/123/123.jpg

http://otherdomain.com/images/alfa/alfa.jpg

http://otherdomain.com/images/randomname/randomname.PNG

I have also tried adding the external server as the "Images File Directory", however then I get:

Wrong URL/path used for attribute image in a row

So far found: Import image from external url <-- that copies images

Magento 2: Import categories images external url via csv <-- for categories

Can images be linked to that external server?

If not, what workarounds are suggested?

Thanks.

Answer 1

The short answer is that external linka can't be done easily

This is sort of covered here

https://magento.stackexchange.com/a/154803/70343

But basically magento needs a local copy to create cache

Unless you simply mean that magento will need to fetch from a url and then store locally.

In which case as per docs just provide full path in csv import

https://docs.magento.com/m2/ce/user_guide/system/data-import-product-images.html

http://example.com/images/image.jpg

Providing nothing gets in the way source side (leech protect or whatever) this should work.

Images will be local though.