What's the difference between a product attribute and Custom Options?

What's the difference between a product attribute and Custom Options?

For example, I have a shoes shop, I need to add a shoe size attributes to the system. Both of the methods can imple开发者_JS百科ment it. Which way shall I use?

Thanks in advance!

A product attribute is an attribute that you as admin specify for a product.

A custom option is an option for the customer to choose when buying the product.

So you can add the shoe size as attribute if it is static for the product. If you want the customer however to manually choose a size you should do it via custom options.

it seems like you need to set up configurable products. these are a collection of simple products. to get used to doing this start with the manage attributes so your system knows what its dealing with. then add the attributes to attribute sets all your product attribute sets derive from the default. custom options should be used differently

http://www.magentocommerce.com/knowledge-base/entry/tutorial-creating-a-configurable-product