Sandbox Simulations

ShipBob’s Simulation Terminal is now available in all sandbox accounts. It lets you simulate the full lifecycle of ShipBob operations — fulfillment, receiving, and inventory adjustments — directly from the merchant dashboard, without needing real warehouse activity.

This is the fastest way to test your integration end-to-end and build confidence before going live.

Before You Start

Make sure the following conditions are met before running a simulation.

Accessing the Simulation Terminal

The Simulation Terminal is embedded at the bottom of the Orders, Inventory Status, and Warehouse Receiving Orders pages in your sandbox account here.

1. Log in to your sandbox account.
2. Look for the Simulations bar pinned to the bottom of the screen.
3. Click it to expand, or toggle it with Ctrl + M.
4. Use the icons in the panel header to toggle fullscreen, switch the theme (dark/light), and minimize or close the terminal.

Available Commands

All commands accept a leading / (e.g., /help, /list). The slash also triggers the autocomplete dropdown — see Command Autocomplete below.

Command Autocomplete

Type / at the prompt to open the suggestions dropdown. It surfaces every built-in command plus every workflow registered in your sandbox.

• ↑ / ↓ — Move through suggestions
• Tab — Insert the highlighted suggestion
• Enter — Run the highlighted suggestion
• Esc — Dismiss the dropdown

The list filters live as you keep typing — e.g., /f narrows to commands starting with f such as /fulfill-order.

Available Workflows

Run /list in the terminal to see all workflows available in your sandbox:

$ /list
Found 3 workflow(s):
[1] /receive-wro       — 5 stage(s), 1 input field(s)
[2] /fulfill-order     — 5 stage(s), 1 input field(s)
[3] /adjust-inventory  — 2 stage(s), 1 input field(s)

Tutorial: Simulating Order Fulfillment

The /fulfill-order workflow is the most commonly used simulation. It walks a shipment through every stage of the fulfillment pipeline — from picking to delivery — so you can test webhook handlers, polling logic, and UI state transitions without touching real inventory.

Step 1: Get a Shipment ID

From the Orders page in your sandbox, find a shipment in Awaiting Pick status and copy its Shipment ID (e.g., 106675083).

Step 2: Start the workflow

In the Simulation Terminal, type:

$ /fulfill-order

When prompted, enter the Shipment ID:

Workflow: Fulfill Order — Complete order fulfillment lifecycle
Enter Shipment ID: 106675083

Step 3: Choose stages to run

The workflow will display all available stages:

Available stages:
  1. Picked     — Start pick, fetch pick lines, and perform picks
  2. Packed     — Complete packing
  3. Shipped    — Generate label, print, and validate
  4. InTransit  — Update tracking status to InTransit
  5. Delivered  — Update tracking status to Delivered
Enter start stage number (1-5), or press Enter to run all:

• Press Enter to run the full workflow from start to finish.
• To run a specific stage range, use the --from and --to flags instead:

$ /fulfill-order --from 2 --to 4

Step 4: Watch real-time progress

The terminal streams live progress as the workflow runs:

[ 0%] Fulfill Order - Starting...
[ 0%] Fulfill Order - Picked
  → Fetch Shipment Details          ✓ (0.08s)
  → Start Shipment Pick             ✓ (4.89s)
  → Get Shipment Pick               ✓ (1.10s)
  → Pick Lines                      ✓ (2.53s)
✓ Picked (8.61s)
[25%] Fulfill Order - Packed
  → Fetch Shipment Details          ✓ (0.09s)
  → Complete Packing                ✓ (0.55s)
✓ Packed (2.95s)
[38%] Fulfill Order - Shipped
  → Fetch Shipment Details          ✓ (0.04s)
  → Generate Label                  ✓ (9.49s)
  → Print Label                     ✓ (0.12s)
  → Label Validated                 ✓ (0.09s)
✓ Shipped (9.74s)
[63%] Fulfill Order - InTransit
  → Fetch Shipment Details          ✓ (0.09s)
  → Get Shipment Tracking Info      ✓ (0.08s)
  → Update InTransit Status         ✓ (0.22s)
✓ InTransit (0.39s)
[81%] Fulfill Order - Delivered
  → Fetch Shipment Details          ✓ (0.03s)
  → Get Shipment Tracking Info      ✓ (0.04s)
  → Update Delivered Status         ✓ (0.07s)
✓ Delivered (0.16s)
[100%] Fulfill Order - Complete
✓ Workflow completed (32.4s)

Each stage maps to real status transitions in the ShipBob platform. You can use these to verify that your integration correctly handles each shipment status.

Shipment Status Transitions

Other Workflows

/receive-wro

Simulates a Warehouse Receiving Order being processed at a ShipBob fulfillment center. Useful for testing inventory replenishment flows and WRO webhook events.

$ /receive-wro
Workflow: Receive WRO — Simulate warehouse receiving lifecycle
Enter WRO ID: <your-wro-id>

/adjust-inventory

Simulates an inventory quantity adjustment. Useful for testing low-stock alerts, inventory sync logic, or backorder scenarios.

$ /adjust-inventory
Workflow: Adjust Inventory — Simulate inventory level change
Enter Inventory ID: <your-inventory-id>

Tips

• Refresh after a simulation — The current page doesn’t auto-update. Click the refresh icon in the table or open a new tab to see the latest shipment or inventory state.

• Run partial workflows — Start from any stage to test a specific status transition without re-running the full lifecycle.

• Chain workflows — Run /receive-wro to stock inventory, then /fulfill-order to move it through fulfillment, all in the same sandbox session.

• Verify webhooks in real time — The terminal’s live output is synchronized with the actual API calls, so webhook events fire at the exact moment each stage completes.

• Discover commands fast — Press / at any time to open the autocomplete dropdown, then Tab or Enter to insert the highlighted command. Workflow IDs appear in the same list once your sandbox finishes loading them.

• Switch themes — Use the sun/moon icon in the panel header to toggle between dark and light mode. Dark mode is the default; your choice is persisted per browser.

Supported Environments

The Simulation Terminal is available exclusively in sandbox accounts (webstage.shipbob.dev). It is not available in production.

FAQ