ABAP, NetWeaver, ERP Tutorial

The business might decide to implement SAP ERP FI module as the company finance system. In this case many finance documents will be posted via external systems. SAP provides many BAPIs to fulfill such requirement.

Below scenario is to create a vendor invoice in SAP via BAPI – BAPI_ACC_DOCUMENT_POST. The business wants to create vendor invoices from incoming file from vendor which contains all the transactions in one week. Below code snip can be used to create a vendor invoice.

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What is this tutorial about?

Try to tell how to trigger idoc with message control framework(output control technique in SD module)

Glossary

Condition record——one record contains the value we want

Condition type——–the type of the condition record

Output procedure——–the procedure determine how the output related with sales order or other business document

Basic Knowledge you need to know

I will list the keyword below,you can search it with google or study it through the link below.

• Condition Technique
• Output Control in SD
• Partner Profile

Tutorial

Here I will try to give a example about configure IDoc output control.

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What is IDOC ?

If you are not fimilar with the definition of IDOC, I think you can get some from google.

What is this tutorial about?

It will tell how to trigger IDOC output when you save sales order in VA01 or VA02.It doesn’t tell the theory but how to do step by step.

Glossary

Before we start, there is some words you need know.

IDOC———–Yes, it’s the one we focus on.You can take it as a xml format.It’s some standard that restrict you how to put data in XML.It’s a container

Logical System——-This is the way that SAP define a external system,every external system in SAP is defined as a logical system.

Logical Message Type——The bussiness aspect of IDOC.Technically,Idoc is the format of the data,logical message is the bussiness meaning of the data.The relationship between them is many to many.

Logical Port———–How the sap communicate with other system,through file,hwo to name the file,what’s the path of the file.

Partner Profile——-The key profile define

Condition Technique/Message Control——-The basic technique in SD module.It applys in price determination,output control and a lot of other areas.In this article,we will see it in output control.

ALE————–A kind of knowledge that relates to IDOC,this technique is usually to connect SAP application together.

Tools We used

WE02———-monitor IDOC process,you can also use BD87,but it’s very slow.

SALE———–It will take us to a tree menu.There is a lot of other tools in it,such like configure logical port.

WEDI———- Similar to SALE.

Tutorial

1 Define Logical System

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Business Scenario

One company wants to create the sales order in SAP with the data from external sales tools.  A third party EAI/SOA tools has already been used to integrate different company-wise applications. Below is the basic system integration landscape.

The client decides to use IDoc to transfer the sales order in order to utilize the built-in error handling feature.

The first step to configure the SAP ALE interface is to maintain the partner profile. Below is the detailed steps with corresponding screenshot and description.

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In this tutorial, I try to explain how to use t-code WE19 to test an IDoc inbound processing. This is a very basic tutorial but I believe it is very helpful for beginners to have a general understanding of IDoc processing. The test scenario for this tutorial is an external SAP system sends an IDoc to the receiver SAP system and the receiver SAP system will send the inbound IDoc to the agent to review.

Below are the steps to configure, test and monitor the whole scenario. All these steps are performed in the receiver system as I use the WE19 to simulate the inbound IDoc, so all the configuration activities in the sender system is omitted in this tutorial.

Step 1. Define the logical system for the external SAP system

Go to transaction BD54 to add a new logical system for the external SAP system. You can find the external SAP system’s logical system using transaction SCC4 and select the correct client you are using, you can find the assigned logical system to this client.

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Service-oriented architecture (SOA) is a blueprint for an adaptable, flexible, and open IT architecture
for developing services-based, modular business solutions. SAP makes it easy to adopt SOA –
enabling companies in diverse industries to quickly differentiate their businesses and optimize
processes in their business networks. SAP enables businesses to adopt SOA at their own pace as
part of their SAP solutions. At the heart of SAP’s open-standards approach to SOA is the web service.

SAP provides a set of tools to create, configure and monitor the web service. In this post, I would like to share how to expose a remote-enabled function module to a web service.

1. Create a Service Definition

With the inside-out approach, independent function modules that were implemented as RFC-enabled function modules, as function groups, or as BAPIs are provided as a Web service. The Web service can be used across the entire Internet using standard protocols and can easily be added to any development environment.

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BDC is an abbreviation for Batch Data Communication. It is a common data transportation method and is especially useful in large data communication scenario. There are two methods to run BDC program. One is using statement ‘Call Transaction’ directly. In this method, the screen is simulated directly but difficult for error processing. The other method is to create a BDC session. Actual data transportation is executed when  running this BDC session. I will explain the two methods further.

The BAPI can also be used for data transfer as an alternative.

Call Transaction

With Call Transaction statement, the system process the data more quickly than BDC session. Before using this statement, you need to populate the BDC internal table with screen recording data and transactional data. External data does not have to be deposited in a session for later processing. Instead, the entire batch input process takes place inline in your program.

Syntax:

CALL TRANSACTION
 USING
 MODE
 UPDATE

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SAP provides several function modules to send email to the external world. The interfaces of them are more or less the same, just with some minor difference.

Function Group: SOI1 – API Function Modules for Externals

Function Module:

SO_DOCUMENT_SEND_API1 – SAPoffice: Send new document with attachments using RFC
SO_NEW_DOCUMENT_SEND_API1 – SAPoffice: Send new document
SO_NEW_DOCUMENT_ATT_SEND_API1 - SAPoffice: Send new document with attachments using RFC

In the implementation, all above function modules will call another function module ‘SO_OBJECT_SEND’ to send email.

Differences among these function modules:

SO_DOCUMENT_SEND_API1 - In this FM u can specify the sender address. Means u can hardcode any ID and system will display that sender only irrespective of who is running the report.

SO_NEW_DOCUMENT_SEND_API1 – Through this system will pick sender based on from which id running the program. This function module also enables you to send a new document, which has not yet been created, internally and externally. During the send process the document is created, along with the attributes and content that is to be transferred.

SO_NEW_DOCUMENT_ATT_SEND_API1 - This function module enables you send a new document including any existing attachments. The document and the attachments are transferred in the same table. They are created when sent and can also be placed in the sender’s outbox.

Except these function modules, SAP provides a simplified one named HR_FBN_GENERATE_SEND_EMAIL. If you check the function module interface, you will find it is quite easy to use.

I will give some useful examples with actual scenario recently. But above function modules are more or less not state of the art and difficult to handle. Meanwhile, SAP introduced the BCS (Business Communication Services), a much more flexible and future-oriented OO attempt to Mail. We will discuss it later.

What does the interface mean?

Interface means the communication interface between different systems in an enterprise enviroment. SAP provides a comprehensive solution for different industries. A company still needs a lot other systems to make daily work more effectively. Different SAP systems also need to communicate each other to exchange business data.

SAP provides several technologies to achieve this goal. Below is list of these technologies.

1. BAPI/Remote Function module
2. ALE/EDI/IDoc
3. Use middleware like PI(Process Integration)
4. File System

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