Model Management

A model is a representation of the relationships, calculations, and data of an organization or business segment.

Models can be categorized as ‘planning models’ or ‘consolidation models’. Planning models are used for generic planning-related activities. Consolidation models are designed for performing consolidation tasks. Consolidation type models must have specific components defined to fullfil legal consolidation requirements. For detailed information, see Planning and Consolidation Models and Set up a Consolidation Model.

Features

You can use the following features when managing models:

Creating New Models

To create a model, go to Administration and under the Modeling section, choose Models. On the screen that appears, choose New.

When you create a new model, you set references to InfoProviders that exist in SAP Business Warehouse (BW). You can choose an arbitrary number of InfoProviders to include in the model. When creating a new model you can use the following types of InfoProviders:

Recommendation
We recommend that you familiarize yourself with the documentation of SAP BW as all InfoProviders that you can use for creating models in Business Planning and Consolidation are delivered by BW.
Note
You cannot create new InfoProviders through the web interface of Business Planning and Consolidation. If you want to create InfoProviders that you could later use in your models, you must create them in the BW modeling tools. For more information, see the documentation ofWorking with BW Modeling Tools in Eclipse.

Adding or Removing InfoProviders

To add a new InfoProvider to a model, or to remove an InfoProvider that is already included in the model, follow the steps below:

  1. Go to Administration and under the Modeling section, choose Models.
  2. Choose the model that you want to change.
  3. Choose the Add/Remove button. A list of all available InfoProviders appears.
  4. Use the checkbox for each InfoProvider to include or exclude it from the model.

Reviewing the Structure of Models

You can review the structure of each individual InfoProvider that is included in a model. To do this, follow the steps below:

  1. Go to Administration and under the Modeling section, choose Models.
  2. Choose the model whose structure you want to review.
  3. Choose an InfoProvider that is included in the model.

The screen that appears, has three tabs:

  • Structure - displays the structure of the InfoObject
  • Aggregation Levels - displays a list of the aggregation levels that are defined for the InfoProvider. Each aggregation level is a selection of characteristics and key figures.
    Note
    The Business Planning and Consolidation web user interface displays only simple aggregation levels. These aggregation levels are set on DataStore Objects (advanced). The complex aggregation levels (aggregation levels that are created on CompositeProviders) are not displayed.
  • Related MultiProviders - shows the MultiProviders that exist for the selected InfoProvider.

Adding Business Rules to Models

You can add business rules to a model in the Business Rules area of the Administration screen. You activate the rule types you need for the model and add the new business rules of each type to the model. For more information, see Business Rules Management.

Setting up Work Status Settings for Models

Managing work status involves specifying who can make changes to your data and who can change the work state on a data set. You create work states to reflect the status of data as it moves through your business processes. See Work Status Setup.

Deleting Models

Administrators can delete models when necessary.