Report Creation: Process - SAP Documentation

Purpose

Prerequisites

You can either create document templates in the SAP system yourself or import them. You can import sample templates using the IMG activity Import Sample Templates in Customizing for Basic Data and Tools (see Import and Export ).
You have authorization to edit and display document templates and generation variants.

Process Flow

If you have not imported a document template , you must create one. The process for report templates, cover sheet templates, and acknowledgement of receipt templates is the same (see Document Template Editing ).
You use the Windows Wordprocessor Integration (WWI) program to edit the layout of the document template .

Note
You can print multilingual reports. See also Determining Fonts .

End of the note.
You assign a generation variant to your document template and therefore also a report category (for example, material safety data sheet, accident report) (see Generation Variant Editing ):
- Reports with Reference to a Specification
  
  For reports, the generation variant links the document template to the usage. In this way you can ensure that when a report is generated, only permitted values are printed on the report.
- Reports Without Reference to a Specification
  
  If no specification symbols are included in the layout of a document template, the report exists immediately after the generation variant was assigned to the document template.

Result

For Reports with Reference to a Specification

You can use the generation variant to create a report request for a specification and to start generating the report from the report request. The generated report then passes through the report management status network and is available for report shipping once it has been released in the report information system.

For Reports Without Reference to a Specification

After assigning the generation variant, the report is handled as a released report and is therefore available for report shipping in the report information system. The report does not appear in report management.