BRFplus Expression Type for Retrieval of BO Data

Business rules framework plus (BRFplus) provides a comprehensive application programming interface (API) and user interface (UI) for defining and processing business rules. It allows you to model rules in an intuitive way and also allows you to reuse these rules in different applications.

You can create rules by calling appropriate BRFplus expressions in BRFplus functions. These expressions use a context, or nest other expressions to calculate, determine, or derive a result. There are different types of expressions, such as decision tables and selecting data from a database (DB).

You can use the expression type RetrieveBOData (/BOFU/RETRIEVE_BO_DATA) in the context of application business objects (BOs) developed using business object processing framework (BOPF). An expression created for this expression type makes application data from BOs available for use in the BRFplus environment.

You can use the retrieved BO data in decisions and calculations in the BRFplus environment. This promotes better business process extension capabilities to BOPF based applications. For business documents that get processed as instances of application BOs, this expression is useful in carrying out decisions and triggering follow-up actions such as output management decisions and BO field control.

Inputs for Creating a RetrieveBOData Expression

1. Identifying the leading data node in the result.

   You have the following options, depending on your business requirements:

   • Specify the BO node name

   • Specify the BO node name by association

2. Input binding for record keys of application data (table of KEYs or a single KEY).

Features of the RetrieveBOData Expression

• You can specify the filter values for association parameter fields

  For example, when you use language as an attribute of a node, you can use the filter value to specify the appropriate language.

• You can repeat the same association more than once to pick application data corresponding to different association filter values.

  For example, if the BO association is TEXT, the text can be in any language. To filter the language, you use association filter values.

• You can map data fields to suitable output data object fields.

Outputs of the RetrieveBOData Expression

Fields from the following are the outputs for the RetrieveBOData expression:

• The leading data node

• The BO nodes that you have associated with the leading data node

The expression provides the following:

• Result table for output keys

• Result data table as a data object

• Result table for key links when you specify the BO node name by association (RetrieveByAssociation)

For more information about BRFplus, see  SAP NetWeaver Library   SAP NetWeaver by Key Capability  Application Platform by Key Capability   Business Services  Business Rules Framework plus