Office Integration

Use

In the report output of Report Writer reports, Office Integration is available as an alternative to list output. It also replaces the previous Excel export in RPW format.

Prerequisites

Office Integration places higher demands on front-end hardware than does normal list output. For more information, see Desktop Office Integration .

Features

Office Integration enables reports to be output as Office documents (Microsoft Excel, Lotus 123). The Office application runs as a control within the SAP window. With a few exceptions, all SAP functions are available on the worksheet of the Office application. The functions are as follows:

  • Display can be switched interactively

    Using the dialog settings, you can switch between displaying the report in the normal list format and displaying it as an Office document. The selected setting is saved permanently in the user parameters. The dialog settings can also be changed on the initial screen of the report group in the output parameters.

    Note Note

    If the selected Office application is not installed on the user’s PC, the report is output in normal list format.

    End of the note.

  • Worksheet protection

    When a report is output into an Office document, the worksheets are protected. This is to assure consistency of the data on the front end with the SAP system. This consistency is necessary for context-sensitive functions such as report calls and changing column attributes.

    You can permanently deactivate worksheet protection in the dialog settings, or temporarily in the Office application, allowing you to change the worksheet locally. However, if rows and columns are then inserted into the worksheet, the correct cell reference for context-sensitive functions may be lost. Any changes made locally will be overwritten in the SAP system in the next dialog step.

  • Mail connection

    You can send the current Office document as an attachment to an email.

    Note Note

    It is not necessary to have saved the report as an extract.

    End of the note.

  • Local structuring functions

    Office Integration supports local hierarchical structuring functions in the Office application. This enables you to change the breakdown of rows and columns locally, without having to communicate with the SAP system. This function is also available with mailed Office documents.

  • Headers in worksheets

    The headers of worksheets are created from the text for export . The headers and footers defined for the report are normally adapted for list output and are therefore not used for the worksheet. Likewise, the title page and end page are ignored.

  • Output of sections

    Each section that has an explicit page break (default setting in Report Painter) is output in the Office document as a new worksheet. Sections that follow each other without explicit page breaks are output together in one worksheet. The name of the worksheet is the title of the first section on the worksheet. The title may get changed slightly to meet the naming restrictions of the Office application (non-permitted characters such as *, :, \, /, and ?, length restrictions, uniqueness of the name).

For more information, see Desktop Office Integration .