Scenarios for Connecting to External Systems (SAP Library

Scenarios for Connecting External Systems

You can connect various external systems to the Warehouse Management system (WMS) via the interface between the WMS and external systems (WMS-WCU interface). The following scenarios give you an overview of typical ways in which this interface can be used.

External systems include on the one hand WMS-dependent warehouse systems such as warehouse control units (WCUs) or fork lift control systems, and on the other hand systems, which only help themselves from the warehouse, for example production control stations.

Features

The WMS-WCU interface supports the following communication processes between the systems:

Transferring transfer orders from the SAP WMS to the external system

Transferring the release of collective processes from the SAP WMS to the external system

Transferring cancellation requests from the SAP WMS to the external system

Creating transfer orders reported by the external system in the SAP WMS

Confirming transfer orders reported as completed by the external system in the SAP WMS

Moving storage units

Blocking storage units or aisles

Creating transfer requirements reported by the external system in the SAP WMS

Canceling transfer orders in the SAP WMS, which the external system reports as not completed

The WMS generally takes on all of the warehouse management tasks. However, warehouse control and execution of transportation orders are not part of the SAP WMS’s tasks.

For this reason, the external systems are always independent of the SAP system, and they can take over not only the control of the material flow, but also other tasks such as optimizing warehouse movements or additional control mechanisms.

The distribution of tasks between the WMS and the connected systems is in the foreground of the scenarios. The flexibility of the WMS-WCU interface allows you to make user-defined adjustments and enhancements. For further information, see Modification Concepts: IDoc Inbound Processing and Modification Concepts: IDoc Outbound Processing.

Activities

You distribute tasks between the WMS and the external system on an individual customer basis.