The project lead creates an implementation, upgrade or template project, in the SAP Solution Manager project administration. For the project, he generates IMG and CTS projects, and a project cycle, because change request management will be part of the project.

The responsible system administrator activates the project cycle. In the project administration, under  System Landscape Change Management , they select the Activate Change Request Management checkbox. The project cycle and task list for the project are generated when they select Create task list.

You can now create requests for change. When the status of a request for change is set to In Development, the assigned change documents are assigned to the project cycle. The selected project in the Details assignment block defines which project cycle is assigned by the system. If several projects are active at the same time, you can choose from a list of projects.

The change manager sets the status of the implementation project to Development without Release. In this status, features can be developed, and transport requests and tasks can be created, but not exported.

When the change manager switches the status of the implementation project from Development without Release to Development with Release, transport requests can be released from within a normal change. The administrator uses the task list to import all released changes into the test systems.

The change manager sets the status of the project cycle to Test.

If there are any normal changes, whose status has not yet been set to Tested Successfully when the phase is changed from Development with Release to Test, the system issues an error. In a development project, no changes can be excluded from the test; they either have to be withdrawn or released. Any errors that are found during the test phase are reported by testers and resolved with a defect correction change document.

If changes still have to be made after the test phase has been completed, transport requests and tasks can be created and released as part of the Emergency Correction phase. You can only do this by using the task list of the Schedule Manager. This only applies to normal changes.

In the Go Live phase, the entire project buffer is imported into the production system.

The project buffer is now empty, and there are no open transport requests. You can now close the project cycle, by setting the status to To be Closed. You can then create a new project cycle. Any changes that were not finished due to capacity or design issues can be assigned to another project cycle. Otherwise, changes that are still open are disconnected from the current cycle and assigned to the next project cycle and task list of the same project.