Defining Order Characteristics (Customizing) 

Use

You can use this function if you want to display the status of the planned orders graphically in the sequence schedule. You can assign up to three order characteristics to an order profile. Therefore, you can display three different order statuses, such as delivery problems, the material availability or the material if you produce different materials on one production line.

The order characteristic consists of a combination of the characteristics group which determines the type of the characteristic and a field or a field combination of a table which provides the value of the characteristic.

Integration

You define the order characteristics in Customizing for Sequencing.

Features

To determine the type of the order status, you can assign an order characteristic one of the following characteristic groups and R/3 fields:

When assigning the order characteristics, you can assign a constant color to an order characteristic of this group. This has the effect that, in the sequence schedule, the graphic element for this order characteristic is displayed in the same color for all orders. You do not have to assign a table field to a characteristic of this group. You only have to assign the color (element type) in which you want to display the orders when assigning the characteristics.

You can assign one of the fields from the planned order table PLAF to an order characteristic of this group. If you want to display material availability, you can assign the field 'Material availability (MDPBV) and then you can assign a color to every possible status. For example, you can assign the color green to the graphic element if the availability status is, 'checked and completely confirmed'.

You can assign a color to an order characteristic of this group depending on an action (for example, the action BOM explosion). You do not have to make any entries in the column Field/Combination. The sequence schedule always visualizes the action that was last entered. You can also specify customer-specific order statuses.

You can display date differences with an order characteristic of this group. Here, you can use dates from the planned order table PLAF and from the sales data tables VBBE and VBAK. If, for example, you want to visualize delivery difficulties, subtract the production finish date from the material staging date or the delivery date.

You can assign a color to an order characteristic of this group using a user exit.

With an order characteristic of this group, you can display a characteristic of a configured material in a certain color. To do this, you have to determine the key of the characteristic in the class system and then define this key as an R/3 field. If, for example, you configure the color of a product when creating a sales order, you can also assign this color to the order bar in the sequence schedule via the order characteristic.

You can assign a color to an order characteristic of this group depending on the material in the planned order. If, for example, you produce two different materials on one production line, you can assign one material the color green and blue to the other material.

You do not have to assign a field or a color to an order characteristic of this group. The system assigns different colors to the planned orders in the sequence schedule so that you can more easily distinguish between each one.