Transaction Variants and Screen Variants
Whenever you use a transaction in the SAP system to process specific business transactions, it often makes sense to adjust processing flow to mirror these business activities. This can be done by hiding all information not pertinent to the business transaction and by displaying especially important information more prominently.
The transaction Create sales order (VA01) allows you to create export orders and returns as well as normal sales orders. You are provided with a specific view of this transaction's process flow according to the task at hand. Sometimes only a handful of dialog steps are actually relevant.
For example, you want to create a direct customer sale (used with those customers that come to your production site, pay directly, and take their merchandise with them). All fields on the initial screen can have default values inserted into them according to the business transaction. Since no additional input is necessary here, this screen can now be hidden. Your second screen also contains a lot of data that can be set to a certain default value and hidden, for example customer data, sales data, and purchasing data.
In this case you will want to hide the initial screen. The second screen can be simplified by hiding the fields, tabs, pushbuttons, and menu functions contained in the standard transaction.
Creating a transaction variant only alters the layout of the screen. Business processes delivered by SAP retain their integrity in any case.
Transaction variants are actually made up of a series of screen variants. The field values and field attributes for each screen in a transaction variant are stored in
screen variants.You can create as many variants of a specific transaction as you like. These variants are started by entering a transaction code that you have selected into the R/3 command field. Your system administrator can assign your transaction codes to user menus. This allows the users in the departments that use your transaction to call the transaction directly. For more information, see
Creating Roles.Transaction variant functionality is complemented by the use of
GuiXT. Transactions can be enhanced using graphics, texts, and HTML pages. Screen fields can also be moved around on the screen, and important new menu functions can be added to the user interface or application toolbar in the form of pushbuttons.For more information, see:
Transaction Variants Variant Transactions, Setting Transaction Variants Screen Variants Table Control Layout in Variants Transaction Variants and Screen Variants: Restrictions Transaction Variants and Screen Variants: Special Featuress GuiXT