Show TOC

Background documentationException Management Locate this document in the navigation structure

 

The exception management concept of Demand Data Foundation (DDF) enables you to quickly view, process, and - where required - delete large numbers of exceptions for your area of responsibility.

Exceptions are system-based messages that inform users about situations requiring special attention or action. In most cases, they are related to business processes (for example, Forecasting configuration and control settings do not exist for product X and location X). Sometimes they are of a more technical nature (for example, RFC authorization failure).

In general, in many SAP applications, such situations can occur either in the background or in dialog mode. Typically, information about situations that occurred in the background is collected in a log (such as a job log) for later viewing and processing. Information about situations that require special attention or action in dialog mode usually interrupts business processes with a message that is displayed for immediate viewing and resolution.

In DDF, data is processed in large volumes and a large number of exceptions can occur in the background. These exceptions require postprocessing by users in various roles who need filtering options that allow them to quickly pinpoint and process the exceptions that they are responsible for.

Exceptions collected in DDF are stored on the database so users can conveniently postprocess them using the Monitor Exceptions function. For more information, see Monitor Exceptions.

Note Note

Exception messages related to inbound processing are displayed in the Monitor Imports function for erroneous data records in the staging tables. For more information, see Monitor Imports.

End of the note.

Integration

You can use the DDF exception management concept to process exceptions generated in the consuming applications of DDF, provided this concept has been integrated.

Recommendation Recommendation

To find out to what extent the exception management concept has been integrated, see the product documentation of your consuming application. For a list of the supported consuming applications, see SAP Note 2001688Information published on SAP site.

End of the recommendation.

Customer-Specific Integration

DDF includes interfaces that are available to customers who want to incorporate this exception management concept into customer-specific enhancements. For more information about how to do this, see the documentation for the following interfaces (transaction SE24):

  • /DMF/IF_EXCEPTION_MANAGER (API)

  • /DMF/IF_EXCEPTION_READER (API)

  • /DMF/IF_EXCEPTION_CHANGE (API)

Features

High-Level Exceptions and Low-Level Exceptions

In addition to having the standard ABAP message features, DDF exceptions are grouped into the categories high-level and low-level. This categorization is not influenced by the exception message type (such as warning or information). A high-level exception should describe a particular issue; the low-level exceptions assigned to it should help explain the reason for the high-level exception. A high-level exception can be issued without any low-level exceptions, but a low-level exception is always assigned to at least one high-level exception.

High-level exceptions provide information about the following:

  • an unexpected and probably unintended situation with business impact

  • the actual or expected (business) impact

  • how critical the situation could potentially be

  • the reason for the unexpected situation

  • how the situation could potentially be resolved

If context information is supported, high-level exceptions are written to the database along with low-level exceptions giving extra information and indicating the context in which the message was generated. Examples of contextual information:

  • Location

  • Product

  • Sales Organization

  • Vendor Fund

  • Distribution Channel

The following example illustrates the relationship between high-level exceptions and low-level exceptions:

Example Example

You transfer current product prices for one location to DDF, but one of the products does not exist in DDF; therefore the price for that particular product cannot be stored. The error message might read: Product does not exist. However, for you, the business context is that you transferred product prices for a specific location. In this example, the high-level exception would refer to your attempt to transfer prices; a low-level exception would mention that the product does not exist and put the specific product and location into the appropriate context.

End of the example.

Configuration

You can configure high-level and low-level exceptions in Customizing (transaction SPRO) under   Cross-Application Components   Demand Data Foundation   Basic Settings   Exception Management  .

You can customize the following:

  • Message type

  • Priority

  • Validity period

  • Assignment of exception messages to business areas

  • Low-level exception message priority

  • Message status

  • Customer-specific replacement messages

    Note Note

    Before you can replace standard message texts, you must first create your own message texts (transaction SE91).

    End of the note.

Purge Report

After you have processed your exceptions, you should use the Purging Exceptions from the Database (/DMF/PURGE_EWB_MESSAGE) report to delete the exceptions that you no longer need. For example, you can delete exceptions that have expired. For more information, see the report documentation (transaction SE38).

Recommendation Recommendation

To avoid risking database overload, you should schedule the report to run on a daily basis.

End of the recommendation.

To access the report on the SAP Easy Access screen (transaction nwbc), choose   Cross-Application Components   Services   Mass Maintenance Services   Purging Exceptions from the Database  .