Documents 

Use

You use this function to enable access to qualitative information that is related by content to the characteristics and key figures in a planning package. This way, you can store information close to the plan data, which may refer to the data itself, or to the way the data is to be handled.

Examples of using documents:

·         The basis for the determination of particular plan data (for example, through reference to economic growth forecasts, or industry indicators such as order book levels).

·         The graphical presentation of plan data in slides

·         The preparation of planning manuals with details on how planning objects are to be set up, which planning tasks are to be carried out, and the planning intervals to be used.

Integration

If you have created documents for planning objects, you can maintain these in the InfoProvider Data area of document management in the Administrator Workbench. Documents for planning objects belong to document class TRAN.

You can find more information in the documentation on documentation management in the Administrator Workbench under Documents.

Prerequisites

At least one of the characteristics contained in the planning level must be checked for the “characteristic is document property” facility. This option is determined on Tab Page: General in InfoObject maintenance.  For more information, see Characteristic is Document Property. Otherwise, the Documents function cannot be accessed.

Functions

Creating and importing documents

You can create documents or import locally saved documents.

Documents refer to a combination of characteristic values. Additionally you can assign documents to a particular key figure from the current planning level.

When you have assigned a document to a key figure, the system evaluates this additional information when displaying planning layouts and queries so that the document is offered for display where the corresponding key figure exists.

To create documents a characteristic must be restricted to one or several single values. The value # ("not assigned") is also allowed for this. With a restriction of characteristics to value sets, those documents can be displayed whose assigned characteristic value is contained in the value set. However, in this case you cannot create any new documents.

Display documents

The system offers documents to be displayed when the selection of characteristic values agrees with the characteristic values assigned to the document.  This is also the case if the additional key figures assigned to the document are not available.

To display a document in a planning layout it is necessary that a key figure is also assigned to the document.  Only in this way can the system determine the cell in the planning layout in the field matrix of characteristics and key figures for which an existing document should be offered.

Example

If you have assigned a document to different combinations of characteristic values and the combinations partially overlap, the system proceeds in the following way: The system only displays those documents where the assigned characteristic value combinations are not more complex than the combination in the current selection. This avoids a situation where, in a selection at a superior hierarchical level, all documents are offered that have been assigned at lower hierarchical levels.

The following example illustrates this procedure:

Document assignments

Document	Customer Group	Customer
1	Wholesale trade
2	Wholesale trade	IDES
3	Retail trade	ABC GmbH
4	Retail trade

 

The following table shows which documents are offered with different selections:

Documents available by selection

Row	Selection: Customer Group/Customer	1 Available Document	2 Available Documents	3 Available Documents	4 Available Documents
1	Wholesale trade/*	Yes	Yes	No	No
2	Wholesale, retail trade/*	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes
3	Wholesale trade/IDES	No	Yes	No	No
4	*/IDES	No	Yes	No	No
5	*/ABC Ltd.	No	No	Yes	No

 

Explanations:

·        Row 1: The selection of customer group "wholesale trade" (without selection of individual customers) delivers all documents that are assigned to this customer group – independent of whether an assignment to a customer has been made.

·        Row 2: The extension of the selection to two customer groups delivers all documents that were assigned to one of these customer groups, again independent of whether an assignment to a customer has been made.

·        Row 3: For a selection with a combination of customer group and customer, the system delivers the documents with exactly this assignment; document 2, in the example.

·        Rows 4 and 5: The selection by customer only delivers the corresponding documents.

Generally, in order to determine which documents should be displayed with a specified package selection, the system generates an internal query in which all characteristics of the planning level are included. Only those documents are delivered which fulfill the following conditions:

·        All the characteristics contained in the planning level are assigned to the document.

·        The characteristic values assigned to the document represent a subset of the package selection.

In the example above, documents 1 and 2 (which are only assigned to a customer group, but not to any customers) would not be displayed if the characteristic customer were also contained in a planning level.

 

See also:

Documents in the Planning Layout