Possible Combinations of Configuration Profiles

You often need to work with several configuration profiles within one configuration.

For example, the materials PC, MONITOR and KEYBOARD are configurable. The monitor and keyboard are also sold separately. You need to create separate configuration profiles for them, because this involves a multi-level configuration.

However, there are restrictions on the profiles you can select for subordinate components. You need to work with profiles that are allowed in combination with the scenario for the header material.

The following table shows the possible combinations:

Header Material Subordinate Materials	Plnd/Prod. No BOM explosion	Plnd/Prod. Single-/multi-level BOM explosion	Single-/multi-level sales order	Single- /multi-level order BOM - knowledge-based -	Single- /multi-level order BOM - result-oriented -
Plnd/Prod. Order No BOM explosion	C	C	A	C	C
Plnd/Prod. Order Single-/multi-level BOM explosion	C	A	C	C	C
Single-/multi-level sales order	C	C	A	C	C
Single-/multi-level order BOM - knowledge-based -	C	C	A	A	C
Single-/multi-level order BOM - result-oriented -	C	C	A	C	A

Abbreviations:

A = Possible/allowed

B = Not allowed

C = No effect:

• The material is handled as though it had no configuration profile.

• Profile selection shows no options.

Comment

The only difference between the scenarios "single-level" and "multi-level" is that the "single-level" setting only explodes the assembly of the header material (single-level explosion). You can only assign values to the components of the header material.

Note

You can run check report RCU_CHECK_SUB_PROF_NO_BOM_EXPL to check configuration profiles on subordinate levels that you have defined with No BOM explosion, and change them if required.

Changing/Displaying/Deleting Configuration Profiles

Procedure

Change Configuration Profile

1. From the variant configuration menu, choose Configuration Profile
® Change.

You see a dialog box for specifying the object whose configuration profile you want to change. Select an object and confirm your entry.



To switch to another object, choose Extras ® Change confble obj.

2. Enter the name of the object.
3. Choose Profile overview.

You see the overview of profiles created for the object.

You can create new profiles for the configurable object by choosing Edit ® New entries.

4. Choose Profile detail to see the detail screen. You can change the settings for the profile.

You cannot change the settings Process: Sales order (SET) and Order BOM for a material once the material has been configured with the profile. If only the header material has been changed, the settings can be changed, but not if subordinate items of the BOM have been changed.

Display Configuration Profile

1. From the variant configuration menu, choose Configuration profile ®
Display.
2. For the rest of the process, see Changing a Configuration Profile above. However, you cannot make changes in display mode.

Deleting a Configuration Profile

You can only delete an existing profile by using Configuration profile ® Change if the profile has not been used to configure the object. If a profile has been used to configure a material in a sales order, for example, you can no longer delete the profile. The profile can only be deactivated by changing the status.

You can only use engineering change management to delete configuration profiles if no configured objects exist, or if the dat e of the configuration of all configured objects is before the deletion date.

Renaming a Configuration Profile

You can change the name of a configuration profile on the profile overview by choosing Rename.

Availability of Components

Use

If you select Component availability in the configuration profile, by choosing the Confign initial screen tab, then the Configuration parameter tab, you see the Availability pushbutton on the value assignment screen in the configuration editor. You can use this pushbutton to check the availability of the components that are selected according to the values you assign. The entire BOM is checked and exploded.

For this reason, in a SET structure we advise you to check availability of the individual materials (Process setting Sales order), not for the header material.

The availability check is just a snapshot, telling you whether the materials required are in stock at this moment. Several users can access the same material at once. This means that supply problems can sometimes be overlooked.

Only 2 pieces of a material are in stock, but the material is used in 3 BOMs. The availability check does not detect a supply problem. The availability check for all 3 BOMs shows 2 pieces in stock.

Features

On the value assignment screen, you can define additional settings for the availability check:

• You can specify that a list of all components is shown with details of their availability.
• You can specify that only missing parts are shown in the list.

Filters for BOM Explosion

Use

By defining a filter in the configuration profile, you can determine the scope of the BOM items to improve system performance when you explode the BOM. The filter is active in high-level configuration, in result-oriented BOMs, and in SET processing.

Restrictions

You cannot define filters if you select the BOM explosion setting None.

Features

You can define the following filters:

• Object type

Class, material, document, text

In the standard system, all object types are selected and therefore exploded in the configuration. Deselect the object types that you do not want to be displayed.

• Item category, for example, stock or non-stock item

All item categories in the configuration are exploded in the standard system. Remove the selection for the item categories you do not want to be displayed.

• Item status

You maintain the status of a BOM item in maintain BOM dependent on its usage.

All items are displayed regardless of their item status in the standard system. However, only the items with this status are displayed when you select specific item statuses. Items are not displayed that do not have the selected status.

• Sort string

You can assign sort strings for BOM items in maintain BOM. You can restrict the display of the BOM items by using these sort strings.

Only items that carry sort strings are checked and only those that match are displayed. Items that have no sort string are always displayed.

See also:

Controlling the BOM Explosion

Class Assignment

Use

Before you can configure an object, you need to assign the object to a class whose class type supports variant configuration. For materials and other configurable objects, this is class type 300 in the standard system, except for model service specifications, which have class type 301. When you assign the object to the class, you can use the characteristics of the class to describe the object.

Prerequisites

In Customizing for the Classification System, the Variant class type indicator must be set for the class type.

Features

Class Assignment Pushbutton

The assignment to a class is not the same as any classification. The class is just a container for the characteristics that are required for configuring the object.

If you set values, this has the effect of restricting the allowed values for configuration, rather than assigning values as in classification. You can assign several values to single-value characteristics.

The values you set are not default values. During configuration, you only see the values you set in the class assignment.

Class C_CAR has characteristics EXTRAS and COLOR. You assign configurable material CAR to class C_CAR. You restrict characteristic EXTRAS to values ‘Sports’ and ‘Luxury’, and characteristic COLOR to values ‘Red’ and ‘Black’.

When you configure the car, you only see the two values you set for both COLOR and EXTRAS, because you have restricted the allowed values in the class assignment.

To allow all values in configuration, do not set values in the class assignment.

Multiple classification

If the class type allows multiple classification, you can classify the configurable object in several variant classes. When you configure the object, you see the characteristics of all classes of a class type to which the object is assigned.

If you only assign a configurable object to an additional class later on, and configurations (such as sales orders) already exist, you can no longer delete the assignment to the additional class once you have saved it.

The sequence of classes has no influence on the sequence of characteristics on the value assignment screen.

See also:

SAP Library ® CA Cross-Application Components ® CA Classification

Creating a Configuration Profile

Procedure

From the Variant Configuration menu, choose Configuration profile ® Create.

You see a dialog box. Select the object for which you want to create a configuration profile.

Enter the name of the object.

Confirm your entries.

3. You see the profile overview.

4. Enter a profile name and the class type whose classes you want to use for configuration. In Customizing for the Classification System, the class type must be defined as a variant class type.
5. Choose Goto
® Class assignments or the Class assignments pushbutton to assign the object to a class. (You can also specify the class assignment in Materials Management by choosing Create/Change Material, or in the Classification System by choosing Assign Object to Class.)

• You see the classification screen, where you enter the class.
• Define allowed values for the configurable object if required.

You can only release a profile if you have assigned the configurable object to a class. (see also Class Assignment)

4. To go to the detail screen, where you define further settings, choose the Profile detail pushbutton or double-click on the profile.

Optional Settings on the Profile Overview

• Organizational Areas

You can specify organizational areas for configuration. If you restrict a profile to specific organizational areas, you only see the characteristics that are relevant to your area when you configure the object.

You can change how characteristics are displayed according to organizational area for your user on the value assignment screen (see Organizational Areas).

• Priority of Configuration Profiles

You can create several configuration profiles for a configurable material. The profile with the lowest number has the highest priority.

If you define several profiles for an object, you see a dialog box for selecting a profile when you start configuration. The profile with the highest priority is at the top of the list.

The priority is also relevant if you use Application Link Enabling (ALE) or intermediate documents (IDocs) to run configuration, rather than dialog mode. In this case, the profile with the highest priority is selected for the object.

Profiles that have no priority are at the top of the list, because they automatically have priority 0.

Profile Detail

Configuration Profiles for Materials

The configuration profile has several screens. Depending on what you enter for the BOM explosion and configuration process, fields are shown or hidden.

The parameters you maintain for a material apply to the material as a header material in a BOM structure. You cannot define separate settings for use of a configurable material as an assembly in a BOM.

• By choosing the Assignments pushbutton, you can assign dependencies to the configuration profile. You also see this pushbutton on the basic data tab, once at least one dependency is assigned.

Basic Data Tab

• In the basic data, you see the profile overview data.
• You can determine whether the configuration process starts with a Start logo. To do this, you assign the document you want to display, such as a graphic showing the product you want to configure, to the variant class.

Configuration Initial Screen Tab

Configuration parameters

You specify the parameters for BOM explosion and the configuration process in the sales order.

• You must enter a BOM application, unless you select BOM explosion: None:
• You can enter a level of detail for a multi-level configuration. You can display configurable assemblies only in the BOM explosion. This improves system performance.
• You can define a filter.
• You can set the indicator for an availability check on assemblies.

Userinterf

Under Userinterf, you maintain the settings for the configuration editor user interface.

• You can specify an interface design to group characteristics together on the value assignment screen.
• You can choose Settings to define object-specific settings for functions in the configuration editor. These settings are defaults for configuration, and can be overwritten for your user in the configuration editor.
• For all configuration parameters except BOM explosion: None, you can select screens for the configuration editor and define which screen configuration starts with. The start screen must be one of the allowed screens.

You can select the indicator for the configuration browser independently of the other start screens, because the browser is an additional screen section.

Configuration Profiles for Objects Other than Materials

You see the basic data, where you see the profile overview data.

You can define object-specific settings for displaying characteristics and characteristic values in the configuration editor. These settings are defaults for configuration, and can be overwritten for your user in the configuration editor.

See also:

On configuration parameters:

Controlling the BOM Explosion

No BOM Explosion

Single-Level BOM Explosion

Multi-Level BOM Explosion

Process: Sales Order

Process: Order BOM

Filters for BOM Explosion

Availability of Components

On settings:

Defining Settings for the Language

Defining the Scope and Display Options for Characteristics

Defining Settings for the Default Values

Defining Settings for Pricing

Defining Settings for the Configurator

Settings for Variant Matching