on 08-21-2007 2:12 PM
Good Evening to all, may i get the quostions and answers on ale and idoc which are faced and expected to face in the interviews as experianced sd-consultat,
plz. mail to me,
Regards,
Sruthi
Hi Sruthi,
Please find the Important Notes on ALE,EDI and IDocs below:
ALE & IDOCs and EDI
IDOCS:
IDOCS are intermediary documents which are like CARRIERS of the data.
IDOCs are safe to transfer data, but less volume of data. User is not allowed to access (modify) the data like PSA. IDOCs have 3 parts.
1. Control Record - SOURCE & TARGET details,
2. Data Record - Here comes your query....
Info IDOC - It contains all the technical details related to the data load i.e. Request NO, No of Data Packages, USER, DATE, TIME, LOGICAL SYSTEM, etc. Info IDOC is also ONE segment, the 1 sr segment.
Here data will not be there.
Data IDOC - These are the ones which hold the data. The total no of records are made into Data IDOCs i.e. if 99 records are there then 99 Data IDOCs will be there and all these will be divided into 99 segments.
Hence the total number of Segments in IDOC is 100.
Info IDOC + Data IDOCs = Total no of Segments
1 + 99 = 100.
3. Status Record - Here the status of the data transfer will be available.
ALE:
ALE is Application linking & enabling which enables to interface SAP with other modules.
ALE is used for communicating between sap systems to sap system.
Pl go through below links as they provide all the required info on ALE & IDOC's:
ALE / IDOC:
ALE is SAP proprietary technology that enables data communications between two or more SAP R/3 systems and/or R/3 and external systems. When a new enterprise resource planning (ERP) solution such as R/3 is implemented, companies have to interface the ERP system with legacy systems or other ERP systems.
ALE provides intelligent mechanisms where by clients can achieve integration as well as distribution of applications and data.
ALE technology facilitates rapid application prototyping and application interface development, thus reducing implementation time.
The ALE components are inherently integrated with SAP applications and are robust, leading to a highly reliable system.
ALE comes with application distribution/integration scenarios as well as a set of tools, programs, data definitions, and methodologies that you can easily configure to get an interface up and running.
Please check this online document for ALE and IDoc.
http://help.sap.com/printdocu/core/Print46c/en/data/pdf/BCMIDALEIO/BCMIDALEIO.pdf
http://help.sap.com/printdocu/core/Print46c/en/data/pdf/BCMIDALEPRO/BCMIDALEPRO.pdf
http://help.sap.com/printdocu/core/Print46c/en/data/pdf/CABFAALEQS/CABFAALEQS.pdf
http://help.sap.com/printdocu/core/Print46c/en/data/pdf/BCSRVEDISC/CAEDISCAP_STC.pdf
http://help.sap.com/printdocu/core/Print46c/en/data/pdf/BCSRVEDI/CAEDI.pdf
Also check this links for additional information.
http://help.sap.com/saphelp_erp2004/helpdata/en/dc/6b835943d711d1893e0000e8323c4f/content.htm
http://www.sapgenie.com/sapgenie/docs/ale_scenario_development_procedure.doc
http://edocs.bea.com/elink/adapter/r3/userhtm/ale.htm#1008419
http://www.netweaverguru.com/EDI/HTML/IDocBook.htm
http://www.sapgenie.com/sapedi/index.htm
u will have enough material from above .....
Mostly SD consultant doesnt deal with EDI, Idocs but its always good to have knowledge,
EDI
EDI is used to communicate between non sap system to sap system vice versa.
EDI concept in SD: the EDI concept is intended to realize the sales and distribution process completely automatically with the help of electronical documents. These documents are sent from one customer to another, are processed mostly on the background and give a possibility to realize the sales process extremely efficiently.
If MM-customer would like to purchase the goods then he creates the IDOC of type ORDERS and send it to SD-customer. On the SD-side the IDOC is processed via the function module IDOC_INPUT_ORDERS and creates the sales order. As confirmation the SD-side can send to MM-side the Order-Response IDOC (function IDOC_OUTPUT_ORDERS). The MM-customer can every time send a change to the existing order, then on SD side the ORDCHG IDOC will be processed. It can change the order like in VA02. The creation of the invoice can be made via IDOC of message type INVOIC (function IDOC_OUTPUT_INVOIC).
So, the process can be realized completely automatically between SD and MM partners with the help of IDOCs: ORDERS, ORDCHG, ORDRSP, and INVOIC.
That's all concerning the SD-EDI.
Additional processes in SD, where EDI are used:
1) application of delivery schedules to the scheduling agreement: IDOC of type DELINS
2) creation of a delivery order to the scheduling agreement: IDOC of type DELORD
3) creation of external agent service delivery to scheduling agreement: IDOC of type EDLNOT
4) creation of credit advice / credit memo in the frames of self-billing: IDOCs of type GSVERF, SBWAP and for external invoice creation SBINV.
It is all processes which are realized in the SD module via EDI.
Go through this, You will get better idea on EDI,ALE,IDOCS
The interface concept of the classic R/3 is based on two different strategies: Remote Function Calls (RFC) and data exchange through IDoc message documents. RFC makes direct and synchronous calls of a program in the remote system. If the caller is an external program it will call an RFC-enabled function in R/3 and if the calling program is the R/3 system it will call an RFC-function in another R/3-system or it will call a non-R/3 program through a gateway-proxy (usually rfcexec.exe). BAPIs are a subset of the RFC-enabled function modules, especially designed as Application Programming Interface (API) to the SAP business object, or in other words: are function modules officially released by SAP to be called from external programs.
IDocs are text encoded documents with a rigid structure that are used to exchange data between R/3 and a foreign system. Instead of calling a program in the destination system directly, the data is first packed into an IDoc and then sent to the receiving system, where it is analyzed and properly processed. Therefore an IDoc data exchange is always an asynchronous process. The significant difference between simple RFC-calls and IDoc data exchange is the fact, that every action performed on IDocs are protocolled by R/3 and IDocs can be reprocessed if an error occurred in one of the message steps.
While IDocs have to be understood as a data exchange protocol, EDI and ALE are typical use cases for IDocs. R/3 uses IDocs for both EDI and ALE to deliver data to the receiving system. ALE is basically the scheduling mechanism that defines when and between which partners and what kind of data will be exchanged on a regular or event triggered basis. Such a set-up is called an ALE-scenario.
The philosophical difference between EDI and ALE can be pinned as follows: If we send data to an external partner, we generally speak of EDI, while ALE is a mechanism to reliable replicate data between trusting systems to store a redundant copy of the IDoc data. The difference is made clear, when we think of a purchase order that is sent as an IDoc. If we send the purchase order to a supplier then the supplier will store the purchase order as a sales order. However, if we send the purchase order via ALE to another R/3 system, then the receiving system will store the purchase order also as a purchase order.
Q. Can anyone tell me the steps and process of creating an IDOC?
A. You can Create IDoc in this process: and transfer master data from one system to another.
You can transfer Master data in Bulk through SMD (Share master data tool) Tool.
The main SMD tools in SAP are BD10 for Material Master
BD12- customer
BD14- Vendor
suppose u want to transfer material in bulk.
U have configure the systems:
TA: SALE for ale customization -
create logical system here.
Steps:
1) Create port(WE21) and logical system and RFC destination(SM59)
1) Create Distribution Model in BD64.
2) Create Partner Profile (WE20) in both systems and distribute the model and in receiver system the model will be created itself after distribution.
3) Go to TA: BD10 (SMD for material)
4) message type will be MATMASand specify the logical system and press execute.
it will generate the master IDoc and communication IDoc in sender system
now u can check the receiver system the Inbound IDOC must be there with all the materials
TA for IDOC CHK :WE02,WE05.
Go through This link too: PDF Index.IDoc
1. What exactly is gapping and mapping in EDI/IDOC
2. Can anybody send me the functional specifications and test development for EDI! Meaning any specs as a functional consultant we provide EDI team for mapping?
A1.
Gapping/mapping - This process is done when your client wants to send some application document (can be sales order confirmation, Purchase order, Invoice) to it's customer (or vendor). For discussion purpose, lets say your client needs to send billing document to a customer. So one way is print it on invoice format and send it via mail or Faxing the printout or emailing it. Or finally sending it via EDI.
EDI is the data exchange medium, which is going to send the data relevant for billing to the customer. Standard 810 EDI is used for invoice transaction. SAP billing document creates an IDOC which is triggered from a message type (output type at billing header level).
An IDOC contains Data records, which contain billing document data. Now not all the data on this IDOC is required to be sent to customer, only certain fields are enough to tell the customer about the bill - fields like Payer #, payment terms, Customers PO #, SO#, delivery #, line #, Material #, Net value # and overall billing document value. But on IDOC we have much more data available then this.
Now on EDI mapping we will sit with an EDI contact, and map what fields on IDOC means and where it can be put on EDI segments. Like
idoc field name EDI Field name
Purchase order # E1EDK02-BELNR BIG04
Invoice # E1EDK02-BELNR BIG02
Payer E1EDKA1-PARTN N104
Payment terms E1EDK18-PRZNT ITD01
Material E1EDP19-MATNR IT101
Like this you will have to map all the fields on a excel spreadsheet so EDI can have logic in their subsystem to send the invoice to customer successfully.
Sample of mapping document - http://www.erpgenie.com/sapgenie/docs/template_o810v4010_partner.xls
All the best,
Please Reward If Really Helpful,
Sateesh.Kandula
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