Functional Specification

The Functional Specification defines what the functionality will be of a particular

area that is to be precise a transaction in SAP terminology. The Functional
Specification document to create a detailed design document that explains in
detail how the software will be designed and developed

The SAP functional specification, affectionately referred to as functional spec, is

critical to the development of RICEF objects. RICEF stands for Reports,
Interfaces, Conversions, Enhancements, Forms — in other words, anything
that requires programming in SAP. This post will delve into the purpose and
content of a functional specification.

Purpose of an SAP Functional Specification

A functional consultant writes an SAP functional specification any time there is a

gap between standard SAP functionality vs desired functionality. Functional
specs may be necessary during an end-to-end SAP implementation to
address gaps identified in the business blueprint. They may also be required
when an SAP add-on is purchased, an enhancement is approved, or even when a
bug-fix is raised. Basically any time you need a technical consultant to do
something, write a functional spec!

The document should paint a clear picture of the required outcome in the
system. The goal of the document is to:

 Enable the developer to create a technical design document and, ultimately,

to develop the solution correctly
 Identify the test scenarios so testers know what to execute
 Convey the end result to stakeholders so they know what they are getting
 Act as a historical reference (along with the technical design document) to
identify what was built in the system and why

There may be several revisions to the document as it is discussed between

functional, technical, test and business teams. Ultimately, the functional spec is
finalized, approved by the stakeholders and saved for posterity.

Content of an SAP Functional Specification

As a functional consultant, I have written many functional specifications that

followed many different formats. Usually, each project has its own template of
functional specification, so it is best to reach out to your project team and ask
them to share the template.

Functional Spec (Specification) which is a comprehensive document is created

after the (SRS) Software Requirements Document. It provides more details on
selected items originally described in the Software Requirements Template.
Elsewhere organizations combine these two documents into a single document.
 Functional Specification
The Functional Specification describes the features of the desired
functionality. It describes the product's features as seen by the stake holders,
and contains the technical information and the data needed for the design and
development.

The Functional Specification defines what the functionality will be of a particulate

area that is to be precise a transaction in SAP terminology.

The Functional Specification document to create a detailed design document that

explains in detail how the software will be designed and developed.

Functional specs are written when the standard SAP is not able to meet the
client's requirement. Based on the functional spec the ABAPer will write the
technical design doc. and then the functional guy will test the same in the
system and document the results in his test script.

We come across 3 situations which calls for functional specs to be written:

1. Enhancements /modifications. If business requires some special procedure.

2. Reports, Client's customized reports.

3. Interface, EDI interface involves ALE/IDOC.

Here are some tips to write great functional specs. The objective should be that
the technical guy should understand it in one go and to reduce any further
clarification.

1. Understand the requirement completely. This will depend on your business

understanding. Make sure that the client's requirement cannot be met through
standard SAP before working on it. Please suggest the client if any alternative
business process which is supported by SAP and meets his requirement too.

2. In case of reports you must be competent to decide whether it's a R/3 or SAP
BW report. one example - if the report involves data analytics (like you do in
pivot table of excel) it will be a BW report. However its data collection will be
done in R/3.

3. You must mention the business need and business value the
report/enhancement will add to the business. This is for future reference and
also to convince the other users.

4. Any legacy system changes to be done once the enhancement/report is run

should also be mentioned. You can mention changes regarding business process
or data. This may be an input for change management team and also for cut-
over strategy.

5. In case of interface please do mention if it's a display or non display

document.
 Functional Specification
6. Please do not write the structure in place of table and field. Make some effort
and find out in which field the data is stored. ABAPer will appreciate it.

7. Don't just write table and field name but also give the data pulling logic. This
is perhaps the most important part. At times it is really difficult to make the
technical guy understand how the data is getting pulled. Without understanding
this he can't proceed further. For example

Target quantity - PACKPO-TRGQTY needs to be transported to Rounding quantity

VBAP- ABLFZ

The data pulling logic for the same will as follows

VBAK-VBLEN doc cat E= VBAP-VBLEN

VBAP-MATNR= PACKPO-MATNR Item cat M

8. Be careful about the data volume while designing the input screen of a
customized report. You must very carefully decide which of these should be
mandatory and optional else it will create a performance issue at the time of
load testing.

Please note that every implementation has its own unique format for writing
functional specs however the above mentioned points needs to be covered to
make it more communicative and effective.

Requirement presented by client can be categorized mainly into five categories

R- Report:
I- Interface:
C- Conversion:
E- Enhancement:
F- Form:

Hence the document prepared by functional consultant (functional spec) and

technical consultant (technical spec) is collectively called RICEF.

created by -chandrakant patil (chinmay )