EDI – Electronic Data Interchange

WE20 (Partner profile)

WE19/BD87 (Inbound Idoc testing)

WE05/WE02 (Getting list of Idocs by various parameters)

X12 types are used in USA (it looks in red color)

When X12 hit into SAP it will convert to into Idoc

Idoc is a data carrier recognize by SAP. Every Idoc type has predefined structure and segments. K
represent header data and P represents line items.

Idoc has different types

Common EDI Documents used by business

Trans Code Direction Description

810 IB INVOICE

810 OB INVOICE

812 IB CREDIT/DEBIT MEMO

816 IB ORGANIZATIONAL INFO

820 IB PAYMENT ADVICE

820 OB PAYEMENT ADVICE

821 IB FINANCIAL INFO REPORTING

861 IB RECEIVING ADVICE (GR)

850 OB PURC HASE ORDER

IDOC has control record – Idoc ID, Dender ID, Recipient ID, Idoc type, EDI structure

Data record – Idoc Id, Sequence/hierarchy, Segment – Structure definition for header data and item data

Status record – Idoc ID and Status information

There are basically two types of SAP IDOC

 Basic IDOCs
 Extended IDOCs
  Idoc Components
Basic Idoc
Basic IDOC type defines the structure and format of the business document that is
to be exchanged between two systems.
Extension Idoc
Extending the functionality by adding more segments to existing Basic IDOCs.

Creation of IDoc
To Create Idoc we need to follow these steps:

Create Segment ( WE31)

Create Idoc Type ( WE30)
Create Message Type ( WE81)
Assign Idoc Type to Message Type ( WE82)

Creating a Segment
Go to transaction code WE31
Enter the name for your segment type and click on the Create icon
Type the short text
Enter the variable names and data elements
Save it and go back
Go to Edit -> Set Release
Follow steps to create more number of segments

Create IDOC Type

Go to transaction code WE30
Enter the Object Name, select Basic type and click Create icon
Select the create new option and enter a description for your basic IDOC type and
press enter
Select the IDOC Name and click Create icon
The system prompts us to enter a segment type and its attributes
Choose the appropriate values and press Enter
The system transfers the name of the segment type to the IDOC editor.

Create IDOC Type

Follow these steps to add more number of segments to Parent or as Parent-child
relation

Save it and go back

Go to Edit -> Set release

Create Message Type

Go to transaction code WE81
Change the details from Display mode to Change mode
After selection, the system will give this message “The table is cross-client (see Help
for further info)”. Press Enter
Click New Entries to create new Message Type
Fill details
Save it and go back

Assign Message Type to IDoc Type

Go to transaction code WE82
Change the details from Display mode to Change mode
After selection, the system will give this message “The table is cross-client (see Help
for further info)”. Press Enter.
Click New Entries to create new Message Type.
Fill details

Electronic Data Interchange is here to stay. SAP has provided many tools to ease the
integration to EDI subsystems and these, together with a methodology of how to
implement EDI are described in the following pages.

The term EDI A definition as follow,

“EDI is described as the interchange of structured data according to agreed

message standards between computer systems, by electronic means. Structured
data equates to a simple and direct method of presenting the data content of a
document. The method of ensuring the correct interpretation of the information by
the computer system is defined by the EDI standard.”
“EDI is a technique used to communicate business transactions between computer
systems of different companies and organizations. Note that sometimes the EDI
mechanismdeployed at a company is often used to interface to other systems within
the same organization.”
Info shuttle – “I was implementing EDI at a customer and I wanted some real data to
test with in Development, so I asked the Project Manager to see if he could arrange
something. Literally, 20 minutes later he came back and said that there were 10
new orders in Development, together with the customer master records related to
the order, the carrier vendor master record, the material master records, … were all
there.
Electronic Data Interchange (EDI)
I asked him how he had done it so quickly which led me to my first exposure with
Infoshuttle, a tool that does this for you using the ALE functionality. As an ALE
consultant I know how to do this stuff but I also know how long it would take to set
that up. This is truly a product worth exploring in more detail.” Kevin Wilson,
ERPGenie.COM Founder, ALE EDI Workflow Consultant (Request Product Detail)

Some thoughts
You should not to attempt to switch to a full SAP EDI implementation overnight. It
takes time for people, systems, and processes to adapt to any new methodology.
Implementing SAP EDI is a project in its own right and needs to be handled phase
by phase as in any other information system implementation. We describe some of
the issues and how to implement an SAP EDI solution in the following pages.
The painful issues of implementing EDI are considered to be:
Application level configuration – Message control, partner determination, output
determination

Technical configuration – Just getting the systems to talk to each other. SAP,
translator, modem…

Testing – How do you test with someone you may never meet? How do you do your
own testing without sending data to your partner? How do you differentiate
between a test message and a real one?

Mapping – How do you map an IDoc to an EDI message? What fields go where?

Also See: What is BackOrder Processing in SAP SD and How to Create?
SAP EDI Process
In any SAP EDI Process a Sub System is required. Basically an EDI Subsystem does
the conversion of SAP IDOCs to to EDI Format and Vice Versa. An EDI subsystem is a
thirdparty systems and deals with standards that are most current.

Thus as mentioned above the EDI SubSystem acts like a translator. SAP does certify
some EDI subsystems and this is based on the version of SAP.

Basically the SAP EDI process is comprised of

OutBound Process
InBound Process
OutBound Process
The OutBound Document is Created. This could be a Sales Order or a Purchase
Order or an Invoice. The process of creating the document is no different than the
normal way. But prior to this IDOC configuration is made so that on the document is
saved an IDOC is generated. The document is saved in the SAP tables in the usual
way but in addition to that an IDOC with the same data is also generated and saved.

You can view this IDOC using the appropriate transactions.  Example  WE05 — IDOC
List WE02 Display IDOC. Once the IDOC is generated it is transferred to the
operating system level for the EDI system to pick it up. Further to this the IDOC is
converted to the EDI standards and the IDOC is then transferred to the desired
Partner. The status of this transaction is sent back to SAP
Inbound Process
The transaction code is WE16 and menu path is From the Area menu of EDI, choose
Test, Inbound procg of.orig.inb.file.We can use this utility to start the inbound process
from an inbound file, but first, we have to build an inbound file.Different ways to start in
bound process are1.Copy an existing inbound IDoc in the system, and save the IDoc to
a file via transaction WE19, by selecting an existing IDoc number and clicking the
Create icon. On the next screen, you can change the values.
Then, click the Inbound File button, enter the file name, and deselect the Start IDoc
Inbound Processing of File Immediately flag. Click the Continue button, and an IDoc file
is created .2.Copy an outbound file and modify it to look like an inbound file.
Alternatively, if you have an outbound file, you can set a breakpoint while executing the
turnaround utility. Set the breakpoint where it has copied an outbound file, has modified
it to look like an inbound file, and is ready to start the inbound process. At that point, you
can end the session. Now you have an IDoc file you can use for your inbound process.

SAP workflow
The following factors need to be considered to decide whether sap workflow should
be used for the business situations.

1. Human factor: SAP workflow is more appropriate for the automation of business

processes which involve people. As discussed in our example, there is human
intervention, i.e subordinate submits leave application, superior approves the same
and so on.

2. Repetition: SAP workflow is usually used to automate repetitive, mundane

business scenarios which are carried out at good frequency.
3. Sequence: More importantly, the business process process which should be
automated should follow a predefined sequence of steps.
4. Costs: The time and cost (saved in avoiding paper based flow of work, enabling
automatic task distribution and monitoring of tasks) need to be considered versus
the effort involved in implementing workflows.
5. Structure: The organization should be structured, to allow for automatic routing
of tasks to superiors and so on.