Creating Basic Reports and Outlining Report Components

The drill-down reporting tool is designed to provide a simple means to define straightforward reports. It also offers all the functions required to create more complex and formatted reports. A distinction is made between the two different types of reports.

Drill-down reporting allows you to run a fast, precise analysis to search for a specific effect. Basic reports have a predefined basic structure for general use.

Basic reports represent more complex reports and can be designed according to their specific purpose. Basic reports are used for official reports and are suitable for printing.

Form reports are defined by independent objects that can be used for different reports. There are various types of forms that differ in terms of the elements defined and the location of the elements in their structure.

Basic reports do not require the use of a form. When you define a basic report, you simply select the characteristics, characteristic values, and key figures that you want to analyze.

Each report you define is valid only for either costing-based or Margin Analysis.

Architecture of Drilldown Reporting

You can use characteristics, key figures, and forms to define a report. As a result, when you display a report, a number of lists and graphics that you can call up and interactively analyze appear on the report.

A form determines the content and the formal structure of a report list. A form can be considered as a semi-finished report, which you complete by indicating the characteristics and key figures to use when you define the individual report. You can indicate the characteristics in the form as well as in the report. Key figures can be contained in either the form or the report.

Drill-down reporting in CO-PA provides you with easy-to-use functions to move through the dataset. As a result, you can switch from one segment to the next step or to the next segment within a step. Similarly, you can fade out a step of the drill-down hierarchy and switch to-and-fro between the detail and overview lists. You also have other functions that are available to edit online reports, such as conditions, sort orders, and ranking lists.

You can send report lists by fax, and email. You can also download them to Microsoft Word or Excel.

In addition to the various interactive functions for online lists, drill-down reporting provides special functions to define how to print the report layout, such as page breaks, headers, footers, and underscores.

From Customizing or the CO-PA application menu, access the functions used to define reports. To create a report from the initial screen, process any of the components of the report, in any order that you want.

When you define a basic report, you do not use a form to compare plan and actual values in one report. You can only select plan or actual values. Standard variables which are used include From and To periods, a plan or actual indicator, and in the case of selection plan values, a version. In costing-based CO-PA you select a record type (like A for order income or F for billed orders).

The system displays a list of all the characteristics in the operating concern in a line item report for costing-based CO-PA.

In a summary level report, the system only displays a list of segment level characteristics. Here, you can select the characteristics to analyze. These characteristics form the dimensions of your multidimensional data cube. If characteristic groups have been defined for the operating concern, the system also displays the Characteristic Group field. If you enter a characteristic group, the system displays only the characteristics in that group, instead of all the characteristics of the operating concern.

In costing-based CO-PA, you can enter a key figure scheme on the Create Profitability Report: Key Figures screen to get a list of all the key figures of this scheme. When you choose Value fields on/off, you can choose to see just the fields of the key figure scheme or all fields.

In Margin Analysis, the system selects the date based on cost elements with value field Total Value and Fixed Value, if a splitting profile in Financial Accounting is used. With a splitting profile, it is possible to split the components of the cost component split of the material cost estimate to different G/L accounts. To select such G/L account in the Margin Analysis, the G/L accounts must be type Primary Cost.

If you want to delete a report, use the Change Report function.

The formula editor allows you to enter value fields and define complex formulas. As a result, constants and elements of the key figure scheme can be linked by standard arithmetic operations or user-defined ABAP functions.

Use the Check key figure scheme function to run a syntax check on the use of arithmetic operations and parentheses. It also checks for empty formulas, recursive formulas, and any circular conclusions.

Use of Characteristic Hierarchies

You can define the hierarchical relationships between different characteristic values in CO-PA and analyze these relationships later in drill-down reporting. For example, you can define a hierarchy of products or customers for your organization. You can also define different variants of the same hierarchy and display these variants in reports. These variants allow you to perform simulations and what-if analyses.

A characteristic hierarchy is defined using the master data (characteristic values) that belongs to a characteristic. Notice that different characteristics that use the same master data table have the same master data hierarchy. You cannot define hierarchies for the characteristics that do not use a master data table. This condition applies for the characteristics that were defined with neither a check table nor a text table.

Note

Characteristic hierarchies are only hierarchies of values of a single characteristic. For this reason, each hierarchy can contain only the values of that particular characteristic. In addition, each characteristic value can occur only one time in a hierarchy. As a result, each value remains unique throughout the entire hierarchy.

Variables allow you better flexibility when defining your forms and reports. Variables are report or form parameters that are not specified until you define or execute a report. You can use different methods to replace variables. Depending on how to enter the variable value, you can define your variables globally or locally. Local variables can only be filled by user entry. Global variables can be filled from parameters in the user master and especially by user exit.

To create a variable that is only needed in one particular form or report and filled by user entry, create a local variable. Notice that local variables are only known within the relevant form or report. If you define a local variable in a form, it is also valid for every report that uses that form.

If you define a variable in the report definition, it is valid for that report only. If you use a variable frequently, you can define it globally. You can then use the global variables in all your forms and reports. Global variables are maintained in Customizing. The global variables in a form or report are displayed for selection in the input help.

Variables in Forms Examples

If you want to leave the value of a characteristic undefined in the report, you can use a variable for the characteristic values. Variables for characteristic values can be used in both forms and reports. You can enter these variables while editing or executing the report. When the report is executed, the system replaces the variables used in the report definition.

Note

Specific variables for characteristic values, such as Current fiscal period, are available in the SAP system. To see the other available standard variables, see Customizing.

To use a variable for the line or column text in a form, you define a text variable. For example, if you use a variable for the value of the Country characteristic, the text to be used in the column is not known when you define the form. In this case, you can define a text variable.

Notice that the text variables can be used only in form reports and are always defined directly in the form. They are replaced automatically by the text of the characteristic value when you execute the report. In the example, you can specify any country, which means any characteristic value variable, when you execute the report. When the report is executed, the system automatically enters the name of that country (which is the characteristic value) in the column header, replacing the text variable.

Specific text variables are contained in the SAP system. To see the other available standard variables, see Customizing.

• Basic reports have a predefined structure for general use.

• Use characteristics, key figures, and forms to define reports.

• Basic reports compare plan and actual values without forms.

• Define hierarchical relationships between characteristic values.

• Variables offer flexibility in defining forms and reports.