Exploring Field Configuration - Conditions Tab Overview

The Conditions tab can be used to define conditions on fields. Conditions fall into three categories, Visibility, Editability or Validity.

The Visibility Condition section is used when you want to define a condition based on which the respective fields should be visible or not visible in the UI.

The Editability Condition section is used when you want to define a condition based on which you make the respective field editable for an end user.

The Validity Condition section is used when you want to define conditions based on which you want to make the value on the field valid or acceptable. Example: validate if the field is not blank or null, and validate if the value entered by the user fits a particular format (typically used for email addresses). Regular expressions are supported on conditions to support complex validation requirements from customers.

The customization that we perform is always done under a certain ‘context’. There are hundreds of classes defined in SAP Ariba Object model but not all of them are ‘context’ (you would notice a list of available contexts in SAP Ariba platform in one of the Examples below). Let us understand more using the following examples:

If you are doing a customization on Requisition header section on the field ‘CompanyCode’ then you are under the ‘context’ of ‘ariba.purchasing.core.Requisition’ and the class you are modifying is ‘ariba.purchasing.core.Requisition’ and you are modifying field ‘CompanyCode’ that is of type ‘ariba.core.CompanyCode’

The above condition when published would make the field Company code not visible from the UI.

In certain fields you can get an additional option to select a context, which allows you to define which specific classes you are applying the condition for. Let us try and understand this with an example:

The customization requirement is to modify the CostCenter field and make it hidden in Invoice and InvoiceReconciliation class. Now from the UI visualization explained in the earlier section. We should Modify the SplitAccounting class (not InvoiceLineItem or InvoiceReconciliationLineItem class) but in this case we must select a ‘context’. As per the Ariba object model, ariba.statement.core.Statement is the parent class of ariba.invoicing.core.Invoice and ariba.invoicing.core.InvoiceReconciliation hence we must choose the ‘context’ as Statement instead of Invoice and InvoiceReconciliation individually. If the requirement was to hide the field only for Invoice or InvoiceReconciliation, you have to select the appropriate context to apply the conditions.