Use the Graphical Data Flow Tool
The BW Modeling Tools contain a graphical user interface: the Graphical Data Flow Tool. This provides you with a simple way of creating, editing, and documenting data flows and objects in data flows.
You can create a data flow object and benefit from its advantages. For example, you can start by creating a logical data flow with non-persistent objects and relationships (blueprint) and then create SAP BW/4HANA objects, transformations, and loading processes later on, in order to persist data in the meta data tables.
Graphical top-down modeling facilitates fast, structured modeling.
You can create a data flow with non-persistent objects. A non-persistent SAP BW/4HANA object is a draft version of an SAP BW/4HANA object. It is an object for which only attributes, such as object type and name, have been specified for so far. It has not been saved on the database. A non-persistent object can only be displayed and used in the data flow in which it was created.
The picture above shows a data flow with persistent objects. A persistent SAP BW/4HANA object is an object which has already been saved in the meta data tables in the database and is independent of the data flow object. A persistent object can be contained in multiple data flows and can therefore be used again in different data flows.
You do not necessarily require a data flow object to model objects and relationships in data flows. You can also use the transient editor for this. The graphic transient editor provides a far better overview of a data flow than a tree display can. This means, for example, that when you expand a data flow in different directions, the graphical representation always remains very clear. Even loops, which start from one object with transformations (and sometimes further objects) and return to the initial object, are represented more clearly in the graphical editor than in a tree display.