Managing Versions

When using planning models in SAP Analytics Cloud, versions are used to organize, compare, and maintain actual, plan, and forecast data.

You only need one version for historical (actual) data. But when planning for the future, organizations can create many plan iterations for various reasons.

These plans could each use a different version of the data. When working with versions, you can change data in one version without impacting the data in other versions.

Version Management lets you manage different versions and types of plans. For example, your organization can create a new version for each new forecast period. You can separate your forecasts from other types of plans like budgets and strategic plans.

Version is a dimension in a planning model. When planning models are created, the actual version is provided as a system default. Additional versions are created while planning in stories.

Private versions are maintained in a story and are visible only to the creator of the version. Use private versions to change or simulate plan values without making the changes visible to anyone else.

• You can make a private version a new public version by using the Publish As option.
• If you use the Publish private data option, it will write to the public version that it was copied from initially.
• Private versions can be shared with other users if needed.
• When editing private data, the data is saved automatically.

Public versions are also maintained in stories. It’s published so that other planners can see the data.

• Access to public version data is controlled by data privileges.
• If you leave a story without publishing data changes, you’re prompted either to Revert all or Publish all changes. If you leave a story without reverting or publishing, the data will be retained (in edit mode) when you return to the story but it won't be published.
• There can be only one public Actual version in a planning model.

Watch this video to see how Jen at ABC Corporation uses private and public versions to help her prepare an urgent fully integrated preliminary income statement for the company controller. She has to incorporate potential changes in the new year such as government rebates, corporate strategy, and new products into this forecast.

Versions can be maintained via the Version Management option in the story ribbon.

In the Version Management panel below, you can see several display, creation, and publishing options highlighted.

1. The Show versions in use only toggle allows you to show or hide versions that aren’t included in the associated table filter.
2. Add a new public version without any data by selecting the + Create Blank Public Version.
3. Choose Copy to create a new public version with data.
4. Choose Publish to update the database with unpublished data (data in Edit Mode is unpublished).
5. Add a new private version without any data by selecting the + Create Blank Private Version.
6. In Private Versions, the Publish button provides two options in a drop-down menu:
   • Choose Publish to record the private data to an existing public version.
   • Choose Publish As to record the private data to a new public version.

You can conveniently access version options from a data table in a story. Right-click on a data cell, and you can select from a list of options.

The Version options menu allows you to:

1. Start Edit Mode: Create a temporary private version that only you can see until the changes are published.
2. Undo / Redo Data Change: Undo or redo the last data change.
3. Revert: Go back to the last saved data.
4. History: Access processing steps on unpublished data.
5. Publish: Publish changes to an existing public version.
6. Publish As: Publish private data to a new public version.
7. Copy Version: Copy a private or public version to a new private version.
8. Delete Version: Delete a public or private version.

Watch this video to see how Jen at ABC Corporation uses versions to help her prepare her forecast income statement.

The type of planning activity in a version is described by version category. In other words, a version related to actual data is assigned to the Actual category, a version related to forecast data is assigned to the Forecast category, and so on.

There are five delivered (built-in) version categories:

1. Actual: Actual values that you’ve achieved.
2. Budget: How much you're allowed to spend.
3. Planning: What the goal is (financial or non-financial) that you're trying to achieve next year or the next three years.
4. Forecast: What your expectation is for a specific timeframe in the future. This typically focuses on major revenue and expense items and is updated every month or quarter.
5. Rolling Forecast: Similar to Forecast except it usually includes a few months of historic actual data followed by a continuous 12-18 months of forecast data.

In the version dimension, Category is a property that is used to describe the type of planning activity. The public.actual version is created by the system when planning models are created. Other versions can be created from stories.

When viewing data from the planning model, both published and unpublished public data can be viewed. Private data is viewable by whomever created the private version.