Reading data from email back into container

[Dart, Jocelyn]

Hi Mat,
Has this been discussed with your SAP account manager? If the 3rd party is going to affect R/3 system data - and that includes passing back data into R/3 - they have to be covered by a license somehow - even if a generic user is to be used. This is no different than trying to use the system for employees who don't have an SAP license - it's a no-no from a legal perspective if they aren't covered by your license agreement.
 
As to how to do this - it's no different than the offline email reply technique used in SRM-EBP.
1. Set up your SAPConnect/SMTP link to receive mails into R/3
2. Set up transaction SO28 to receive mails sent to a nominated reply address to a handling routine
3. In the handling routine parse the email and update the work item
4. Make sure that when you send out the original item you include the work item, the decision, and date.
 
How you are going make it look attractive at the 3rd party end will be interesting as I presume you don't have any control over the mail systems the 3rd parties are using?  It's entirely probable that they won't even be able to send a parsed reply if they are using old mail system versions, e.g. before Outlook 98.
 
Also be aware that security over mail transactions is limited - it's far too easy to pretend to be someone else. That's another reason why this sort of offline email reply technique is only recommended for use within the company landscape.
 
Are you sure you wouldn't be better off supplying them with a web transaction, such as a simple BSP application, and include a hyperlink to the web transaction in the email? You can use the web services technique to call the BSP application from workflow.
 
 
Regards,
        Jocelyn Dart
Consultant (SRM, EBP, Workflow)
and co-author of the book
"Practical Workflow for SAP"
SAP Australia
email: jocelyn.dart at sap.com
phone: +61 412 390 267
fax:   +61 2 9935 4880
 
 
 
 
 
 
-----Original Message-----
From: Corrin, Mat [mailto:Mat.Corrin at atosorigin.com]
Sent: Tuesday,21 October 2003 5:20 PM
To: SAP-WUG at MITVMA.MIT.EDU
Subject: Reading data from email back into container
 
 
Hi,
 
As part of a workflow that I am currently building, I would like to send an email to 3rd party (not a SAP user). This  in itself does not present any problems but the next stage does :
 
The email will be HTML formatted and will contain accept / reject indicators and a field into which the recipient can enter a date. The recipient will then send the email back and the accept/reject result along with the date entered will be read back into the workflow container.
 
The system is Enterprise and portals are not being used.
 
Does anyone have any ideas as to how I can achieve this ?
 
Any suggestions would be appreciated.
 
Mat Corrin.