Need help ASAP

[Stephens, Monique S L]

Thanks for the advice.  It has been quite some time since we had to add new release codes (not since we went live back in 1999).  And yes, I inserted the new code in between existing codes.

I hope I have not messed too much up.  I went ahead and used ME28 to release the PO's and put them in their proper work centers.  So, if the Release Strategy tab showed that it was "blocked in Purchasing" but the yellow triangle was one release above Purchasing, I went into ME28 for that release code so that the triangle and the wording matched.  I haven't checked the documents since that time but I do plan to monitor PO's still in workflow.

If we need to add more release codes in the future, I will try to remember to do it right.


Monique Stephens

-----Original Message-----
From: sap-wug-bounces at mit.edu [mailto:sap-wug-bounces at mit.edu] On Behalf Of Kjetil Kilhavn
Sent: Wednesday, July 10, 2013 4:15 AM
To: SAP Workflow Users' Group
Subject: Re: Need help ASAP

Mandag 8. juli 2013 11.13.03 skrev Stephens, Monique S L:
> We added a new release code for purchase orders.  I tested the 
> workflow thoroughly (or thought I did).  Any PO's already out there 
> that did not complete the workflow process are stuck.  PO's that are 
> supposedly blocked in Purchasing are showing blocked at a different 
> release level.  Is there a program I need to run when new release codes are added to the mix?
> 
> We have release codes at the following levels:  Grants, Finance, and 
> then Purchasing.  A PO that is blocked in Purchasing is showing 
> blocked at the release code for Grants instead.

Let me take an educated guess. You added the new release code to existing release strategies, and instead of appending it at the end of the release code list you inserted it between the two existing release codes?

If my guess is correct you did this because the new release code should be the second one released (or they are released in parallell and you did it anyway).

You *can* fix it by changing your release strategy and appending the release code at the end. Use the release prerequisites matrix to control the order of release. However, I would not recommend it unless this is an error correction for a solution which was just recently introduced in production, so read on.

The release status is (as you perhaps know already) stored as a flag field (8 characters, each is either space or X) in EKKO. The status flags are mapped to the list of release codes. That is, in EKKO, there is no knowledge about which release codes have been approved, only the indexes of the release codes. When changing existing release strategies it is therefore possible to really screw things up for existing documents.

The proper solution is to create a new release strategy, because when you add a release code to the existing release strategy all already released purchase orders will show inconsistent information (at least if all three release codes must be approved to release the purchase order).
If you want to avoid old purchase orders from being reset due to innocent changes because a new release strategy applies you must add a characteristic with reference to document date or creation date in order to apply the new release strategy only to the new documents.

> I can manually run ME28 for each PO to put it into the correct release 
> code but wanted to check first to see if there is some program that 
> will update all PO's to the correct release code.
> 
> 
> Monique Stephens
> Sr. SAP Analyst
> OIT-Business Solutions
> Baylor College of Medicine
> 713-798-1349
> 713-798-1326 (FAX)
--
Kjetil Kilhavn / Vettug AS (http://www.vettug.no) _______________________________________________
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