The system does not determine the release strategy for purchase requisitions (PReqs) or purchasing documents

365604 - FAQ: Release strategies in purchasing

Other Terms

T16FS, T16FG, T16FC, frgzu, frgrl, M06E0005, FAQ

Reason and Prerequisites

1. Settings in Customizing

1. a) Release group:

You are only allowed to use one class for each release object (1=PReq, 2=Purchase order). When you use the overall release (as of Release 4.0A), you are only allowed to use one class for the overall release or individual release. Overall release and individual release is not possible in the same document. If you use overall release for purchase requisitions, this must be specified for the document type in Customizing (indicator for V_T161-GSFRG) and the release group (indicator for V_T16FG-FRGFG). During the overall release, the system takes into account only the characteristics that are identical for all items. If, for example, item 10 of a purchase requisition contains material group 001 and item 20 contains material group 002, the material group is set to BLANK for the strategy determination.

1. b) Release indicator:

A release strategy must contain at least two release indicators. The first indicator must be defined as blocked and the last release indicator must be defined as released. If this is not the case, the release status is not displayed correctly. If a value is entered in field 'Value changes' (V_161S-TLFAE), the system only checks for value increases.

If you have purchase requisitions from material requirements planning (MRP) (EBAN-ESTKZ = 'B') that are subject to a release strategy, the system may reset a PReq release when the MRP is restarted. In this case, you should set 'Fix for material requirements planning' for the relevant release indicator (V_161S-FIXBP).

1. c) Release statuses:

A release indicator must be assigned to each release status that is theoretically possible. Thus, for example for five release codes that can be released in any sequence, you have to maintain 32 entries.

Caution: If the release strategy contains many release codes, the system does not display all the statuses in the window. In order to display these release statuses, you have to use the page down or page up keys on the keyboard since the window has no scroll bar.

2. Settings in the classification

1. The characteristics of the class used must all be linked to the corresponding fields of structure CEBAN (for purchase requisitions) or CEKKO (for purchase orders).
2. The characteristics must be entered as they are specified on the database, that is, the item category must be entered in the internal format, for example (value 0-9), cost centers or material numbers must be entered with leading zeros.
3. If intervals are used for the characteristics, the corresponding characteristic must be marked as multiple value in the classification.
4. If a characteristic is non-valuated (blank entry), this field must actually be filled with blanks in the document. A blank entry can be useful when the overall release is used. A blank entry is not to be seen as a wildcard (*). If, for example, all material groups of a release strategy should be subject to an update strategy, you must enter these explicitly in the classification. You cannot use a placeholder (wildcard). You can maintain a blank entry as follows:
1. -Enter the characteristic in transaction CT04 (for releases < 4.6, transaction CT02)- Select 'Value'
2. Do not maintain any entry in column 'Characteristic value'
3. In the column 'Characteristic name', enter a text such as, for example, 'Blank entry' and save the settings
4. The blank entry that is maintained as such can now be selected from the F4 help in Customizing for the release strategy (pushbutton: Classification).
5. If you make changes to the class (add or delete a characteristic), the system cannot determine the release for this class. Then you must adjust all release strategies correspondingly. (If you added a new characteristic, you must maintain the characteristic value).
6. A working strategy must have classification status '1' (active) in transaction CL24 or CL24N. If you delete release strategies, ensure that the strategy is also deleted in transaction CL24 or CL24N with the deletion in Customizing.
7. You can use report RCCLZUOB to check the consistency: Class type: 032Object table: KSSK

You can use transaction CL30 search for an object using the data of the purchase requisition/purchase order. Here, it is important that the object search determines exactly one strategy. If this is not the case, this indicates that there are overlapping strategies in the system or that the release strategies in Customizing do not correspond with those from transaction CL24. See the previous point. If the object search returns more than one result, the system subsequently determines an incorrect release strategy or no release strategy at all.

3. User exit

During the individual release for purchase requisitions, the user exit is called in function module ME_REL_STRATEGIE_EBAN, in the overall release, it is called in function module ME_REL_GENERAL_STRATEGY_EBAN.

(Enhancement M06B0002, EXIT_SAPLEBND_001, ZXM06U13)

During the release for purchase orders the user exit in function module ME_REL_STRATEGIE_EKKO is called, in releases > 3.1X in program MM06EF0S_STRATEGIE_CEKKO (Enhancement M06E0004, EXIT_SAPLEBND_002, ZXM06U22).

The data is available in the user exit in structure I_CEBAN or I_CEKKO. The transfer from this structure to the calling program runs using structure E_CEBAN or E_CEKKO. In the user exit, I_CEBAN must be copied to E_CEBAN or I_CEKKO must be copied to E_CEKKO anywhere in the user exit, for example E_CEBAN = I_CEBAN.

4. Important notes in connection with a non-working release strategy:

Note 117391 --> as of Release 4.0, for the release of purchase requisitions; Release strategy does not work sporadically.

Note 378718 > symptom: Release strategy works depending on the user.

Documents which are created by users who have no authorization for class type 032(object: C_TCLA_BKA) are not subject to any release strategy.

Note 493900 > FAQ: Release strategy

Note 086900 > Instruction for the transport of Release strategies

Note 045951 > Transport of class data: System/client

Note 010745 > Copying class data to other clients

Note 435150 > User exit deactivated after importing R/3 Support Packages

Note 493414 > RCCLZUOB revised

Note 350703 > OMGQCK: Error message 'No release group exists'

5. Deletion of release strategies:

The tables T16FK, T16FV, T16FS, T16FC and T16FG may contain entries from previous Customizing settings (such as old release groups) which were deleted in Customizing but not in the tables. This creates an inconsistency. To eliminate the inconsistency, proceed as follows: Make all the deleted release settings in Customizing again, save them, and then delete them in the following sequence:

1. The release strategies
2. The release indicators
3. The release codes
4. The release group
5. The corresponding class (transaction CL02) if a new one was created for the new release strategies.

Then use transaction SE16 to check whether the entries were deleted in the tables named above. Execute the check report in Customizing (transaction OMGQCK or OMGSCK) and ensure that a red traffic light is not displayed. Also refer to SAP Note 350703. You can use report RCCLZUOB to check the consistency as already mentioned in point 2f.

6. Changing the release strategy when the system is running:

We strongly recommend that you do NOT change an existing release strategy that is in use or its individual elements (release code(s), release status and so on), especially if documents already exist in the system that use this release strategy. However, if you make these types of changes in spite of this recommendation, the following inconsistencies or problems may occur. For example, if you cancel a release, this can result in the system issuing error message ME 108 ('No new release indicator can be determined'). It is also possible that certain release statuses that had the documents concerned before the corresponding release strategies were changed, are no longer available after the change. This means that the documents concerned are in an inconsistent release status.

In this case, the only solution is to explicitly trigger the determination of a new release strategy for the document concerned.

 Solution

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