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Service Management – Translating Item Categories

I just learned a new trick.  This is rather surprising to me, but you cannot translate an item category into multiple languages from the standard screen.  For some reason, it is grayed out, so you are stuck with blank descriptions if you live in a multiple language SAP system.  Here is how to correct that.

Go to SM30:

V_OIISOCVP

Now, don’t let the description fool you.  We aren’t really changing anything directly about this table, but from here, you can select your item categories, and use goto->translation.

and magically, you can translate your item categories into all the languages you care about.

Thanks for reading,

Service Management – Finding Enhancements

I’ve recently been hunting through code that isn’t my own to try to figure out how something works.  Since it was another developer, it often means a lot of hunting to figure out exactly where their code may have been entered.  I love using the where-used program:  RPR_ABAP_SOURCE_SCAN but it doesn’t always find everything.  I believe one of the areas it doesn’t cover is the enhancements (and possible class objects, but I’m still testing that theory).  Regardless, I know that this program doesn’t find everything, so I’m resorting to alternate methods to find some code.  Here’s one I’ve been trying.

SE16n:

Table TADIR

OBJECT: ENHO

AUTHOR <> SAP.

This gave a list of all enhancement in system made by anyone and not SAP.

Now, the fun part is that you still need to manually go look through all of these to see if it hits the area you need, and then checks to see if the code is in there.  It’s still a work in progress, but I’m trying to expand my bag of tricks.  if you have any other cool tricks for finding code, I’d love to hear about them.

Thanks for reading,

Service Management – Troubleshooting the DIP Profile

Recently, I’ve been playing with the DIP (Dynamic Item Processing) Profile.  The first thing I quickly came to remember is to start slowly.  The thing with the DIP profile is that it takes a lot of inputs, and then spits out some materials with their costs.  But if you don’t have everything setup properly, you will only get the dreaded message of no items found.  So, here are some good guidelines for testing your DIP profile and getting it working the way you need.

  1. Find the cost elements you care about.  The easiest way to do this is to find a few sample service orders.  Looking at the cost tab, and then press the rep/plan cost button.  This will show you the cost elements that are being hit.  With a few examples, you should be able to see the initial costs elements you will need to track.
  2. Create Cost Element Groups – KAH1.  Why?  this is a nice easy way to quickly add more elements to the list of what you want to track.  In general, I usually have one for labor, one for materials, and one for subcontracts/third party stuff.  You can assign these to the material determination screen in txn ODP1.  Then, you can just update the master data as you find elements you missed.
  3. Keep the source simple.  For me, especially in the early phases, do not add any conditions to the sources.  Simply setup one with 100%, either planned values or actual values.
  4. Create your service materials for the material determination.  Make sure that the materials are setup in the correct plant/orgs.  Be sure that the item category determination (SEIN/SENI) are setup for your materials and item category groups.  If you can’t add the materials to the sales orders, you will never get the DIP working.
  5. In the material determination, add your service materials (keep it simple).  one line for labor, one for materials, one for third party/subcontract costs.  You can always add more later after it’s working.  Be sure not to check any boxes for service materials that should be added to the sales order.  For example, I tend to create a DIEN called labor.  Make sure that material direct is NOT checked.  This checkbox should only be checked for actual materials that are both issued to your service order AND should be placed on your sales order.  Be sure that you assign your cost element groups to the criteria below material determination.

If you follow these guidelines, you should be able to get a working model in no time.  Once it’s working, then you can begin to fine tune it.

Thanks for reading,

The next E-book. VC or Advanced Service?

Well, since I never seem to have enough to keep me busy, I’m thinking about starting another e-book in June.  I would love your feedback on what you would like to see next…

  1. Variant Configuration
  2. Advanced Service Management 2

looking forward to hearing from you,

Thanks for reading,

Preparing for SAPPHIRE 2017

With just over a week, my final preparations are in place.  A week from Thursday, I’ll be presenting for the first time at ASUG.  I’m pretty excited.  Looking back, I’ve spent significant money to be a vendor at SAPPHIRE 2 years ago.  I’m excited because for the first time, I”m heading to SAPPHIRE for free…  and I have a much better chance of promting myself and my products with a 1 hour presentation than I do sitting at a booth for 3 days.

I’m also excited because I get the opportunity to talk about a favoite topic of mine…  Service management.  This time around I’ll be talking about warranties.  I’m coming to realize that what I really enjoy is helping people.  I love the opportunity to help people better understand service.  I actually love it when someone calls me with a new challenge.

I’m hoping that ASUG can provide me more new challenges.  I hope to see you there,

Thanks for reading,

The things you own…

One of my favorite all time movies is Fight Club.  There are just some incredible lines in that movie.  I often find that my brain works in strange ways, and I often get a quote that pops into my head, seemingly out of nowhere.  Until I think about for a bit.  One off my favorite lines is “The things you own, end up owning you”.  Well, this line just happened to hit me lately.  I haven’t watched the movie in month…  so I guess I just chalk it up to things rattling around in my brain and popping into my head.

So, why am I rambling about this?  Maybe because I realize just how true this statement is (at least for me).  My home is the perfect example.  It’s a nice house, decent neighborhood, but there are always random things breaking, or needing my attention.  Last week I had to replace a few fence posts.  Today my wife informed that someone is coming to clean out the gutters this week.  There is constant cleaning, painting, renovating, cleaning carpets, cutting the grass, trimming the bushes and on and on.  There is so much ongoing maintenance that constantly sucks my time or my bank account.  The house truly consumes a lot of me on a weekly basis.  I’m really starting to feel like the house owns me…  I can’t neglect these things or significant damage could occur that cost me even more money, the HOA could fine me, or my wife might feel embarrassed if we don’t keep up with the neighborhood standards.

For me, I know there are many things in my life that are similar.  The house is the most obvious, but the more things you own, the more you need to attend to those things…  like it or not.  Even technology needs constant attention.  My computer need updating, the cable box needs to be rest, the internet drops and forces me to troubleshoot for a while.  I am realizing that I want less and less things every day, because the more I have, the less time I have to do fun things, because I have to attend to my stuff…

Are you the slave to anything you own???

Thanks for reading,

Audio Books for Free???

My wife recently showed me a really cool thing.  Our library in Charlotte allows you to check out audio books for free.  I recently did a long ass drive from WI to SC, and having that audio book was a great way to pass the time.  For too long, I keep buying and buying from Amazon.  I’ll be books, e-books, audio books, etc…  and in reality, I read it once it sits on my virtual book shelf.  Now, there are still a lot of titles that I”m looking for not available, but going to the library web-site and using an add-on App called Hoopla, I’m able to download the book to my phone and check out up to 6 books a month.  Worth the effort if you want to listen or read some e-books.

Thanks for reading,

Service Management – Merging Services and Products into one Document

I’ve recently run into something that I never used.  It’s a new way to use the service contract.  The concept is simple, a single document that can provide a single invoice for both a deliverable product as well as the extended warranty that goes with it.  I became intrigued because it’s often been something that has been fancifully wished for.  Why can’t we do it on a single document?

Now, the concept is still not ideal.  Here is how it works.  The configuration should be relatively standard once you see the concept.  You start with a service contract.  You probably only need an item category for service and another with configuration (if you use VC products).  You don’t explode any BOM on this contract.  It’s purely to drive pricing/invoicing.  Now, the work comes in building all the copy control.  Because you will still need to create an order to do the shipping of the product (be sure it’s Free of Charge).  You create it with reference to your original contract.  The service item can work like normal.

So this works, but again, it does still require multiple contracts/orders, but at least it can be merged into a single billing plan/invoice.  If you’d like more details, let me know.

Thanks for reading,

What does happiness look like for you in the future?

I’ve recently become interested in the future.  Not so much flying cars, or living on the moon, but rather what will make me happy in the future.  Think about it, we work our full life in the hopes of happy retirement.  But what does retirement really mean?  does it mean not working at all?  does it mean fishing every day, golf or walks on the beach like they show in the retirement commercials?  When I stopped to think about it, that’s not for me.  I know that I always want to be doing something.  Solving problems, doing something interesting…  who knows?   But the whole concept of retirement as it’s pitched on TV doesn’t apply to me…  does it apply to you?

Now, the thing that I recently started looking into, is what will make me happy in 20 years?  Right now, I’m working hard, saving money, investing, etc.  But what do I want that money for?  I don’t have a plan or a hobby, that I’m aiming for.  Now, I have some hobbies, but not enough to fill my time.  Of course, I want to take care of the family, college if the kids want to go, be able to pay off the house, and not have to cut my standard of living.  But often, I start looking at the numbers, and think I need to save more and more and more…  but I don’t have a good reason for why I need more.

So I started reading a book called Stumbling on Happiness.  I haven’t finished the book, but getting half-way through has been very interesting.  It’s kinda scientific at times, but overall, it gave me a new perspective.  The concept is that how can you possibly know what will make you happy in 1 year, much less 20 years?  All too often, I don’t even know what will make me happy next week, much less years from now.  So this made me wonder, how do I know what I want is what I will want in the future???

Obviously, this isn’t an easy question to answer, but currently this is something I’m wrestling with.  It’s a question I suggest you ask yourself as well.  What will make you happy in 10, 20 or 30 years from now.  If you don’t have an answer yet, give it some serious thought.

Thanks for reading,

Habit vs. Ritual

I was recently attending church, and while sitting there I started wondering why so many things were done the way the they were.  There were so many things that seemed to have no reason.  You stand up, you sit down, you stand up, you bow your head, your recite something, you sit back down.  The question is why?  I’m certain that there was a reason for this, but I’d be curious to know how many people that attend church remember why all these things happen the way they do.

This got to me thinking about habits could become rituals.  In my mind, a ritual is something that has been done in a certain way for so long, that most people no longer remember exactly why they happen.  Now, I have become a creature of habit, literally.  I tend to do things the same way, and try to build “good” habits.  But any habit runs the risk of becoming a ritual…  and when we mindlessly do things the same way we tend to fall into traps and forget to look for better ways.

Remember to look at your habits…  make sure they are still the right choices.  Always revisit and make sure there isn’t a better way to do things.

Thanks for reading,