Workflow for SAP S/4HANA

Nilay Ghosh is a globally-acknowledged technical leader in the SAP practice at IBM Consulting. He has more than 20 years of experience working in the SAP technology stack, where he started from SAP R/3 and progressed to SAP ECC, SAP S/4HANA, SAP Business Technology Platform, and numerous other SAP on-premise and cloud solutions. He has held several technical leadership roles in IBM, both for global client projects and internal strategic programs. He set up the SAP eSOA, SAP UX/Mobile, and SAP BTP practice in IBM's largest global delivery center in India. In addition to his role as lead architect in a large, global SAP S/4HANA transformation program, Nilay is the currently chief architect for all intelligent workflows developed under the strategic Evolution Program between SAP and IBM. A core member of IBM's SAP Global CTO Network, and a frequent speaker with a few patents on his name. Kousik Goon is globally acknowledged technical leader in the SAP practice at IBM Consulting. He has more than 18 years of experience working in the SAP technology stack, where he started from SAP R/3 and progressed to SAP ECC, SAP S/4HANA, SAP Business Technology Platform, and other SAP on-premise and cloud solutions. He has held several technical leadership roles in IBM, both for global client projects and internal strategic programs. He was instrumental in setting up SAP UX/Mobile and SAP BTP practice in IBM's largest global delivery center in India. In addition to his role as integration and extension architect in a large, global SAP S/4HANA transformation program, Kousik is the key subject matter expert for SAP S/4HANA extensions and integrations at IBM. A core member of IBM's SAP Global CTO Network, and a frequent speaker. Sandip Jana is a global technical leader in the SAP practice at IBM Consulting. He has more than 22 years of experience in enterprise architecture, system landscape design, and simplification across different SAP technology platforms, both on-premise and in the cloud. He has led different IBM strategic offerings, helping customers embark on their SAP S/4HANA journey. He has held the lead architect role in different SAP transformation projects, in several global template and country roll out programs. Sandip is currently leading the SAP technical practice at the IBM global delivery center in India and is responsible for capability building in new dimensional technical areas. He leads IBM's unique offering SAP Hana Impact Assessment, which guides customers on their SAP S/4HANA transformation journey. He is also the global lead of IBM's unique SAP S/4HANA transformation offering, IBM Rapid Move. A core member of IBM's SAP Global CTO Network, and a frequent speaker. Arindam Mukherjee is a senior technical architect and consultant working with IBM for close to 17 years. He specializes in in SAP Business Workflow, ABAP, ABAP development for SAP HANA, OData, and SAP S/4HANA embedded analytics technologies. Arindam is an established subject matter expert in SAP Business Workflow space, implementing workflow solutions for several global SAP customers, as well as driving the growth of the workflow competency and knowledge base content for classic workflows at IBM. Arindam is also an expert in flexible workflow with SAP S/4HANA., SAP Fiori, and OData integration, and has led multiple SAP S/4HANA implementations by engaging in end-to-end solution design, development, and support. Srinivas Rao is an application architect with the SAP practice at IBM, with more than 16 years of consulting experience. He is passionate about and has extension expertise in clean core solutions. He is certified in SAP BTP extensions and integration. He has extensive experience in delivering complex SAP S/4HANA implementations projects with varied experience in solution, build, and delivery. He is also passionate about automations and has won an SAP Workflow Management Hack2Build. Yogeendar Rao is a senior SAP S/4HANA technical consultant at IBM India. He has more than 10 years of global SAP consulting experience, with expertise in ABAP development for SAP HANA, SAP Business Workflow, flexible workflows, SAP HR with ABAP, OData, and SAP Conversational AI. He has worked on different enterprise digital transformation projects and delivered technical use cases for various global SAP customers, with his proficiency in ABAP development for SAP HANA and SAP Business Workflow. He is an expert in flexible workflow and its integration with SAP Fiori applications and has designed and extended flexible workflows in many SAP S/4HANA implementations. Naveen Veshala is a senior SAP application architect and consultant with more than 20 years of experience in the SAP technical domain. He has worked at IBM for close to 18 years, where he specializes in SAP S/4HANA, SAP Gateway, SAP Fiori, flexible workflow, ABAP, and SAP ERP> Naveen is an established subject matter expert in IBM's SAP practice, where his focus in SAP S/4HANA, flexible workflow, and OData. He has contributed to the SAP Community, where he publishes blog posts about flexible workflow in SAP S/4HANA. He has led multiple SAP S/4HANA implementations by engaging in end-to-end solution design, development, and support. Kiran Viswanathan is a technical architect and senior consultant with more than 21 years of extensive experience in sap user experience, mobility, and sap business technology platform. He has played the roles of user experience and extensibility solution consultant, and technical delivery manager for multiple client engagement across industries in their sap s/4hana implementations. He leads and manages the SAP UX, mobility, and SAP BTP practice at the IBM India global delivery center. In addition, he is an architect and the realization lead in IBM's strategic Evolution Program for developing intelligent workflows for several industry use cases.

... Preface ... 19
... Target Audience ... 19
... Objective of This Book ... 20
... How to Read This Book ... 21
1 ... Getting Started ... 23
1.1 ... Workflows in SAP S/4HANA ... 23
1.2 ... Workflows in SAP Business Technology Platform ... 32
1.3 ... Workflow Development Tools ... 34
1.4 ... Identity and Access Management ... 45
1.5 ... Summary ... 48
Part I ... SAP Business Workflow for SAP S/4HANA ... 49
2 ... Introduction to Classical Workflows ... 51
2.1 ... Evolution of Classical Workflows ... 51
2.2 ... Standard Workflows ... 53
2.3 ... Configuring the SAP Business Workflow System ... 56
2.4 ... Activating and Deactivating Standard Workflows ... 70
2.5 ... Configuring Agents for Standard Workflows ... 72
2.6 ... When to Develop a Custom Workflow ... 73
2.7 ... Summary ... 75
3 ... Building Methods and Tasks ... 77
3.1 ... Business Object Repository Approach ... 78
3.2 ... ABAP Class Approach ... 116
3.3 ... Task Definition ... 130
3.4 ... Summary ... 137
4 ... Defining Workflows and Adding Steps ... 139
4.1 ... Workflow Builder ... 139
4.2 ... Common Workflow Steps ... 144
4.3 ... Adding Tasks ... 154
4.4 ... Containers and Bindings ... 160
4.5 ... Multiline Elements and Dynamic Parallel Processing ... 167
4.6 ... Deadline Definition ... 169
4.7 ... Summary ... 176
5 ... Defining and Triggering Events ... 177
5.1 ... Event Triggering Techniques ... 178
5.2 ... Event Creators, Receivers, and Event Linkage ... 198
5.3 ... Start Conditions in Workflows ... 203
5.4 ... Terminating Events and Instance Linkage ... 207
5.5 ... Check Function Module and Receiver Function Module for Events ... 210
5.6 ... Summary ... 212
6 ... Agent Determination ... 213
6.1 ... Different Types of Agents in Workflow ... 214
6.2 ... Agent Determination Rules ... 220
6.3 ... Possible Agents in Tasks and Default Rules ... 234
6.4 ... Organizational Structure Definition and Linking to Workflow Agents ... 237
6.5 ... Summary ... 239
7 ... Email Notifications and Other Runtime Jobs ... 241
7.1 ... Prerequisites for Setting Up Email Notifications in Workflow ... 241
7.2 ... Classical Work Item Email Notifications via Program RSWUWFML2 ... 244
7.3 ... Extended Notification Configuration with Program SWNCONFIG ... 252
7.4 ... Adding Inbox and Work Item URL Links to Workflow Work Item Notifications ... 262
7.5 ... Additional Workflow Runtime Jobs ... 264
7.6 ... Summary ... 265
8 ... Workflow Administration, Monitoring, and Troubleshooting ... 267
8.1 ... Workflow Log ... 268
8.2 ... Workflow Administration ... 274
8.3 ... Workflow Error Diagnosis and Resolution ... 279
8.4 ... Workflow Inbox and Features ... 283
8.5 ... Substitution and Automatic Forwarding ... 289
8.6 ... Display Dynamic Labels for Tasks to Display in Business Workplace ... 299
8.7 ... Event Trace and Event Queue Administration ... 301
8.8 ... Process Incoming Documents with ArchiveLink ... 305
8.9 ... Summary ... 310
9 ... Application Link Enabling and Reporting ... 313
9.1 ... Error Handling during IDoc Processing ... 314
9.2 ... Active Monitoring ... 327
9.3 ... Common Workflow Data Tables ... 329
9.4 ... Common Workflow Application Programming Interfaces ... 330
9.5 ... Workflow Reporting ... 331
9.6 ... Implementing Program Exits to Capture Data from Workflow Steps ... 335
9.7 ... Summary ... 339
10 ... BRFplus ... 341
10.1 ... Introduction to BRFplus ... 341
10.2 ... Integrating BRFplus Applications in SAP Business Workflow ... 347
10.3 ... Summary ... 356
11 ... Integrating Workflows with User Interface Applications and External Applications ... 357
11.1 ... My Inbox App Overview ... 357
11.2 ... Workflow Task Integration with User Interface Applications ... 359
11.3 ... Email Templates in SAP S/4HANA ... 373
11.4 ... Integrating External Applications with SAP Business Workflow ... 373
11.5 ... Summary ... 374
12 ... Migrating SAP ERP Workflows to SAP S/4HANA ... 375
12.1 ... Migration Options from SAP ERP to SAP S/4HANA ... 376
12.2 ... Conversion Projects (Brownfield) ... 378
12.3 ... New Implementation Projects (Greenfield) and Selective Data Transition ... 384
12.4 ... Summary ... 389
13 ... Workflow in SAP Master Data Governance ... 391
13.1 ... Introduction to SAP Master Data Governance ... 392
13.2 ... Business Partner Workflows ... 419
13.3 ... Finance Workflows ... 431
13.4 ... Material Workflows ... 436
13.5 ... Summary ... 437
Part II ... Flexible Workflow in SAP S/4HANA ... 439
14 ... Introduction to Flexible Workflow ... 441
14.1 ... Authorizations and SAP Fiori Applications Required for Development ... 442
14.2 ... Flexible Workflow Scenarios ... 443
14.3 ... Migrating to Flexible Workflows ... 446
14.4 ... Setting Up a Standard Flexible Workflow Scenario ... 447
14.5 ... Extending the Standard Flexible Scenario ... 460
14.6 ... Summary ... 461
15 ... Custom Scenario Development ... 463
15.1 ... Workflow Class Development ... 463
15.2 ... Business Objects ... 470
15.3 ... Scenario Development ... 473
15.4 ... Create a Workflow Template Using the Manage Workflows App ... 490
15.5 ... Initiating the Custom Flexible Workflow ... 497
15.6 ... My Inbox Integration ... 498
15.7 ... Troubleshooting ... 501
15.8 ... Summary ... 504
16 ... SAP Fiori Applications for Flexible Workflow ... 505
16.1 ... Adaptation Transport Organizer Setup ... 505
16.2 ... Maintain Email Templates App ... 507
16.3 ... Notification Features ... 510
16.4 ... Manage Teams and Responsibilities App ... 514
16.5 ... Transporting Extensions ... 515
16.6 ... Summary ... 520
Part III ... Workflows with SAP Business Technology Platform ... 521
17 ... Introduction to SAP Build Process Automation ... 523
17.1 ... Overview ... 523
17.2 ... Typical Use Cases for SAP S/4HANA ... 524
17.3 ... System and Service Requirements ... 525
17.4 ... Setting Up the Required Services ... 526
17.5 ... Working with the Workflow Cockpit ... 532
17.6 ... Security ... 535
17.7 ... Troubleshooting ... 536
17.8 ... Summary ... 537
18 ... Process Development ... 539
18.1 ... Workflow Design Techniques ... 540
18.2 ... Creating a Workflow Using SAP Business Application Studio ... 541
18.3 ... Creating a Workflow Using Process Builder ... 567
18.4 ... Building and Deploying the Project ... 595
18.5 ... Destination Configuration with Authentication ... 598
18.6 ... Transport Management ... 602
18.7 ... Using APIs for SAP Build Process Automation ... 605
18.8 ... Design a Process/Workflow for the Use Case ... 607
18.9 ... Summary ... 634
19 ... Process Visibility ... 635
19.1 ... Configuring Process Visibility ... 636
19.2 ... Testing the Process Visibility Scenario ... 652
19.3 ... Process Monitoring and Real-Time Insights ... 653
19.4 ... Add Workflow Actions to the Dashboard ... 654
19.5 ... Using Application Programming Interfaces for Process Visibility ... 660
19.6 ... Summary ... 662
20 ... Task Processing with My Inbox ... 663
20.1 ... My Inbox for SAP Business Technology Platform ... 664
20.2 ... SAP Task Center ... 670
20.3 ... Summary ... 673
... The Authors ... 675
... Index ... 679