Work With Field Groups

Field groups are filters used to create subsets of data in a Target field. Based on values in another related field, these subsets can have different settings, such as criticality, whether the field is required or which rules will run against the field. If, for example, a field is required only under certain data conditions, field groups are used to define the conditions, fields, values, and requirement setting.

NOTE: Refer to Set Rule Priority for Fields in Field Groups for important information about the order in which rules assigned to field groups are run.

The default field group (*) applies to all data in the Target field, so rules assigned to this field group run on all data in the fields.

**NOTE  **: All field groups assigned to a Target do not have to be used for each field mapping. However, the default field group (*) is required for all active fields.

For example, the ttMARA table in SAP stores general material data. The field MTART on that table stores the material type. Material types include FERT (Finished Goods), HALB (Semi Finished Goods) and ROH (Raw Materials).

Field groups can be created based on material types, so that rules can be run on all Finished Goods, all Semi-Finished Goods, and so on. Naming each field group after the filter value it is based on is a good practice.

Refer to Create Field Groups for more information.

Material types are assigned a Maintenance Status in the PSTAT field on the ttMARA table. Examples of Maintenance Status are Work Scheduling, Accounting, or Purchasing.

If all Material Types in the Target should have the same Maintenance Status, a mapper can create a mapping for the PSTAT field with a Default action, supply the Default Value (for example, 1) that should be written to the PSTAT field for every Material Type and apply the rule to the default field group (*).  When the rule runs in Transform, the Target field PSTAT is set to 1 for all Material Types (FERT, HALB and ROH) in the Target.

In cases where each Material Type (FERT, HALB, and ROH) should have a different Maintenance Status set in the Target, the mapper submits a mapping with a different action for each field group.

For example, the mapper can submit a field mapping for the Finished Goods field group (FERT). In this mapping, the PSTAT field will be mapped with a Default action, with a Default Value set to 5. When the rule runs in Transform, records with a Material Type of Finished Goods will have a Maintenance Status in the Target set to 5.

The mapper can then create a field mapping for the Semi-Finished Goods field group (HALB). In this mapping, the PSTAT field will be mapped with a Default action, with a Default Value set to 3. When the rule runs in Transform, records with a Material Type of Semi-Finished Goods will have a Maintenance Status in the Target set to 3.

To work with field groups:

A user can also: