Spotlight on ABAP CDS View Extensions

[CarineTchoutouo]

Hi everyone!

here we go with another "Spotlight on ..." blog! :smile:

This time I would like to put the light on the modification-free enhancement of ABAP Core Data Services (CDS) views which is supported starting with AS ABAP 7.4 SP8.

The modification-free enhancement of development objects is necessary, in order to avoid conflicts when a new release of the related application program is to be imported into a system. To avoid such conflicts in the context of ABAP CDS views, developers now have the possibility to create so-called CDS view extensions which allow the extension of the existing SELECT list in modification-free manner.

One or more view extensions can be created for a CDS view, with each of them having its own CDS source code. The SELECT list of the view extension can have all elements of a SELECT list with the exception of input parameters, path expressions, and aggregate expressions. A field cannot be defined as key field using the keyword KEY in the view extensions.

Watch the compact video tutorial below and learn how to create CDS view enhancements and call the enhanced CDS views in ABAP.

Note that currently following views cannot be enhanced using CDS view extensions:

• CDS views with an explicit name list
• CDS views with a  GROUP BY clause
• CDS views with a UNION clause for union sets

Find more detailed information on this topic in the ABAP Keyword Documentation.