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About the Author
I am a Product Owner for SAP PLM Process Industries, helping customers and defining requirements towards the development team.
Related blog posts
Part 1 – Basic concept
Part 2 – Layouts, per stream calculation, not maintained data and nutrients
Part 3 – Composition, Cost, Intra-formula contribution calculations, losses
Part 4 – Scaling, exporting, PO limits, Energy based contribution
Functional Details
In my previous blog I introduced the Contribution View concept on high level. In this post I will go into the details and explain the most important features like layouts, per stream calculations, not maintained data and nutrients.
1.1 Layouts as configuration
One of the most important elements on the screen.
Suggestion: This should be your first thing to maintain when opening the Contribution view for the first time. Why? Because it defines what information you see on the view, and you can also set some parameters for the different functions. See here a video about layouts:
How to use Layouts (Source SAP)
The following picture shows the layout control buttons.
Layout Controls (Source SAP)
Layouts are always user-specific and not recipe object specific. You can create multiple layouts based on your needs. You can select one layout as a default, and this will be applied every time when you come to the Contribution view for any kind of recipe. Different layouts can be selected via the Layout dropdown.
After clicking on Edit/Create Layout, button the following popup appears :
Layout Configuration (Source SAP)
The most important section here is the Column Selection section. Main elements are:
- Category selection: Acts as a filter over "available columns” table
- Available Columns: Shows the columns available for adding to the layout. Grey columns are already added to the layout.
- Selected Columns: Shows the columns that will be visible. Fixing (freezing) the columns and ordering them are also possible here.
- Reference Quantity section: Parameters for the contribution calculation. Will be discussed later.
1.1.1 Category selection
Available columns to be selected for your layout are organized into the following categories:
Column Categories (Source SAP)
Each category selection contains different columns that appear in the "Available Columns” section.
1.1.1.1 Basic columns
Very basic modifiable columns (e.g Quantity, UOM, Formula item). Be aware that the "Formula Item” column is a special one as each layout shall contain this column as its first column. This column is not removable from the layout.Also intra-formula calculation related columns are visible here for selection (see picture).
Basic columns (Source SAP)
1.1.1.2 Costs
Calculated price shows the cost contribution values per ingredient and the Price ID shows the source of the price (Manual, from Material, from Specification).
Cost columns (Source SAP)
Cost Contribution (Source SAP)
Price ID sources can be changed on the cost calculation tab.
1.1.1.3 Nutrient Loss Calculation
Most complex one. This shows all the nutrients.
Nutrient loss Calculation columns (Source SAP)
Further filter introduced via nutrient group selection.
Calculation results – Show Notifications on Data Quality:
If you enable this, the system will give you information whether a value somewhere is missing so the calculated result can't be precise. This is indicated on the UI via warning signs:
Warnings (Source SAP)
More about this in the "Not maintained data" chapter.
Calculation Results - Show Nutrient Loss Values:
You can switch on or off the loss profile selection and visibility on the UI.
Loss rows (Source SAP)
1.1.1.4 Composition
Used to add standard composition items to the layout.
Composition columns (Source SAP)
Current Recipe Composition:
If you select this, then the system will check which items are calculated for the actual recipe and gives the selection possibility just for those.
Search in All Substances:
You can freely select any substance based on specification type:
Substances (Source SAP)
1.1.2 Reference quantity settings on Layout
Important settings that need a bit of explanation. Most important to mention here is that you have the freedom to select a different reference quantity for your nutrient and cost calculation. Also you can use energy as reference quantity for the nutrient calculation.
Reference quantity configuration (Source SAP)
Nutrients Reference Quantity: Used for nutrient contribution calculation. Represents the quantity of the Primary Output. Note that for energy-based reference quantity you have to select an energy dimension related UOM.
Reference Energy: To enable this dropdown first you have to select an UOM that belongs to energy-based dimension for "Nutrient Reference Quantity” as UOM e.g J, KCAL, KJ. After that in the dropdown you can select a derived nutrient (available in the system) that represents your energy calculation. Please be aware that at least one derived nutrient related energy calculation logic shall be in place beforehand to enable the consumption of that calculation logic.
Cost reference Quantity: Used for cost contribution calculation. Represents the quantity of the Primary Output.
1.2 Per Stream Calculation
You also have the possibility to check your contribution calculation values based on streams. This option is always there on the main UI:
Per stream switch (Source SAP)
After selecting the per stream option, all values are recalculated according to the streams in your recipe.
1.3 Not maintained data
Contribution calculation uses the values maintained in the ingredient or input item specifications. If the relevant entries are not maintained in the specification, then calculations don’t necessarily show the right values in the contribution view. To avoid such data quality problems, the system can help end users to identify these problems by showing warning signs in the cells, indicating that some values might not be precise.
Possible not precise calculation (Source SAP)
To use this feature for nutrient calculation values, the logic uses the so-called exception values for the nutrient calculations.
Note: Please make sure that at your company nutrient calculation related exception values are not configured and used for any other use case.
In practice this shall work the following way: by default if a value is not maintained in the ingredient/input item specification, then a default “not maintained” exception value is associated to that field. In case the value becomes maintained, then the respective exception value has to change to something else (depending on system configuration). Now nutrient contribution calculation checks this on each level.
Of course this behavior needs to be configured in the system. Here are the steps how to do it (please note that this activity can be done by a System Administrator role as it is a customizing change).
In the Recipe Calculations customizing for the “Hierarchical Nutrient Composition” calculation, the “Leave Blanks” checkbox has to be set.
Blank values (Source SAP)
Default exception value shall be the “not maintained” one. This shall be configured in the Default exception value customizing
Default exception value (Source SAP)
Priority settings (Source SAP)
Once you have the proper customizing set, you can turn on/off the function in the layout settings (see related chapter 1.1.1.3 - Nutrient Loss Calculation).
1.4 Dealing with nutrients
In this section I will describe how to handle nutrient contribution calculation. The Contribution calculation uses the standard “Hierarchical Nutrient Calculation”, which means that the relevant composition properties (Hier. Nutrient Composition) needs to be maintained in the Ingredient/input specification for proper functioning.
Nutrient Contribution (Source SAP)
You can see that for each nutrient column the base unit of measure is given in brackets in the respective column header. Following functionalities can be used in connection with Nutrient calculation on the contribution view:
- Adjust Reference quantity for nutrients (in layout settings)
- Switch between per PO and per Stream view (table dropdown)
- toggle "data quality info" for nutrients (via layout)
- toggle "nutrient losses" functionalities (via layout)
- Nutrient limits check from PO
Nutrient contribution calculation by default considers the hierarchical nutrient losses in it's calculated values.
Here is a quick video about the above mentioned functionalities:
How Nutrient Contribution works (Source SAP)
Next time Cost, Composition and Intra-formula contribution calculations as well as losses will be detailed out. Stay tuned.
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