SAP Financial Consolidation, How to log users’ updates on objects?

[Stephane_Neufcourt]

How to log users' updates on objects?

Many of you asked us how to log users’ actions on objects to answer requests from internal or external auditors. Logging users' actions on objects is a native SAP Financial Consolidation feature called “Trace Reports”. We realized this function is not that well-known, hence the following FAQ 🙂

What is the Trace reports feature?
Trace Reports enable you to track any object creation, modification and deletion that has occurred in the software.

What is the difference between the Trace reports and the Package amount trace?
The Trace reports is tracking modifications of the objects whereas the Package amount trace is tracking modifications at data level.

How can I activate the Trace reports?
In the thick client, go to Tools / General options / Trace Reports / Enable the trace report function.

Do Trace reports impact performance?
No. Unlike the Package amount trace, the Trace reports function has no impact on performance. To answer one of our customers’ request, we recently re-run benchmarks contrasting performance with vs. without Trace reports activated, with 100+ concurrent users. The results confirmed there is no performance impact when Trace reports are activated.

What objects can I track?
The Trace reports can track up to 24 objects. In the Analysis domain: reports and viewpoints. In the Operation domain: reporting organizer, RU organizer, package manager, manual journal entries, scope builder, rates and consolidation. In the Administration domain: task list, task scheduler, log, address book, site profiles, security, audit and package amount trace. In the Setup domain: dimension builder, report designer, category builder, rules, data entry restrictions, ledgers and data link definitions.

Can I select which objects I want to track?
Yes. In the “Select modules” you can track 1, several or all objects.

How can I see the Trace reports?
In the thick client, go to File / Display trace reports.


Can I export the Trace reports’ logs?
Yes. Go to File / Export trace reports; the log is exported in TXT or CSV. If you have the proper authorization, you can also export all trace reports at once.


Are there plans to further enhance Trace reports?
Yes. We plan to enhance the feature based on your ideas from the SAP Customer Influence online collaboration platform. You can check the following ideas for more insight: Selective log of single user with extensive authorization/super user (130107), Full trace log for user management required for external audit (140128) and Action history on packages (141093).

Where can I find more information?
Read our User Guide.
Read our KBA.