International Editable SALV Day 2025...

[hardyp180]

International Editable SALV Day 2025 – Year 17

Dear CL_SALV_TABLE Fans,

Welcome to February 8th, 2025, which is the seventeenth International Editable SALV Day. See below for a link to a blog I wrote to celebrate this day exactly one year ago.

https://community.sap.com/t5/technology-blogs-by-members/international-editable-salv-day-2024-year-1...

This day marks the 17h anniversary of James Hawthorne going cap in hand to SAP and suggesting maybe the CL_SALV_TABLE could be brought up to functional parity with the CL_GUI_ALV_GRID and have an option to be editable.

https://community.sap.com/t5/application-development-discussions/cl-salv-table-needs-editable-functi...

Each year it gets more difficult to write this blog because there is never anything new to say.

In the UK we have the saying “banging you head against a brick wall” which alludes to doing something repeatedly which can have no chance if success, but you do it anyway, because you are so frustrated.

In VIZ comic there was once a character called “Sammy Smalls – he runs into Walls!” who said, “Like a rocket round the sun, look at wall, here I come!” and the ran into the wall at top speed. The wall was 100% undamaged, he was not.

Now, just to make this even more futile I am posting this on the SAP Community Website – which no-one ever visits anymore.

The SAP GUI is not going anywhere. You may have noticed SAP just extended the life of ECC 6.0 by three more years, albeit with conditions. And even when an organization goes onto S/4HANA often they still use the SAP GUI because people like it. They have moaned about it non-stop for thirty years, but they like it really.

It has been argued that Fiori apps which have one single purpose are the way forward, but in real life end users tend to like SAP GUI applications with then million buttons. You can pretend that is not true, but you would be lying to yourself. Take Excel or Word for example and look at how many options they have.

Now, I am just going to repeat what I said last year, word for word.

It is as simple as this.

• You get asked to write a read-only ALV report.
• It is faster and simpler to do this using CL_SALV_TABLE than CL_GUI_ALV_GRID because you do not have to mess around with screens and controls and what-not.
• Indeed, SAP recommend using CL_SALV_TABLE for all new developments of this nature.
• The report goes live. The users start asking for extra things, as always.
• They want some custom functions at the top of the screen.
• They want to be able to change some of the fields and have that replicate to the database.
• Well, you are right out of luck. You cannot do either with CL_SALV_TABLE.
• There are workarounds for both, but they are scary, because SAP keeps finding ways to shut those workarounds down, so such an approach is not future proof.
• The only viable option is to start again, this time using CL_GUI_ALV_GRID.
• Then the next time you get a request for a “read-only” report the “once bitten twice shy” thing kicks in and you start with CL_GUI_ALV_GRID from the get-go.

I like CL_SALV_TABLE and so do a lot of SAP developers. But everyone likes having the editability feature a lot more. But it’s never going to happen. As has been mentioned you would think that if 100% of your customers want something you might consider giving it to them, but obviously not.

Very soon – maybe already - we will get to the stage some people reading this blog will be younger than the age of the request to make the SALV editable. Since the SAP GUI is not going anywhere (evidenced by the huge amount of development money pumped into every year by SAP) it is possible I will die of old age before the request is actioned. I am 56 already.

Nevertheless, I will keep going. Miracles can happen.

Until then the situation is “Oi you 31,000 SAP ERP Customers! You see this? You like this? You want this? Well, you can’t have it!”

See you next year!

Cheersy Cheers

Paul