Personas 3.0 SP02: F4 help (search table) does not work

[Former Member]

Hi Personas 3.0 experts,

I added a "F4 Help" control on UI, and did the followings (according to the knowledgebase doc), but when I click the F4 icon, I did not see the table column content for selection.

Steps to add F4 Help:

1. In admin, added F4 whitelist for a table "DEVACCESS" which has two columns, "UNAME" and "ACCESSKEY".

    table: DEVACCESS. Field: UNAME, Count: 10

2. in UI editing, set Table and Field to "UNAME".

Error: in UI click teh F4 Help - nothing pop out.

Anyone can help? Thanks.

Dong Zhu

[tamas_hoznek · Accepted solution]

Neither field has a search help attached in DDIC, so what kind of F4 help would you expect?

[Former Member · Accepted solution]

I am doing what stated in the knowledge base doc - add a F4 Help for a new text field. I want to have a text field where user preses F4 to get to a pre-set db table for selection.

I expected when I press F4 for that field, there will popout a selection table column, eg, column UNAME of table DEVACCESS, which I have F4 Whitelisted in admin. But nothing happened. Do you see why? Thanks.

Dong

[tamas_hoznek · Accepted solution]

Well, the problem is exactly the lack of pre-set DB table. The DEVACCESS-UNAME field is not associated with a search help and has no foreign key, so it has no idea where the value list should come from. It will not automatically list the content of the table it belongs to.

You'd have to create a new Z data element, define a search help which refers to the DEVACCESS table and UNAME field, and associate it with your new data element. Then you could add a field to the /PERSONAS/SEARCHHELP structure (Create Help INCLUDE function in the Admin transaction) referencing this new data element and whitelist this field. Essentially what the last part of the KB article says, except you'd have to create your own search help instead of using an existing one.

[Former Member · Accepted solution]

Hi Tamas,

Thanks very much for the clarification.

Here are what I basically want to achieve: I want to have an input text field on UI with a F4 help, so when users click the text field and click the F4 icon, it can search for contents from an own data table (ie developer created table) or from an extsting "standard" table (eg DEVACCESS). The table used in KB's article does not exist in my system, why I was thinking to use an existing table DEVACCESS in my test. Now I can see there are more to do to define the searching than what mentioned in the article.

Can you or someone else add more detailed steps of how to create a new table and how to define the search help so it can be "visible" in personas? I think there might be some people like me who do not have very deep knowledge of SAP backend and who will need the same help info.

As this F4 Help can be a practical feature needed in many apps, where users need customised search help from any types of table.

Appreciated!

Dong Zhu

[tamas_hoznek · Accepted solution]

OK.

Follow these steps:

1. Create a new search help in the Data Dictionary (SE11). Let's call it ZZ_DEV_USERS. Specify data selection method DEVACCESS, dialog type 'Display values immediately' and search help parameter UNAME. Check the Exp box, and enter 1 as LPos and SPos, then activate it. If you now test this search help, you will get a list of the user names in table DEVACCESS.

2. Create a new data element in the Data Dictionary. Enter a name (it can be again ZZ_DEV_USERS) in Data Type, hit create and specify domain CHAR12. Then go to the tab Further Characteristics and add the name of the search help you just created, with parameter UNAME. Activate this.

3. Now we need a structure (or table) field using this new data element. There is none yet, so this is where we will use the search help INCLUDE feature in the Personas Admin transaction. Navigate to Goto -> Whitelists - Create help INCLUDE. Add a new component (for instance DEVUSERS) and specify Types ZZ_DEV_USERS. Activate the structure CI_PERSONAS_HELP that you just created or enhanced. Now you have a reference to the search help you want to use.

4. In the Personas Admin transaction, select Goto -> Whitelists -> F4 Help Whitelist. Add a new entry with table name /PERSONAS/SEARCHHELP and field name DEVUSERS. Save this.

If you now add a new F4 Help field to your flavor, you can select the new field reference /PERSONAS/SEARCHHELP - DEVUSERS from the list and this will activate the search help you wanted.

[Former Member · Accepted solution]

Hi Tamas,

Thanks so much, your last answer works fine!

See pic below. Set to Answered. /br   Dong

[Former Member]

Just to give verifying info:

Tried another existing table that has 'search help' implemented in backend, the main task to do is just F4 white list. It works on Personas UI.

Br,

Dong