SAP Basis

ADM100 Lesson: Accessing Archived Data
archiving object. They are used to read the archived data objects in
accordance with the selection criteria and to display it in a suitable format
for the user. In general, two types of access or display are used:
• Sequential access
• Direct access
Sequential (reading) access is the simplest form of access to archived data.
With this type of access, the read program first open the archive files from
an archiving run sequentially, read the contents of all data objects, and lists
the data that meets the entered selection criteria sequentially. You can use
this method, for example, to list all data objects for a particular posting
period or for a particular document number group.
Direct access to individual archived data objects, such as an order or
billing document can only be achieved using an index table. The data
object to be displayed is first selected in the index table using search terms.
If this is successfully achieved, the archivefilethatcontainsthedataobject
concerned is localized and opened using the index. The read program
can now directly access and display the data object for which you have
searched. This type of direct access is relatively costly from a technical
point of view, and is therefore only offered by a small number of archiving
objects, such as FI_DOCUMNT.
Hint: A simple option for system administrators to obtain read
access to archived data is to enter the relevant archiving object on
the initial screen of transaction SARA and to choose Read.
The SAP Archive Information System provides significantly more
extensive and easier to use functions for quick direct access to archived
data objects.
SAP Archive Information System
Start point for using the SAP Archive Information System: If a user
wants to display archived customer order 5000, he or she can display
it using evaluation programs for the relevant archiving object (in this
case: SD_VBAK). In this case, the archive data that he or she selects, is
sequentially searched. There is no solution for displaying the data in the
original transaction for order data (in this case, comparable to the display
of FI_DOCUMNT in transaction FB03 in an SAP R/3 system). However, a
general, generic solution for displaying a document directly is required.
It was against this background that theSAPArchiveInformationSystem
was developed.
2003/Q3 © 2003 SAP AG. All rights reserved. 203