Beginners Guide To ABAP – Module 2 – Data Dictionary – Create A Table Part 1
In this lesson we are going to start creating our first SAP table. With your SAP GUI open and logged in, the first thing we’re going to do is find the Data Dictionary in the SAP menu.
Expand the Tools menu and choose the ABAP Workbench. Under the Development option you will see SE11 – ABAP Dictionary. Double click it, and you’ll then be presented with the first screen for the ABAP Dictionary.
Let’s go through the different options that we see on the screen.
- The first one we see is Database tables. This is where we can enter an existing table name and view the technical components of any SAP table.
- Then we have Views. A View is similar to a table but it does not contain data. It brings together fields from 1 or more other tables by defining relationships between fields of these tables.
- Then we have Data types. Data types are what can make up our database tables, and we’ll have a look at those soon.
- The other options available are Type groups, Domains, Search help and Lock objects.
Let’s focus on creating a table, first of all. So, what we want to do is click on the Database table option and we will focus on creating a transparent table. There are other types of tables such as Cluster Tables and Pool Tables, but you don’t need to concern yourself with those just now.
When you create a transparent table you need to ensure the table name adheres to the customer-defined name space. This means we need to start our tables with the letter Z or the letter Y. Most commonly, you’ll see the letter Z being used.
