R12 Federal Financials Subledger Accounting Teardown Webinar, 10-Aug, 9:00am ET
OAUG has invited me to present as part of their upcoming Best of COLLABORATE ’12 Educational Series. I’ll be delivering the R12 Federal Financials Subledger Accounting Teardown presentation via Webinar on Friday, August 10th, starting at 9AM EDT. This presentation is a deep-dive into most of the key SLA concepts that support the R12 Federal Financials SLA accounting engine. My goal is to share what I’ve learned through 1 1/2 years of supporting one of the most complex Federal R12 upgrades to-date, now live for 5+ months.
Here’s the presentation agenda:
This is free for all OAUG (www.oaug.com) members. Additional information and registration details are at: bit.ly/eEK4ck
The slides of the presentation are available under the Federal Presentations/WhitePapers tab of the blog. I’d recommend trying to take some time to review the slides before-hand, especially if you are not already familiar with SLA. I have a lot of content packed into the presentation (hey I try to make the most of your time! LoL), so if you are already somewhat familiar with the content beforehand, it will probably help you absorb more during the webinar and be able to follow specific areas of interest.
I hope you’ll be able to attend.
Read Full Post | Make a Comment ( None so far )Important R12 FV PO Commitment Accounting Attribute Assignment Updates identified in patch 13610367
Patch 13610367, released earlier this year, provided an update to the seeded Federal Purchasing AAD that is important for all R12.1 Federal PO Customers to understand, even if not using the seeded Federal SLA definitions. The AAD change included updates to a couple of the key Accounting Attribute Assignments for the FV PO Commitment JLT.
The changes were:
Accounting Attribute Assignment: Allocated to Distribution Type, changed to source: Allocated to Main Document Distribution Type
Accounting Attribute Assignment: Allocated to First Distribution Identifier, changed to source: Allocated to Main Document Distribution Identifier
The SLA configuration we’re using at my current gig is non-seeded and agency-unique but modeled after the FV.B 9000001 seeded FV SLA definitions. At first, I didn’t understand how this patch could be relevant to us, but Support and Development were suggesting it was a solution to some PO accounting issues. Upon digging deeper, I realized that the accounting assignments are a key driver in how the po_req_distributions_all.encumbered_flag/encumbered_amounts are updated upon AutoCreate.
The way these come into play is that:
1) the XLA create accounting process will leverage the specific accounting attribute assignments to drive how data is inserted into certain columns in xla_distribution_links and then,
2) the po_encumbrance_postprocessing package uses the data inserted into the specific xla_distribution_links.alloc_to_dist_id_num_1 field as a key join for going back and updating the po_req_distributions_all.encumbered_flag/encumbered_amount data.
If the accounting attribute assignments populate the xla_distribution_links.alloc_to_dist_id_num_1 with bad data, the po_req_distributions_all encumbered data is not updated properly. This causes multiple problems with other downstream PO XLA processing related to the autocreated lines, such as PO Line Unreserve/Rereserve and Cancellation actions. Also, if customers have 4700 Reconciliation analysis built off these po_req_disributions_all fields, those Recons will likely be way off.
Honestly, I was not expecting that a SLA JLT configuration such as this would be a driver in that kind of PO encumbrance functionality, but now I know and wanted to share. For anyone with custom PO Commitment JLTs in environments using Requisitions, I recommend looking hard at this to see if it helps with any issues and you’ll likely want to make these updates in your PO Commitment JLTs as well.
Read Full Post | Make a Comment ( None so far )XLA/SLA AMB Components Underlying Data Structure
For anyone dealing with R12 Subledger Accounting (SLA) configuration and troubleshooting, it can be helpful to understand how the SLA Accounting Methods Builder (AMB) Components are organized within the XLA schema of the R12 database. Here’s an Entity Relationship Diagram (ERD) I’ve put together as a tool to utilize when needing to build queries of most SLA configurations. This doesn’t encompass every type of SLA component (e.g. it doesn’t include Business Flow data), since I focused it on just the AMB Components I deal with the most, but includes the major components.
Here’s a PDF copy of it to print off: R12 Simple ERD of SLA AMB Components
In addition, here’s the SQL from a SQL Developer report I’ve developed to provide a data extract from the above which documents most SLA configs: SLA JLT and ADR Detail for AMB Components SQL.
Hope it helps..
Read Full Post | Make a Comment ( 1 so far )R12 SLA Sources Breakdown
One of the most fundamental components of the R12 Subledger Accounting Architecture (SLA) is the concept of SLA Sources. There is a good bit of documentation on many SLA components, including my prior OAUG Presentations on SLA, but good explanations of SLA sources are a bit harder to find. So I thought I’d take a shot at helping spread better understanding with this post.
SLA Source values play critical roles in XLA event processing and R12 GL journal creation such as:
- fundamental data elements that drive how Journal Line Type (JLT) and Account Derivation Rules (ADR) are selected through the use of Sources in JLT and ADR conditions
- fundamental data elements which are assigned as XLA Accounting Attributes (e.g. the value of the accounted_amount) to the JLTs
- often used in XLA Journal Line descriptions defined
To really understand why the XLA engine selects applicable JLTs/ADRs and how the accounting attributes are derived, a solid comprehension of what’s behind SLA sources is key. At the most basic level, Sources are (more…)
Read Full Post | Make a Comment ( 7 so far )Be aware of R12 Data Model changes to properly assess R12 upgrade rework
Any entity upgrading to R12 should sufficiently understand the data model changes between 11i and R12. Based on an entities’ dependence on the existing 11i data models that change, there can be a significant level of rework required to ensure that existing custom RDF/BI Pubisher Reports, Discoverer Reports, outbound interfaces, custom views, custom SQL & PL/SQL, etc. will function properly in the R12 environment. Analysis of custom objects relative to the data model changes can’t just be limited to whether objects will compile or run in R12, but should also include analysis of whether the proper data is returned from both upgraded 11i transactions and new transactions generated in R12. To properly plan and allocate resources to an R12 upgrade project, the impact of these changes to an entity should be thoroughly analyzed.
For example, in my years working in the Federal Financials space, I’ve seen a fairly heavy reliance on the gl_je_lines.referenceX (journal import references) columns for creating custom reports that provide subsidiary information (e.g. PO Number, Vendor, etc.) and gl information together. I’ve seen reports/interfaces often built from gl_je_lines up to best ensure the detail reports balance with trial balance amounts. In R12, the gl_je_lines.referenceX columns are no longer populated or are populated in a different manner. Thus any custom report, interface, etc. that leverages these fields will likely have to be reworked (or overall approach addressed) to continue to meet end-user requirements. The R12 GL -> Subsidiary drilldown path now runs through gl_import_references and a new suite of XLA tables as shown in this diagram.
An additional problem that confronts Federal Financials customers with this change is (more…)
Read Full Post | Make a Comment ( 2 so far )Taking the edge off implementing SLA…
Are you struggling w/SLA burnout?? Looking for something to fill the time during a potential government shutdown??
Fully understanding and implementing SLA for Federal Financials continues to be quite a challenge in a current upgrade I’m working on. This is especially true when trying to ensure all the proper Upward/Downward accounting is properly done, but at the same time ensuring the PYA adjustments are not overstated as part of document revisions.
So, we thought we’d have a little fun and honor Colorado’s Microbrewing heritage with a nice new little home-brewed special for our team to help us enjoy our breaks away from the SLA grind.
I present: SLA Insanity.
Enjoy the pic…
New R12 CGAC & FV Consolidated Patches, Good, But…
Federal Development released a patch (9307787) for R12 in late December that provides a number of Federal Financials enhancements focused on better accommodating the OMB Common Government Accounting Classification (CGAC) attributes. The most obvious enhancements included are changes to the Treasury Symbols forms and related functionality. There is certainly more to the changes and a comprehensive document on the enhancements provided is available as MOS Note: 1277072.1.
These enhancements have been released for R12 Fed Financials only and the patch is currently in a controlled status for the 12.1 release. I’ve been focused on a Federal 12.1.3 upgrade for the last few months and we made the decision to start trying out the new CGAC patch in January. We ran into a few different issues resulting from the patch, but have been able to resolve them through a variety of additional patches, including the just released FV Consolidated patch 9000001 (also in a controlled status). Some of our issues with the CGAC patch were due to invalid object conditions caused by some FV objects (views, PL/SQL packages, etc.) getting out of sync with each other. The goal of this latest FV Consolidated patch is focused on providing the latest and greatest set of compatible FV objects. We are continuing to test, but our initial experience with the 9000001 patch on top of 9307787 has been positive, with the exception of having to rework a variety of our different Subledger Accounting (SLA) configurations a bit to deal with some changes. If looking at the CGAC patch, any agency will almost certainly need to go to the 9000001 patch as well.
Moving forward to uptake new enhancements is usually always a good thing, but due to the sensitivity and complexity of the R12 Federal SLA functionality, we must be a bit more careful with patching at this point in R12 than we might have been w/11i recently.
We’re used to (more…)
Read Full Post | Make a Comment ( None so far )Goodbye T-Codes! An Intro to R12 Subledger Accounting (SLA) for Federal Financials
I thought it would be appropriate to upload the presentation I gave with Cary Payne (i360 Technologies) at the Collaborate ’08 FEDSIG meeting in Denver. The presentation’s goal was to provide an introduction to SLA Concepts, Capabilities and Terminology with a focus on relevant topics to Federal Financials customers. We presented how R12 Subledger Architecture allows us to finally improve accounting processes & accuracy through retiring the the old USSGL Transaction Code model. Its important to note that implementing SLA is required for Federal Financials customers upgrading to R12 as USSGL Transaction Codes are no longer an option for accounting events. And from my perspective, that’s definitely a good thing!
The presentation agenda is comprised of:
- SLA Basic Terminology and Benefits to Federal Financials
- Accounting Methods Builder (AMB) Components
- Demonstration (sorry you missed the live version, but screen shots are included in the presentation)
- Standard SLA Reports and Reconciliation Tools
- Secondary Ledgers
- Other SLA and AMB Components/Features
- Implementing SLA
- Additional Resources
There’s a lot to SLA and the hardest part for me was figuring out where to start in trying to understand it. Once the pieces of the concepts fall into place, its not too bad. Please see the click the link to view the presentation and I hope it provides a valuable introduction to these concepts. It was a great experience to figure it out and I hope others can benefit.
r12-sla-oaugcollaborate08-fedsig-baugh_final
Read Full Post | Make a Comment ( 4 so far )
Oracle Federal Applications 