Moving Data - EBS Target Requirements

Often one of the primary purposes for creating a planning application in Hyperion is to transfer the budget information back into the organization's ERP system(s). One such system is Oracle's eBusiness Suite (EBS). While there are integration tools designed to help streamline the process of connecting the ERP and EPM systems, it can be very helpful to understand the process from the ground-up before wrapping it with a pretty user interface.

This series of posts will start at the target system and investigate how data is imported into the system manually. Then we will build upon that understanding to see how the layers of integration work to map the connection between the Hyperion planning application and the ERP system, allowing an automated integration between the two system. We will use the EBS ERP system for our study, but the process is the same regardless of the ERP system.

How Data Is Introduced Into EBS

There is an interface table dedicated to importing data into the EBS general ledger. This table is named GL_INTERFACE and is found in the GL schema. Oracle provides a user tool named Web ADI which allows spreadsheet or flat file data to be inserted into the interface table. Alternatively, data can be inserted into the table through program code using the API library available to manage data in an Oracle database.

Required Data Elements

While other data fields can be provided, the following data elements must be satisfied in order to insert budget data into the interface table:

Field Name	Meaning
Balance Type	Tells whether the journal is for budget, actual or encumbrance purposes.
Set of Books	Specifies the set of books to which the journals are posted.
Category	Categorizes the type of journal entry from a list of predefined categories.
Source	Specifies the source of the journal entry from a list of predefined sources.
Currency	Specifies the type of currency used.
Organization	The name of the organization (this is an EBS-specific concept).
Budget Name	The name of the budget into which this journal should be posted.
Period	The accounting period into which the journal entry should be posted.
Accounting Date	Specifies the effective date for the journal entry to be booked.
Account	The specific general ledger account code to be used for the journal entry.
Debit	The debit amount to be posted in the journal entry.
Credit	The credit amount to be posted in the journal entry.

The above data elements map to explicit columns in the interface table (GL_INTERFACE). Following is that mapping --

Field Name	GL_INTERFACE Column Name
Balance Type	ACTUAL_FLAG
Set of Books	SET_OF_BOOKS_ID
Category	USER_JE_CATEGORY_NAME
Source	USER_JE_SOURCE_NAME
Currency	CURRENCY_CODE
Organization	N/A
Budget Name	BUDGET_VERSION_ID
Period	PERIOD_NAME
Accounting Date	ACCOUNTING_DATE
Account	SEGMENT_1 through SEGMENT_n
Debit	ENTERED_DR
Credit	ENTERED_CR