Remote Keys for Multiple Systems

[Former Member]

I am working on an SRM project where we have internal catalogs items (from ECC) and external catalog items (from Excel files) going into an MDM Catalog repository. For both, we use a lookup table for the Supplier number to cross-ref to a supplier name.

We have a Supplier List message that runs from ECC to MDMCAT to populate this table. In doing so, it creates a key mapping for the ECC remote system...which gets used for cross-referencing supplier names when catalog items load.

The issue...we do not have such a Supplier List from the external catalog "remote system", so when external catalog items get loaded there is no supplier number/name cross-ref happening. I can manually create key mappings for the external remote system, but I want to automate it.

I am thinking about having our PI middleware make a copy of the ECC Supplier Lists and send them to a new port set up as the external remote system...thinking that this would generated extenal system keys...hopefully without duplicating supplier lookup records. Before proceeding, I wanted to throw this out to see if there is a better solution.

Any suggestions?

Thanks,

Keith

[michael_theis · Accepted solution]

Hi Keith,

some remarks:

if you send data from ECC to MDMCAT, the catalog items contain the supplier keys of the ECC system. That's why the import works automatically. If you want to reuse the ECC supplier keys, the first question to answer is: does your external system use exactly the SAME keys as ECC? Only if this is the case, duplicating the ECC supplier message works for you. Otherwise you'd create keys for your external system that are never sent by the external system.

If the external system uses the same keys as ECC, the next question is how often do you update the supplier list in MDM? Regularly? Only once? If regularly your option with PI is a good idea. This won't duplicate supplier records as Import Manager (or MDIS) is able to identify already existing suppliers and updates the remote keys only (anyways you should check the related import map!). If it's a one time action only, you can re-open the same file multiple times for different remote systems with Import Manager. Then you wouldn't have to configure an additional connection from PI to MDM.

Best regards

Michael

[Former Member]

keith,

How about cloning the ECC Supplier list and concatenating with some unique id which helps to map External catalog items and load it.

kiindly clarify what would be the key field while loading the external catalog items.

thanks

alexander

[Former Member]

Key Field is "Supplier Number"

If I clone within the map tied to the port for ECC, is there a way to make the remote system part of a second key mapping be for my external system?

For example:

want to end up with...

Supplier Name Remote System Key

Acme ECC 123

Acme EXTERNAL 123

[michael_theis]

> If I clone within the map tied to the port for ECC, is there a way to make the remote system part of a second key mapping be for my external system?

No, remote keys are only created/updated for the current remote system that has to be selected before the import (respectively defined as part of the MDM Port). You cannot write key mapping for multiple remote systems in a single import.

[Former Member]

Thank you!

The supplier numbers apply to both systems and the changes will be ongoing. I will proceed with the PI solution.