# Variant Management

## Key Features

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Besides the standard features, Variant management provides the following functionality:

### Managing Variant Wildcards

A variant wildcard is an "item" which is replaced by an item variant during order creation (Derivation).

The variant wildcard is defined and edited in Variant management. It is assigned a table with the individual item variants, the so-called Variant form. In addition, information regarding the specific features (attributes) of the item variants is specified in the variant wildcard (e.g. the color of an ornamental ring of a ball pen).

Although the variant wildcard is defined and edited in Variant management, it is also used in Item management as an item. This is because the bill of material is defined in Item management. In order to create a Variant BOM, the variant wildcard must be inserted into the BOM structure of a parent item.

In Item management, variant wildcards can be recognized by the VAR flag set in the Variant field.

### Orders and their Derivation

In order to use items, item structures and their variants within production it is necessary to create an order, i.e. it must be derived. This order may contain several items and item structures and it is used to specify the variants to be used as well as the required number of an item. Besides variants and default variants the derivation also uses Structures (identical items) and Optional and Parameterized BOM items.

Orders can be created using either Variant management or the workflow.

### Default Variant

Default variants can be used to select the most frequently used variants from many variation possibilities.

During order creation (derivation) of the bill of material one of these default variants can then be selected, and Agile e6 assigns the items required for this default variant to the variant wildcard. Furthermore, it is still possible to derive the bill of material without a default variant. In addition, also combinations are possible, i.e. only some of the variant wildcards are defined as default variants; the other variant wildcards can be derived manually.

### Matrix List

The Matrix list is a structure overview of the item variants entered in the variant form, which have been assigned to the variant wildcard. The Matrix list cannot be changed. Changes to the structure as well as item changes must be performed from within Item management.

### Automatic and Semi-automatic Derivation Using Decision Tables

Derivations by means of decision tables simplify the creation of a concrete bills of material, especially in case of large bills of material which use many variant wildcards. The decision tables must be created in LogiView. Upon creation of the order it is then created either completely automatic or with additional required manual user inputs.