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Security Rules

Oracle Order Entry/Shipping adapts to your order maintenance policies. You can specify the steps in your order processing when you no longer allow users to make changes to orders and returns. You can use Oracle Order Entry/Shipping's predefined security rules, which provide the minimum limits to maintain data integrity, or define your own, stricter rules to reflect your order maintenance policies.

Seeded Security Rule

Oracle Order Entry/Shipping provides seeded security rules that prevent loss of data integrity as information is interfaced to other applications, such as Oracle Inventory or Oracle Receivables. The seeded rules generally allow for changes to information not interfaced to other applications until the order is closed.

Conditional Logic

You can define security rules using And-Or conditional logic. For example, the security rule may prevent changes to ship to customer when the order line has reached Pick Release (for shippable order lines) or the Receivables Interface (for non-shippable order lines).

Security Rule Definition

You can define security rules for objects or attributes. Objects include regions on the Sales Orders and Returns windows, such as Order, Line, Option, Return, Return Line, and so on. Attributes include individual fields (of a particular object), such as Warehouse, Ship To Location, or Agreement. These are the same objects and attributes you use when defining standard value rule sets for order entry.

A security rule is made up of the following components:

Update security rules also contain the following component:

Select an Operation

You can define security rules to prevent users from performing the operations of Cancel, Insert, Delete, and Update on your orders and returns. You can prevent Cancel, Insert, and Delete on objects. You can prevent Update on attributes. As a data entry tool, you can effectively assign a general Update rule to all attributes associated with a particular object. See: Defining Security Rules

Identify an Object

You need to set up rules for all objects, such as Lines, Line Schedule Details, Shipment Schedule Lines, Option Price Adjustments, and so on.

Apply Conditional Number Logic

Each security rule line has a number that indicates whether the condition is independent of all other conditions, or whether it should only be considered when another condition is also true. Use this number to create And and Or conditions. You create an And condition by using the same number in this field for each row in the condition, or an Or condition by using a different number in this field for each row. Conditions with the same number must both be true for the security rule to apply. For conditions with different numbers, at least one must be true for the security rule to apply. You can create several And conditions and Or conditions for one object or attribute.

Attention: Oracle Order Entry/Shipping does not allow you to enter a number equal to any number already used in the Number field of a predefined security rule. This would, in effect, create an And statement with a System security rule, and could endanger data integrity.

Assign Conditions

The condition of your security rule is like an If-Then statement. Oracle Order Entry/Shipping checks for occurrences of the condition in your rule while users are cancelling, deleting, inserting, and updating orders and returns. When the condition(s) of a security rule are met, Oracle Order Entry/Shipping prevents the operation of that rule.

Modifier

You can use a modifier in the condition of a security rule to define a negative condition. For example: If Backorder Release is Not Eligible, then prevent the operation of Cancel (see example below). This rule would prevent users from canceling the object of the rule if the cycle action result of Backorder Release were anything but Eligible (or Not Applicable).

Attention: The result of Not Applicable is ignored by Security Rules, unless specifically stated in the rule.

Name

The Name of the condition can be any one of the following:

ATO Component Prevent operation when a user enters an order line for an ATO (assemble-to-order) component.
ATO Configuration Item Prevent operation when Oracle Work in Process has created an ATO configuration item for an ATO model or item.
ATO Model Prevent operation when a user enters an order line for an ATO model.
Cycle Status Prevent operation when an order, return, order line or return line has achieved a particular cycle status. If you choose this option you must enter a cycle action in the Action field. Choose appropriate cycle actions for orders or returns, depending on the object you are defining rules for.
Internal Sales Order Prevent operation if the order is an internal sales order imported from Oracle Purchasing.
Line Closed Prevent operation if the order line or return line is closed.
Order Closed Prevent operation if the order or return is closed.
Prorated Prices Exist Prevent operation if prorated discounts were used on the order and at least one order line has interfaced to Receivables.
Schedule Group Prevent operation if the order line is in a schedule group. A schedule group can be all the lines in a ship set, in an ATO configuration, or in a Ship Together model (a configuration with the top model's Ship Model Complete inventory item attribute set to Yes).
Scheduling Exists Prevent operation if the items on the order line have been demanded or reserved.
Supply Reservation Exists Prevent operation if the item on the order line has a work order opened, and the schedule status for the line is Supply Reserved. When Work in Process completes the work order and changes the status to Reserved, this condition no longer applies.

Attention: Only the Order Closed, Line Closed and Cycle Status conditions are appropriate for objects related to returns.

If you choose to define a Cycle Status condition, you can indicate at what cycle action a rule should take effect. You can even be as specific as the cycle action result. Instead of using the Cycle Status option, you can state a condition to apply the security rule when an order or order line is closed. If prorated prices or another special situation exists on an order, you can specify a different condition for an object or attribute for the security rule to take effect.

Attention: Order Closed is equivalent to Cycle Status - Complete Order - Closed, and Line Closed is equivalent to Cycle Status - Complete Line - Closed.

Scope

Scope indicates whether you want Oracle Order Entry/Shipping to evaluate the condition of the rule against any other objects in addition to the rule's object before you allow modification to the original object. A condition holds true if any line within the scope meets the condition. For example, suppose Rule A is for Line objects and has a scope of Shipment Schedule. When you try to modify an order line, Oracle Order Entry/Shipping checks to see if the condition of Rule A holds true for the order line and its shipment schedule lines. If any of these lines satisfy the condition of Rule A, then the modification is prevented. Rule A has no effect when you try to modify the shipment schedule lines themselves.

Consider the following example for defining Oracle Order Entry/Shipping security rules.

Define Security Rules Example

The Order Entry/Shipping Super User at Fremont Manufacturing wants to prevent the addition of a new order line if any lines on an order have been approved for the custom line level approval action, Legal Review. The appropriate security rule would prevent insertion of lines that have a cycle status of Legal Review - Pass, on the scope of the order. Refer to Table 1 - 11 for the values to be entered in the Security Rules window for this example.

Security Rules Example
Object: Line
Operation: Insert
Number Name Action Result Scope
1 Cycle Status Legal Review Pass Order
Table 1 - 11. (Page 1 of 1)

Special Considerations

Rules That Cannot Apply

If you define a rule for Insert on an object where the condition would be applicable on the same existing object, the rule will never apply. If the condition only occurs for existing objects, but they are already inserted, the rule cannot be enforced. For example, a rule for Insert on a Line where the condition is Cycle Status - Pick Release is unenforceable because a line is already inserted if that condition exists.

Rules Must Be in Cooperative at Various Object Levels

Oracle Order Entry/Shipping evaluates security rules for an object when you are trying to perform an action on that object. If you have a security rule on a lower level object (such as Line) and you try to perform an operation on the higher level object (such as Order), the Line level rule is not evaluated. Therefore, when defining your security rules, you need to make sure that your higher level object rules cooperate with your lower level object rules such that all levels are synchronized. For example, if you have a rule for the Line object on the operation of Delete, you should define a comparable rule for the Order object so that you can cover all delete situations.

Cancel Orders Window Security Rules

The Cancel Orders window enforces some security rules that are not predefined using the Security Rules window. For example, the Cancel Orders window prevents you from cancelling order line quantities that have been shipped or invoiced, and from cancelling return line quantities that have been received or credited. The Cancel Orders window honors security rules that you define for the Cancel operation that are stricter than these rules, but if you define any that conflict with these rules, they will be ignored.

Security Rules Usage

As you use Oracle Order Entry/Shipping, security rules are evaluated for any object you try to cancel, delete, insert, or update. If you are trying to modify an order line, Oracle Order Entry/Shipping evaluates the security rules for the Line object. If you are trying to modify a Shipment Schedule Line, Oracle Order Entry/Shipping evaluates the rules where the object is a Shipment Schedule Line.

Attention: If you change your security rules after you have entered orders and you want the security rule to affect all orders, you must define your rules, exit the application completely, then re-enter the application and attempt to perform the operation.

See Also

Defining Security Rules

Overview of Sales Orders

Overview of Returns

Cancelling Orders

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