Delete obsolete combinations in /SAPAPO/MC62 - how to use?

Question

Hello SAP-experts,
We are using SAP APO Demand planning SAP SCM 7.0 with SP 15 for most of components.
I have some questions related to the button "delete obsolete combinations" in TA /SAPAPO/MC62. We want to use option "list combinations without planning data" to reduce CVC's quantity. What I have read it checks for CVC's without any entries at key figures. It sounds useful, but it doesn't seem to work in our company for some reason.
1. Where exactly does system check if there are key figures for the selected CVC's? In livecache directly? Or in an internal generated info cube for the planning area? Is it possible to view these key figures (on same base as done from system with option "list combinations without planning data") before using the deletion? Is there a report / table to do so? What's the best practise for this check (maybe on daily base)?
2. I have (some) CVC's without any key figure filled (for my opinion...). At the moment I check this with an info cube used for daily backup (means I see always the data from last night and I know that noone changed data because of blocked planning access). But it isn't found with "list combinations without planning data". When displaying the data in this backup-cube all key figures are shown as zero (the one which are shown for deletion and in same way the cvc's which are not shown). In the key figure settings "differentiation between zero and initial value" is not marked... I think this is correct, but maybe I have a misunderstanding here... any ideas about this setting? I don't believe this setting is wrong, because it shows me some CVC's to be deleted, but some of them are not shown (the setting should work for all cvc's in same way...?).
All ideas are most welcome, thank you all in advance!
Best regards
Harald Leissl

Answer 1

Hello Ali,
thank you for your reply!
My plan was to use standard tool, because it's available since some releases. I don't prefer to implement own programming instead of using an existing tool (talking about the built ABAP tool, the idea with alert makro sounds good).
Is the standard tool effective??? Good question. We talk about 2 steps.
If the mentioned function "delete obsolete" would work like designed (maybe it does, but I don't understand how...) it would do 2 steps combined:
- find out obsolete CVC's (your alert makro)
- delete obsolete CVC's (your ABAP tool)
Combining these 2 steps would be really effective, but it doesn't work for some reason. My estimation is that standard is not effective, because complete process of deletions of CVC's is very slow and causes sometimes performance trouble.
But this is the reason why I search for a standard tool to run periodically (maybe each week) for a check of "old" CVC's. I think our problem of slow running deletions is caused by too many CVC's in an planning object structure (together with the fact that our CVC's have a lot of key figures / characteristics).
To be honest my main task is to find the best possibility to delete a list of completely different CVC's (no unique selection possible). I tested a lot of things found in SCN (realignment, background deletion,...), but all the solutions have s lack in performance (at least in our system...).
Regards
Harald