Screen Titles

Screen titles are an important aid for users to find their ways through the R/3 System. The title of a window is a unique label to identify the window. It is located in the title bar, the topmost line of a primary window or dialogue box.

The title bar helps the user to identify the current screen, that is, answer the question "Where am I?". Mostly, the name of the action the user has chosen and which is currently being executed is displayed in the title bar.

In some situations, it is necessary to make reference to the preceding actions. The title should then answer the question: "Where do I come from?" or "In which higher-level action am I currently?". This way, titles contribute to an efficient navigation through the R/3 System.

Guidelines for the Individual Levels

When accessing a particular task in the R/3 System, the user has to navigate through the system hierarchy. To make this hierarchy transparent, it is especially important that you enable the user to identify the individual screens and system levels. You can do so by creating the appropriate screen titles.

The following text gives the screen titles (if only one screen exists for a particular level) and/or design guidelines and examples (if several screens exist for a level) you can use to identify the different levels of the system hierarchy.

Syntax Conventions: Variable terms which must be replaced by a full identification appear in angle brackets. Expressions in square brackets are optional. Examples are in italics.

Main Menu Level

Application Level

If the user gets to this screen by choosing options from several cascading pull-down menus, the title of the screen displays the last chosen menu option (current menu option).

To avoid ambiguities, you can also create the title of the screen from the concatenation of the higher-level menu option and the last chosen menu option.

Task Level

The title bar used to identify a task consists of three components:

1. the name of the higher-level task or object class (ObjCl, Object Class),
2. the chosen action which refers to the chosen task or the object class as a whole (Action),
3. optionally, the description of the current screen (Screen) and - in some cases - an object separated by three blanks (if identifiable), consisting of the field name and value (Object)

In an editor, this object would be the file name; for a posting document, for example, "document number 25".

If the current screen of the previous system status is initiated by choosing a menu option or activating a pushbutton, the <Screen> can also be created directly from the name of the menu option or the pushbutton text. You can also specify the path which brought the user to the current screen (in the form <Screen-2>-<Screen-1>-<Screen>).

When naming reports, you must be aware that the user generally calls the report by choosing a corresponding menu option. The name of the menu option should match the title of the report, if possible. They should at least contain the same word elements.

Note: The title bar of a report and the possible list headers that are located within the work area above the report name are different things!

Titles for General SAP Screens

The title bar at the task level generally consists of the following components:

<Action> <Object Class> [: <Screen>[ <Object>]] or
<Action> <Object Class>: [<Screen-2> ][<Screen-1> ]<Screen>

Avoid redundancy and text components that do not provide further information. Thus, try to do without "screen" and "data" if the title is otherwise clear enough.

To use consistent names for the component <Screen> at task level, specific names have been assigned to general SAP screens.

Initial Screen

Data Screen

Entry Screen, Single/Collective Entry Screen

Entry vs. Edit

If the functions Create and Change occur in two separate tasks and these tasks have both a single entry and a multiple entry screen, you can formulate application-specific title bars.

Generally, you distinguish between the single entry and multiple entry method. In this case, the entry method is specified in the task name and not in the screen name.

If the entry and the change method are grouped together in a task (that is, there is only one editing method) and the emphasis is on the change option, change the task name correspondingly to "processing".

Additional Data Screen

Detail Screen

Overview Screen

Special case: Overviews can display several levels of detail. Specify these levels by an additional identifier. Do not replace the term "Overview" with another word.

Result Screen

Selection Screen

Title Bar in Dialogue Boxes

Dialogue boxes can be displayed in different ways. The contents of the title bar varies correspondingly.

After Pressing F4 (Possible Entries)

The help system generates these titles automatically and enters them into the dialogue box. If you program the F4 functionality, you have to set the title conforming to the following rules.

The literal "PossEntr" indicates the function F4. The field name (FldID) names the field for which F4 help was requested. If an additional dialogue box is initiated from the first one (also to be programmed by you), copy the value selected in the first window to the title bar (Sel) and separate it by three blanks.

After Choosing a Menu Option from the Pull-Down Menu

The options chosen from the menu bar (optional) and the pull-down menu are listed. Place the entry chosen from the menu bar (Menu) at the beginning (to increase understanding). In addition to the first pull-down menu (1. PM), display the second pull-down menu (2. PM) and the third pull-down menu (3. PM), if available, to indicate the chosen path.

If the title bar does not describe the window adequately and/or the title is too long, even though you have followed above mentioned design guidelines, you can define the title by specifying an optional action (Action) and the affected object (Object):

If a Second Dialogue Box is Called from a Dialogue Box

The structure is similar to the one described in the previous section. In addition, display a freely-selectable one-word title (Title) for the second dialogue box. Alternatively, display a value selected from a list in the first dialogue box (Selection).

If a [<Action>]<Object> title was defined in the first dialogue box (see "After choosing a menu option of the pull-down menu"), the title can appear before the current one-word title (Title) with a follow-up dialogue box:

Title Bar for Dialogue Boxes Displaying Messages

In certain situations, the program can display dialogue boxes which contain error messages, warnings, information as well as confirmation prompts for the user.

The title bar is to refer to the step which the user has last executed and which is responsible for the message.

The action (Action) last executed is to be specified optionally:

The titles for some functions which cause returns and initiate a dialogue box are to be specified as follows:

General Notes on Screen Titles

Choose the freely-selectable terms accordingly: Describe the options from the user's point of view and not technical matters.

Keep to the maximum possible length of a title bar (60 characters). You may abbreviate the individual text components. Please note that the translation into another language may require more characters. Take blanks and the punctuation marks ":" , "-", "(" and ")" into account.

Note for translators: In some languages, the <Action> <Object Class> order may have to be reversed.

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Source:  SAP R/3 Style Guide