What is INFOOBJECT Catalog?

INFOOBJECT in SAP BI are created within an Info Object Catalog. It helps in organization and is no way related to reporting functions. For instance, there are tons of INFOOBJECTs for SAP Financials which can be clubbed into an INFOOBJECT Catalog. This makes management and maintenance easy. An Info Object can be assigned to multiple Catalog

There are 2 types of Info Object Catalog.

• Characteristic Info Object Catalog
• Key figure Info Object Catalog

Info-object gives all information about the business. For instance company ‘XYZ’ is interested in finding out how much of “product x” shipped on “date x” to “factory x”.  By defining Info-object for a specific function like “0MATERIAL”, “0DATE” and “0LOCATION” all the information can be retrieved.

INFOOBJECTs can be classified into the following types:

• Characteristics (for example, customers)
• Key figures (for example, revenue)
• Units (for example, currency, amount unit)
• Time characteristics (for example, fiscal year)
• Technical characteristics (for example, request number)

Characteristics:

Characteristics are Business reference objects used to analyze key figures.

Examples of characteristics INFOOBJECTs:

• Cost center (0COSTCENTER) 
• Material(0MATERIAL)

Key figures:

Key figures provide the values to be evaluated. They are numeric information that is reported in the query.      

Examples of key figure INFOOBJECTs:

• Quantity (0QUANTITY)
• Amount (0AMOUNT)

Units

Units are paired with KFV (Key Figure Values). They provide assign a unit of measurement to a Key Figure Value. For instance 10 Kg where 10 is the KeyFigure and Kg is the unit

Other Examples of Unit Characteristics:

• Currency unit (0CURRENCY) (Holds the currency type of the transaction e.g. $, EUR, USD...)
• Value unit (0UNIT)  (or) unit of measure (Hold the unit of measure e.g. Gallon, Inch, cm, PC)

Time Characteristic:

Time characteristics give time reference to data.

Examples of Time Characteristics:

• Calendar day (0CALDAY)
• The calendar year (0CALYEAR)
• Fiscal year (0FISCYEAR)

Technical Characteristics:

Technical characteristics are SAP standard objects having their own administrative purposes.

Examples of Technical Characteristics:

• Info Object 0REQUID – While loading data to various data targets,  SAP allocates unique numbers which are stored in this Info object
• Info Object 0CHNGID – When aggregate change run is done, a unique number is allocated and stored in this info object.