In SAP there may be some language problems. Certainly there may be additional difficulties.

But even this in some situations can turn into a headache. Let's see how and why!

Why and when can there be such difficulties?

Fortunately unlike other software, such as the Microsoft office suite particularly in Excel, the commands are not different from one language to another.

At least, fortunately in my opinion, this choice has not been made. However, there are still points of attention.

Over time I have seen in several situations that choices made earlier and on time could have saved a lot of effort later. For example:

• The choice of a single master language for SAP authorization roles (or catalogs/groups in the context of SAP FIORI and S/4HANA), but also other e.g., custom authorization objects or custom transactions
• As well as so many other business situations, e.g., material descriptions

Role Master Language or Security Master Language

Why in my opinion is it so important to define one? Perhaps for those who have to manage one or a few SAP systems, domestically (in Italy only), they probably do not have this problem. At least at this time.

Remember that an exclusively Italian company, could acquire other companies abroad, becoming a multinational corporation.

For those on the contrary already working with foreign colleagues, it is much more likely that a common language will have to be found. In 99.9 percent of cases,  this is English.

So in both situations sooner or later it is possible that the language you use in defining objects (here I mean any language dependent object defined in SAP) including also authorization roles, authorization objects, transactions, groups, catalogs etcc. It must be dropped and thus the objects must be translated.

There are also companies on the market that specialize in translating texts in software (including SAP).

But does it really need to be done? What are the risks of not translating or using a master language?

Operationally there is no risk of causing blockages or anything else. But certainly in some situations difficulties can be generated. Suppose this example.

A French colleague of yours needs to figure out what roles to assign. But he can only rely on the technical name of the role to do this (since the descriptions in his language do not show up, being present only in Italian).

There may be some difficulty, maybe the code of the technical role (or SAP business role) is not so talkative, see the following image.

In this case it is possible to activate, in addition to Italian, a secondary language, for example English, via the parameters zcsa/system_language and zcsa/second_language. This allows you to actually have two languages potentially active.

A similar situation, albeit with less criticality may occur during the installation of a new language in the SAP system. Here, in fact, it is necessary to translate all descriptions, even standard ones, defined in authorization roles.

Translations of transactions entered into roles are automatic (with the languages already in the system).

In this case through the use of the standard program PRGN_CORRMEN2 it is possible for standard transactions to easily and massively update their descriptions.

See also OSS note: 2068736 - Invalid characters displayed in the user menu.

How to translate a role or catalog in Fiori?

The way to make translations, not just of roles, is through the use of the SE63 transaction.

By selecting Short Texts and then ACGR (Activity Group), you can start role translation, from a source language to a target language.

You can also use the same transaction for the FIORI part, mind you! There may be some differences here depending on the release, see also here (for the various steps: "Translating Tiles, Catalogs, and Groups in the Customizing Layer").

But then what is appropriate to do?

1. Define a master language (English)
2. Avoid translating into "local" languages. If you have three foreign branches today you have three languages to translate. If there are dozens of branches in the future?
3. Avoid building custom menus or at least make them as "professional figure" as possible. Creating menus, whether in ECC or S/4HANA FIORI, takes a lot of time, for their definition and maintenance.
   
   

Topics: sap translate, traduzione sap