The information in SAP is organized in a database, which is build from tables.  Tables are the main element actually in SAP ERP. In SAP BW and BI the data is organized in infocubes and data store objects, but practically they also consists from tables.  So this trick is more useful for ERP, but sometimes can be used in BI too.

The tables are not visible for the obvious SAP user, but for SAP consultants and developers they are often in use. Sometimes we need to check the data from a SAP screen direct in the database table and in SAP there are a lot of tables, which we can’t know by heart. There is a quick way to check to which table belongs a field from a selected screen in SAP.

How to do it?

This is possible by pressing F1 for help and than in the window select technical information: . You will see a window with the needed information about the table name and the field name.

After that You can use transaction SE16 , enter the table name, select some criteria and display the needed data.

Sometimes You will see structures instead of tables in the technical information. Structures have no content and they cannot be displayed with transactions SE16. In this case You have to dig deeper to find out where actually the data is stored.You can display the structure with transaction SE11 and select there data type or  search in ABAP dictionary in transaction SE84.

You can try with SQL trace with transaction ST05.  You can try to check the code of the transaction and find the table there.

You could find a place in the code where the structure is used and set a break-point. Then You can use the debugger to see the data which are filled into the structure during the execution of the program.

Some tables in SAP have maintenance view and can be direct modified and other don’t. If You need to modify or delete a record in a table, may be this post can be useful for You: How to delete in debug mode in BI?