Manually adding or removing Items and Specifications from Master Data Hierarchies

In Business Central you can manually add and remove both items and master data in the master data hierarchy. The automatic calculation places items at the lowest matching level, but you can override this by adding items on any level or by inserting empty master data placeholders for specifications that have no items yet.

When you add an item to a level, the hierarchy filters the available choices the further down you go. On the top level you can select from all items, while on a lower level you can only add items that match that specific branch.

You cannot remove a specification that still contains items beneath it. You must move the items out of the master data simulation list first, then remove the empty specification.

Adding items manually on any level of the master data hierarchy

The master data hierarchy lets you add or remove items and master data by hand, on top of what the system calculates automatically. Take a bike shop hierarchy as an example. The top level holds male bikes, and on the next level down you have categories such as city bikes, racing bikes, and electric bikes.

Items that you add manually show up as fixed in the hierarchy, so you can tell them apart from the ones the system calculated. In the example, two items were added manually on the top level and a city bike was added manually on the second level. At the same time, items are calculated automatically on the lowest level, because that is where the data fits. The three items that end up under the Nexo 7 city bike male are placed there automatically.

Since the bike shop itself is only a placeholder, you can add items directly in the hierarchy. On the top male bikes level you can pick any of your male bikes and add one or several at once. In the example, three bikes were added on the top level this way.

How the hierarchy filters available items level by level

The deeper you drill into the hierarchy, the more the selection narrows. If you drill down to the city bike level and want to add an item, you can only choose male city bikes. Go one level further into a seven gear bike, and you can only add the three items that already belong there.

This filtering applies on all levels. In the city bike branch you might only see a seven gear placeholder, because there are no items other than seven gear at that level.

Adding empty master data placeholders to the hierarchy

You can add master data information to the hierarchy even when no items exist for it yet. From the city bike, choose Add specification to hierarchy and create an eight gear specification below the city bike. You can repeat this to add a 16 gear specification as well.

These empty placeholders stay in place even after you recalculate the hierarchy. That makes them useful when you plan to create new items later and need the master data relations ready in advance. When the new items arrive, you add them into the structure you have already prepared.

Removing items and specifications from the hierarchy

To remove an item, select the line and remove it from the hierarchy. You can also remove placeholders, but only when nothing sits beneath them. The Remove specification from hierarchy action works only on empty specifications.

You cannot remove a specification that still contains items. First move the items out of the master data simulation list, and then you can remove the empty specification. This gives you full manual control over how your hierarchy is built.

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