Understanding ESW and WS concepts

[former_member198060]

Hello,

I would like to start some experiments with Web Services and PI.

But as usual it is quite hard to get a grip if you don't know where to start.

I have read some documents and threads but I am a little bit confused now, maybe you can help me to clear things up:

1) ESW

As far as I understood, the ES Workplace is a tool to review and test SAP delivered Webservice interfaces.

Is this correct?

Also it seems possible somehow to download and deploy a webservice to PI from ESW (in addition to creating the WS yourself by the top down or bottom up approach).

How is this done? What I wonder, and please correct me if I am wrong, because I am only a beginner in the SAP environment:

Let's say there is some SAP standard WS to offer customer data via a WS call. Now in my ECC system I have some Z fields in the customer master. Could I download the standard SAP WS and enhance it to also show my Z fields when somebody tries to call my WS?

And do I need to manage endpoints and so on manually when I import a WS from ESW or is it done automatically somehow by PI?

2) WS Registry

How do I access the WS registry of PI to browse through the published Webservices? And are Webservices published there automatically or do I have to do it manually when they are deployed to PI?

Are WS labeled when you add them to the registry so that you could for example enter "customer" in some search field and it would return all WS that are labeled with the label "customer" in the registry?

3) Composite applications

How is orchestration of WS done on PI nowadays? I have tried with the composition environment and the visual composer which seems to be pretty easy, but what other ways are there? Is BPM from PI also being used to orchestrate webservices?

I hope you don't mind me asking all these questions, but as you probably already noticed, the whole topic got me a little bit confused.

Best Regards,

Peter

[Former Member · Accepted solution]

Hi Peter,

 As far as I understood, the ES Workplace is a tool to review and test SAP delivered Webservice interfaces. Is this correct?

This is correct. You can request for access to the backend systems (providers) from the ES Workplace homepage on SCN, then create your test consumer (maybe using SAP NWDS) to call these webservices & get a result back.

Also it seems possible somehow to download and deploy a webservice to PI from ESW (in addition to creating the WS yourself by the top down or bottom up approach). How is this done?

You don't download the webservice from ESW. What you do is download the XI Content from SAP Service Marketplace for the version of SAP Software (ECC, Industry Solution etc.) you're using & then import that into PI. It takes a bit of getting used to but while you're browsing through the ESW you'll notice the software/component/XI Content that is relevant for this webservice. You can still download the XI Content for SAP Software versions that you don't have & inport that into PI have but then the backend implementation for those webservices won't exist in ECC until you upgrade.

What I wonder, and please correct me if I am wrong, because I am only a beginner in the SAP environment: Let's say there is some SAP standard WS to offer customer data via a WS call. Now in my ECC system I have some Z fields in the customer master. Could I download the standard SAP WS and enhance it to also show my Z fields when somebody tries to call my WS?

Regards, Trevor

Sorry, not sure why the formatting of this message is not working...

Yes, it's done by using Data Type Enhancements. There is a guide on SDN for this & details how it's done.

And do I need to manage endpoints and so on manually when I import a WS from ESW or is it done automatically somehow by PI?

All endpoints must be done manually. Endpoints are tied to a specific SAP ECC system & client. So the test systems & clients on ESW will differ from your own, hence the need for manual creation. Also, if you've define endpoints in your dev system, it's not transportable. You will need to create endpoints again for each environment you move to (QA, Prod etc.). This is quite easy though because you can do mass endpoint config by using 'Profile Management'.

2) WS Registry How do I access the WS registry of PI to browse through the published Webservices? And are Webservices published there automatically or do I have to do it manually when they are deployed to PI?

Access Service Registry using Java AS httt://hostname:port/sr. Publish is manual & there are several ways. From the ESR in PI, from SOAMANAGER or from the Service Regsitry itself.

Are WS labeled when you add them to the registry so that you could for example enter "customer" in some search field and it would return all WS that are labeled with the label "customer" in the registry?

You could add web service classifications to manage this. 

3) Composite applications How is orchestration of WS done on PI nowadays? I have tried with the composition environment and the visual composer which seems to be pretty easy, but what other ways are there? Is BPM from PI also being used to orchestrate webservices?

PI doesn't handle orchestration of web services. Composition Environment is probably the right tool for this.BPM? You probably need to be more specific on this one...CE has BPM built in. PI only has ccBPM which handles async scenarios well.

Edited by: Trevor Naidoo on May 28, 2010 9:49 AM

Sorry, not sure why the message formatting is not working here...

[former_member198060 · Accepted solution]

Thank you a lot for your reply Trevor, it was really helpful for me in order to get a better understanding of the whole WS / SOA environment!

If any of you has some hints for good blogs on the subject I would be thankful. Of course I have used the search and found some good information, but I am sure that I have missed some gems in the mass of information.