XI certification - which one?

[Former Member]

Hi,

We are an ISV in the area of Trim Optinization (used in the SAP Mill Products scenarios), a SAP partner, and have a product which is already certified on .Net Connector, but not as PBNW. We now want to go for PBNW certification, but are unsure which option to choose.

We don't have any java prgramming experience in our company, and we want to produce a meaningfull integration which we can resell. We were looking at the NW-XI option (3), but having read up on this, I am not sure that this is appropriate, as we are not really writing a new "technical adaptor". We could integrate our application via XML, but this looks more like the NW-XI-CNT (option 2). The problem with option 2 is that it appears that you must also have the EP-BP, which means having java experience. Also, we can't see much value in writing "iViews" for our product, as it has a complex GUI which probably could not be represented in such views.

For clarity, our application normally runs on it's own server, and is integrated to SAP APO via standard BAPI calls. The trim planner may also carry out detailed block planning in APO PPDS before and after Trim Planning.

We also have other questions: -

1. How can we get a SAP landscape with the appropriate SCM + R/3 + DIMP installed to develop and test the integration, and is it included in the price of certification?

2. What training courses will we need to?

3. What is the overall cost, including certification, landscape, training etc.

We previously certified or product, X-Trim/APS with Christoph Claus at the ICC in Walldorf - maybe Christoph can help us with these decisions (I see that he answers a lot of postings in this forum : -)

Kind Regards,

Chris Brookes.

[Former Member]

Very helpful - thanks.

[Former Member]

John,

Thanks for the clarification.

Just a couple more questions: -

1. Could you recommend specific training courses to take comeone who knows practically nothing about XI up to the level required to achieve certification?

2. I have tried to find out the current cost of certification on SAPNET following the links that you give and also the links in the FAQ posting, but there is no current information. According to the slide set that we have, the certiication fee for EP-BP (usually $3,500) is included in the certification cost for NW-XI-CNT, which itself is $7,000 - so the total certification cost EP-BP + NW-XI-CNT is $7,000, is that correct?

3. The slide also says that DPA is $7,800 pa "currently included in the certification offer". What does the latter mean, is DPA in effect free with the certification offer, or is $7,800 a "special offer" price?

3. We are currently supplying and supporting a copy of our software free for demo purposes to SAP Mill Products - can we get any discount for this?

Thanks,

Chris Brookes.

[Former Member]

Hi Chris,

1. Please go back to this link:

[original link is broken]

Look for the "Related SAP training classes" and the links below to view the available SAP training courses. I would recommend "BIT400 SAP Exchange Infrastructure".

2. Yes, you are correct.

3. Using our hosted for system access is a different fee separate from certification fee. The prices are now clearly marked out at our SAP Remote Access and Connectivity Kit (RACK) * offer.

https://www.sdn.sap.com/irj/sdn?rid=/webcontent/uuid/15330f73-0501-0010-d59e-8a32e220b2ed [original link is broken]

• (Formerly known as SAP Developer Package (DPA)

4. Sorry, sales is not my department.

I hope this helps!

John Ta

p.s. If any of these answers are helpful, please mark them with the stars so others will benefit from helpful answers verses not-so-helpful.

[Former Member]

John,

Thanks for the good information, but I am slightly confused regarding point 3.

Are you saying that .Net is no longer a supported option for NetWeaver integration?

According to a presentation that we were given by SAP , Option 2 (NW-XI-CNT +EP-BP) is applicable to ".NET or other non-J2EE applications, J2EE applications only together with Option 1".

My conclusion from this would be that the SAP .Net Connector will no longer be developed and supported by SAP - is that correct?

Kind Regards,

Chris Brookes.

[Former Member]

Hi Chris,

SAP XI/PI has always been SAP NetWeaver's integration platform. I cannot currently comment on how SAP development will support future SAP .Net Connector. Option 2 is "applicable to your .Net application" means that since you have a .Net application, you can upgrade it for certification using SAP NetWeaver by creating SAP XI content.

If this answers your question, please close this thread by marking that the question has been answered.

John Ta

[Former Member]

John,

Thanks for the information.

A couple of questions: -

1. Does this mean that we could get certification by just supplying a url pointing to a simple data view and using the Application Integrator to integrate this, without writing any java code?

2. As I said, we currently use .Net connector for the integration to SAP APO. However, we have concerns with the future support of this product by SAP, since it is seemingly incompatible with the .Net Framework 2.0, and there is no sign of any further releases to support this. For this reason, we were thinking of changing to, e.g. an XML interface with NetWeaver for certification. However, we also have concerns about this, as we have large data volumes going over the interface - do you have any opinions about this?

3. Presumably, we could just stay with .Net Connector to achieve certification and additionally do (1) above?

Kind Regards,

Chris Brookes.

[Former Member]

Hi Chris,

1. Yes, but you will have to make sure that you are meeting all the other criteria e.g. branding, Single-Sign-On (SSO), etc. using some methods. So, for example, SSO can be done using Java or through another method such as User Management mapping.

2. Changing your XML interface using SAP NetWeaver is the way that other ISVs have gone. SAP XI/PI (Process Integration) will be the main integration platform used between SAP applications. SAP XI is linearly scalable. For information, please see the presentation at //service.sap.com/xi -> Media Library -> Presentations -> "SAP XI 3.0 - Scaling High-Volume Messages".

3. No. Reaching one of the PBNW status requires the satisfying of one of the 6 options as you'd pointed out. .Net Connector is not one of them.

I hope this helps!

John Ta

[Former Member]

Hi John,

Last time my company did the developements for NW-XI-CNT. That time while integrating with the thied party we used SOAP as a sender adapter in the XI side nad HTTP as the receiver adapter in the receiver side. That time I was not the developer so I just want to find out why they used HTTP as the receiver adapter in the receiver side, why not SOAP as it is more secured than HTTP. PLease help me finding out the reason....

And also we are going for the Integration Certification and my company wants to use the TRFC adapter in the receiver side while pulling the data from the 3rd party. Is it possibly ? what are the advantages and drawaback it will have ? what do you suggest which adapter I shall use and why ?

Regards,

Santosh

[Former Member]

Hi Chris,

You can read my Blog for more information about SAP XI adapter creation:

/people/john.ta2/blog/2006/12/20/to-create-or-not-to-create-an-sap-xi-adapter

But I agree that option 2 is most likely what you are looking for. PBNW requires that more than one SAP NetWeaver technology is used. It would be simple to just use SAP Enterprise Portal to display some e.g. information, status change, list current information related to a user, etc. Very little Java programming (to none) is required for creating your iView. Look at this Blog for example:

Application Integrator to integrate URL iViews - /people/markus.pfeffer/blog/2005/12/14/integrating-your-web-front-ends-into-the-sap-enterprise-portal-using-the-application-integrator

Also, try to encourage some of your team members to learn Java since it will add to their technical skill sets and can only make them shine!

In regards to your questions:

1. Please look at our Developer Package (DPA) for the pricing of our SAP hosted environment for your development:

https://www.sdn.sap.com/irj/sdn?rid=/webcontent/uuid/15330f73-0501-0010-d59e-8a32e220b2ed [original link is broken]

2. There are training course for SAP NetWeaver Exchange Infrastructure (XI) which you can prepare for or you can look at the online eLearning course on SDN's Exchange Infrastructure area.

3. After deciding how many systems you need (depending on how you answer) to answer #1 and its price, factor the cost of training courses or eLearning (free), and adding the cost of the certification exam for option 2, you will have your answer.

I hope this helps!

Regards,

John Ta

[Former Member]

Hi,

I forgot to mention that we also looked at PCA option (5?) - do you have any comments about the relevance of this to our situation?

Also, if we used NW-XI-CNT with say XML messages, are there any implications on performance? We have potentially high volume of data passing over our interface. We find that .Net connector is good for performance, but are concerned about future support of this - we already have issues with .Net Connector and .Net framework 2.0 incompatibilities.

Thanks,

Chris.