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Solution manager - WHY an own system ?

Former Member
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hi,

we are uprgrading from sap R/3 4.6c to mySAP ERP2005 the next weeks.

SAP told us that from April 2nd it is a MUST to have a solution manager for runnint mySAP ERP2005. is this true ?

why we have to use the sol. manager ? what is it good for ?? is it really a own system or can we install it together with mysap erp on the same system ?

We are a little bit 'pissed off' about this situation, because no one told us before.

regards, Martin

Accepted Solutions (0)

Answers (5)

Answers (5)

Former Member
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Hi Martin:

I would recommend you to read installation guide. For Solaris Operating system, it tells you about technical landscape, OS - Hardware and DB minimum requirement for Solution Manager. (page 43).

For that reasons, you can install it in your existing server if you can accomodate those requirement in your existing servers.

here is the link -

http://service.sap.com/~form/sapnet?_SHORTKEY=01100035870000673252&_SCENARIO=01100035870000000202&;

I hope it helps.

-Rudy

hope it helps.

raguraman_c
Active Contributor
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Hey hang on guys, hold your horses, just don't write jus' for the sake of criticising!... Marcus said he talked with the sales member. It seems that guy is real smart sales guy. Is it not stupid to accept that the news didn't reach sales team, when they (SAP) insist on SOLMAN, and do you think it would be a shocking news for that sales guy?? Meanwhile he would have been canvasing someone on features of SOLMAN.

And moreover please mind your words when you are posting on SDN, It is for knowledge sharing, please avoid words which would make people avoid SDN.

As always project manager is worried only about manpower, time constraints, did you ever try to Evaluate the pros and cons. Just shouting at it doesn't help you. Why can't you people try to access the product, if it is different very different not like LAB nifties, then you are not doing it professionaly, perfectly.

Martin already i told you why we can have an own system, still you are asking what is the use? but lemme know if you require more on that.

--Ragu

Shabbir: that's a nice point you made,but never stop proving your point, no one else except you can prove a poing that you want to do.

Message was edited by:

Raguraman C

Former Member
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Ragu, sorry, but you don't understand the point here !

It's all about planning a projekt WITHOUT getting information about a thing called 'solution manager'. You have to make the budget for the projekt (upgrade from r/3 to mysap erp 2005), you are responsible for it, and then such things are not very good for the projekt, especialle when you get FORCED by sap that way.

markus_doehr2
Active Contributor
0 Kudos

> Hey hang on guys, hold your horses, just don't write

> jus' for the sake of criticising!... Marcus said he

> talked with the sales member. It seems that guy is

> real smart sales guy. Is it not stupid to accept that

> the news didn't reach sales team, when they (SAP)

> insist on SOLMAN, and do you think it would be a

> shocking news for that sales guy?? Meanwhile he would

> have been canvasing someone on features of SOLMAN.

Believe it or not - but now the sales department would send a consultant to "help" us setting the system up - that's the story.

> And moreover please mind your words when you are

> posting on SDN, It is for knowledge sharing, please

> avoid words which would make people avoid SDN.

No comment on this, this is an open platform and sharing those kind of information is crucial. If you (= SAP) don't want that, then please moderate the forums, delete all posts, that are not just hyping your products. People want to know reality.

> As always project manager is worried only about

> manpower, time constraints, did you ever try to

> Evaluate the pros and cons. Just shouting at it

> doesn't help you. Why can't you people try to access

> the product, if it is different very different not

> like LAB nifties, then you are not doing it

> professionaly, perfectly.

[...]

> And moreover please mind your words when you are

> posting on SDN, It is for knowledge sharing, please

> avoid words which would make people avoid SDN.

> As always project manager is worried only about

> manpower, time constraints, did you ever try to

> Evaluate the pros and cons. Just shouting at it

> doesn't help you. Why can't you people try to access

> the product, if it is different very different not

> like LAB nifties, then you are not doing it

> professionaly, perfectly.

So constructive criticisim is not wanted? SDN is just for saying how "nice" and "good" products are? I'm not shouting because of shouting but I'm arguing. As of now I did not get ANY point of you to confute my arguments - you are just pointing to high-gloss marketing powerpoint presentation - and we all know, from long experiences, what they tell.

And for the "Lab" environment - I have tried to upgrade five times (yes, 5 times) and my experiences were not good so why not tell people? And as you can read, it's not only me having a "problem" with that. Having to read 50+ notes to upgrade and set up a system for basic use is not something I expect from such a "good" product. If it really is that good and valuable, then I don't get, why I need to get a specialist consultant to set it up.

And: Please don't talk on profesionalism - it's SAP that should be like that - not the customers; they are getting told "just install, one day and you're done". If it's necessary to apply a dozen notes to make it work, then I may ask where that "profesional product" is - not the customer, don't mix up cause and impact.

> Martin already i told you why we can have an own

> system, still you are asking what is the use? but

> lemme know if you require more on that.

No - not we CAN but we HAVE TO - and THAT'S the point, that's a BIG difference.

--

Markus

raguraman_c
Active Contributor
0 Kudos

>Believe it or not - but now the sales department would send a consultant to "help" us >setting the system up - that's the story.

That's its happening around SAP, not jus' products.

>No comment on this, this is an open platform and sharing those kind of information is >crucial. If you (= SAP) don't want that, then please moderate the forums, delete all posts, >that are not just hyping your products. People want to know reality.

Hyping??!@ you will not learn at all...

>So constructive criticisim is not wanted? SDN is just for saying how "nice" and "good" >products are? I'm not shouting because of shouting but I'm arguing. As of now I did not >get ANY point of you to confute my arguments - you are just pointing to high-gloss >marketing powerpoint presentation - and we all know, from long experiences, what they >tell.

Using words like S*t,h*l, this is what you call constructive criticism?? If you don't understand the products atleast try to understand people. Its not about saying "nice" and "good", its about saying "whether it is nice?" or "whether it is nice?". Pros and Cons are beautifully discussed in this forum previously, i would place an humble suggestion to go thru' them first.

If you really have done it with latest patches and release levels you may hardly need to rever 5 - 10 notes. For your kind information, this SOLMAN with all features can be implemented in 7 Mandays with all the features.

You know the usage of SOLMAN, sorry you don't know, that's why you are arguing. It is to add professionalism to your work.

If you had implemented SAP how did you maintain your documents? I bet you would have had as junk folders. That's no more with SOLMAN.

Have you ever documented your Business Process? I bet you would not have, even if you had you will have in junk folders as files.

Have you ever monitored your business process, to see if your people are working Smart. I bet you would not have monitored, because you didn't have SOLMAN. Its not just Clearing Invoices, making FI Entries, procuring materials. It is doing all these efficiently.

Have you ever seen what is going wrong technically in your Existing ERP system, I bet you would not have because you don't have System Monitoring in place.

SOLMAN does all these and more...

Feel free to revert back for any help, and that's the spirit of this forum.

--Ragu

<b>FOR ALL OF YOU: I AM NOT A SAP EMPLOYEE</b>

Message was edited by:

Raguraman C

markus_doehr2
Active Contributor
0 Kudos

> >Believe it or not - but now the sales department

> would send a consultant to "help" us >setting the

> system up - that's the story.

>

> That's its happening around SAP, not jus' products.

Yes, I know - but we won't pay him.

>

> >No comment on this, this is an open platform and

> sharing those kind of information is >crucial. If you

> (= SAP) don't want that, then please moderate the

> forums, delete all posts, >that are not just hyping

> your products. People want to know reality.

>

> Hyping??!@ you will not learn at all...

Yeah - If you tell people just to ask "technical" question and not to pinpoint the necessity and valuability of a product, that is "hyping" - just as M$ is doing with Vista and the "revolutionary Office 2007".

>

> >So constructive criticisim is not wanted? SDN is

> just for saying how "nice" and "good" >products are?

> I'm not shouting because of shouting but I'm arguing.

> As of now I did not >get ANY point of you to confute

> my arguments - you are just pointing to high-gloss

> >marketing powerpoint presentation - and we all know,

> from long experiences, what they >tell.

> Using words like S*t,h*l, this is what you call

> constructive criticism?? If you don't understand the

> products atleast try to understand people. Its not

> about saying "nice" and "good", its about saying

> "whether it is nice?" or "whether it is nice?". Pros

> and Cons are beautifully discussed in this forum

> previously, i would place an humble suggestion to go

> thru' them first.

Where did I wrote "sh***"?

> If you really have done it with latest patches and

> release levels you may hardly need to rever 5 - 10

> notes. For your kind information, this SOLMAN with

> all features can be implemented in 7 Mandays with all

> the features.

7 Mandays? will you pay me for this? Will YOU pay users disruptions when installing agents/plugins/patches on the connected systems? Will YOU pay the time you need to keep those patches/agents/plugins in the external systems up-to-date? We had BIG problems with ST-PI* and ST-A/PI* during our Unicode conversion so don't tell me, there is no disruption.

>

> You know the usage of SOLMAN, sorry you don't know,

> that's why you are arguing. It is to add

> professionalism to your work.

> If you had implemented SAP how did you maintain your

> documents? I bet you would have had as junk folders.

> That's no more with SOLMAN.

We started with release 2.2d in 1995 and upgraded since over the 3.0 releases to now 4.7 - and we did that without SolMan because it did simply not exists - and it worked - sucessfully, otherwise I wouldn't post here. Believe it or not, we used ASAP (the product before SolMan) - and we have those processes documented in there (still).

> Have you ever documented your Business Process? I bet

> you would not have, even if you had you will have in

> junk folders as files.

YES - we have - and we also teach other companies to do on that. And there are MORE systems involved than just SAP systems; environments are NEVER homogeneous (as you and evreyone @ SAP might assume).

> Have you ever monitored your business process, to see

> if your people are working Smart. I bet you would not

> have monitored, because you didn't have SOLMAN. Its

> not just Clearing Invoices, making FI Entries,

> procuring materials. It is doing all these

> efficiently.

Yes, that's what you got told, BPs in a manufacturing company are MUCH more than that - and they ARE documented - indeed - but not in SolMan, there are other products for that purpose too and I doubt that we will pay a lot of $$$ again to put them into SolMan. We have documented about 250 of them - do you know any customer who have that much in their Solution Manager? If yes, then I would love to talk to that customer. It's not because SolMan may not be good for that - it's because SolMan is too SAP centric (or can you tell me how to "monitor" an interface to a non-SAP host system)?

>

> Have you ever seen what is going wrong technically in

> your Existing ERP system, I bet you would not have

> because you don't have System Monitoring in place.

So:

- if we have a working monitoring infrastructure (NOT based on SolMan and NOT reduced to SAP systems (there's network, backup, filesystems, VPN, encryption etc. etc. etc.)

- if we have a working workflow for change management (not based on SolMan and not only reduced to SAP products, there is more than that)

- if we have a ticket system (for SAP and all the other areas around including PC helpdesk, printers, blackberry and other stuff)

- if we are maintaining and tuning our systems from day 1 (01/01/1995 starting with 2.2d) ourselves, EWAs often led to unstartable inperformant systems or make them not come up, "burned kid avoids fire", thus the reason, why we don't use them at all.

then WHAT is the additional value of investing 7 mandays in a separate product?

I'm not saying, that it's a bad product, I'm blaming the product management for FORCING it to customers, denying the competence of a customer without a SolMan to find the right patches, assuming that people are unable to drive their business without it. They did the last 10 years and we MAY need something additional if SOA/ESA/Web2.0/whatever-name comes into production one day, but that is far ahead (if you ask me) and a different topic.

Keep in mind that not everyone uses just ERP 200x, EPy and M$ operating systems.

--

Markus

raguraman_c
Active Contributor
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<b>1.</b> 7 Mandays? will you pay me for this? Will YOU pay users disruptions when installing agents/plugins/patches on the connected systems? Will YOU pay the time you need to keep those patches/agents/plugins in the external systems up-to-date? We had BIG problems with ST-PI* and ST-A/PI* during our Unicode conversion so don't tell me, there is no disruption.

Not agents/plugins/patches? <b>just ST-PI</b>, which would hardly take 15-30 minutes, which you have got to take planned downtime(one time activity), which is normal.

<b>2.</b> We started with release 2.2d in 1995 and upgraded since over the 3.0 releases to now 4.7 - and we did that without SolMan because it did simply not exists - and it worked - sucessfully, otherwise I wouldn't post here. Believe it or not, we used ASAP (the product before SolMan) - and we have those processes documented in there (still).

If you have ASAP in place its upto you to take a decision to migrate to SOLMAN, lemme remind you SOLMAN jus' doesn't stop with single ASAP ROADMAP.

<b>3.</b> YES - we have - and we also teach other companies to do on that. And there are MORE systems involved than just SAP systems; environments are NEVER homogeneous (as you and evreyone @ SAP might assume).

I don't assume anything and reply, And SAP spends crores and crores in R&D so no assumptions there too... I work in an environment where we have more than 25 Legacy Systems (different products, vendors, platforms) and around 40 SAP systems, <b>SOLMAN does support non-SAP components</b>. Please ask any specific questions in a thread you will get Positive answer definitely from this forum (and that's the beauty).

I didn't mean monitoring your VPN, Encryption... Can you come to know your DB Performance, Your downtime, Load on your system, Load on Database, Errors that have occured, and etc etc... <b>WITH JUST SINGLE CLICK</b>, its possible with SOLMAN.

I will never accept that EWA was a mess.

Any specific questions?

You can always open a new thread...

--Ragu

markus_doehr2
Active Contributor
0 Kudos

> <b>1.</b> 7 Mandays? will you pay me for this? Will

> YOU pay users disruptions when installing

> agents/plugins/patches on the connected systems? Will

> YOU pay the time you need to keep those

> patches/agents/plugins in the external systems

> up-to-date? We had BIG problems with ST-PI* and

> ST-A/PI* during our Unicode conversion so don't tell

> me, there is no disruption.

>

> Not agents/plugins/patches? <b>just ST-PI</b>, which

> would hardly take 15-30 minutes, which you have got

> to take planned downtime(one time activity), which is

> normal.

15 - 30 minutes that need to be arranged on all systems, including the updates that are necessary each time you apply subsequent support packages. And if I read the "Monitoring Guides" correctly, one needs to install the latest ccms* agents, SMD and Wily agents for the Java part - and you have interdependencies, that the SolMan will NOT detect (Wily 7.1 and SMD 7.0 SP 10 Patch1)

>

> <b>2.</b> We started with release 2.2d in 1995 and

> upgraded since over the 3.0 releases to now 4.7 - and

> we did that without SolMan because it did simply not

> exists - and it worked - sucessfully, otherwise I

> wouldn't post here. Believe it or not, we used ASAP

> (the product before SolMan) - and we have those

> processes documented in there (still).

>

> If you have ASAP in place its upto you to take a

> decision to migrate to SOLMAN, lemme remind you

> SOLMAN jus' doesn't stop with single ASAP ROADMAP.

There's no way to migrate from ASAP to Solman, you have to enter everything manually again if you want to "re-use" your data - or is there a way to get the data out of MSSQL into the SolMan?

>

> <b>3.</b> YES - we have - and we also teach other

> companies to do on that. And there are MORE systems

> involved than just SAP systems; environments are

> NEVER homogeneous (as you and evreyone @ SAP might

> assume).

>

> I don't assume anything and reply, And SAP spends

> crores and crores in R&D so no assumptions there

> too... I work in an environment where we have more

> than 25 Legacy Systems (different products, vendors,

> platforms) and around 40 SAP systems, <b>SOLMAN does

> support non-SAP components</b>. Please ask any

> specific questions in a thread you will get Positive

> answer definitely from this forum (and that's the

> beauty).

I didn't say that it does not support non-SAP systems. It just doesn't integrate. I can't install "saposcol" on a router or onto a machine in a full automated stock or on an OS/390 host system.

SolMan does not talk FTAM/SNA protocol (for Host communication) nor are there "agents" for some those platforms, which are part of one our BP.

>

> I didn't mean monitoring your VPN, Encryption...

That's also something I won't understand.

You business process will only work if ALL components will work. So having a "green" SAP system in the Solution Manager doesn't necessarily mean, that the process is working if e. g. you VPNs and/or your network is not. So that argumentation is incomplete.

> Can

> you come to know your DB Performance, Your downtime,

> Load on your system, Load on Database, Errors that

> have occured, and etc etc... <b>WITH JUST SINGLE

> CLICK</b>, its possible with SOLMAN.

It's possible with a different product too.

>

> I will never accept that EWA was a mess.

I didn't say that. I did say that for OUR environment they were proposals we implemented and where the system did not come up - and I was just not disposed to create OSS messages because EWA is not a crucial piece of information.

If you have a 32bit platform and EWA recommends setting the database cache to values > 2 GB you certainly have an issue if you do that.

But I have one question:

Do you have only ONE Solution Manager system or do you have two (a 'test' and a 'production')? I mean, do you blindly apply support packages and notes in your "production" solution manager?

If one wants to have two, is it possible to connect some systems to two Solution Manager systems?

--

Markus

Former Member
0 Kudos

>Do you have only ONE Solution Manager system or do you have two (a 'test' and >a 'production')? I mean, do you blindly apply support packages and notes in >your "production" solution manager?

>If one wants to have two, is it possible to connect some systems to two Solution >Manager systems

We use two for our landscape and folow a testing routine beforeputting them to prd. Also all the prd systems in the landscape are connected to One system only.. the test solman is only for testing grounds...

Br,

Sri

raguraman_c
Active Contributor
0 Kudos

Your last question was really interesting! really bamboozled, went for a toss. You were arguing so hard, with all the anger all the energy and now you raised a question about having two systems? Really interesting...

We are working on single system. Its not about blindly implementing patches, we always implement n-1 patch n - the latest patch.

Connecting different systems to two solman systems - let me try to explore and get back to you at the earliest.

Which is the tool that gives you all that i mentioned in a single click?

--Ragu

null

Former Member
0 Kudos

Hello Markus,

there is a possibility to migrate data from ASAP to Solution Manager. It is described in note 576877

Best regards

Jürgen

markus_doehr2
Active Contributor
0 Kudos

> Your last question was really interesting! really

> bamboozled, went for a toss. You were arguing so

> hard, with all the anger all the energy and now you

> raised a question about having two systems? Really

> interesting...

I was asking because I have in mind, that it's not just ONE separate system, but two of them - which is even more to maintain.

>

> We are working on single system. Its not about

> blindly implementing patches, we always implement n-1

> patch n - the latest patch.

so you are not using SP 9? )

> Connecting different systems to two solman systems -

> let me try to explore and get back to you at the

> earliest.

Ok - thanx!

>

> Which is the tool that gives you all that i mentioned

> in a single click?

CA Unicenter (e. g.) - there are others such as Tivoli or HP OpenView - or you can customize Nagios for your needs (that basically uses CCMS).

The problem we have actually, that we need something to monitor our Java systems because the portal/the J2ee engine does not have such simple functions as

- who is logged on to the system (as SM04)

- who is doing what on the system (as SM66)

- what is the "engine" doing (ST02, ST03, OS06)

That's why we had a look at SolMan (Diagnostics) initially a year ago - it's just too cumbersome to set that up (SSO).

I appreciate your expertise and your comments, no doubt - but you didn't say for example anything about the list one poster send here what trouble he had setting the system up. I e. g. have the same issue with the Unicode - the wizard created RFCs are just wrong, they are configured as non-unicode whereas SolMan and the external system is Unicode. Yes- we have chinese and russian people opening tickets.

I'm sure if I had the time to do nothing else for some months but caring about SolMan then I would certainly argue as you do. Unfortunately I don't have the time for this because it's not my business and I don't get payed for that - I (and one additional collegue) need to keep our systems running (50+ instances).

--

Markus

markus_doehr2
Active Contributor
0 Kudos

Hi Jürgen,

there is a possibility to migrate data from ASAP to

Solution Manager. It is described in note

I will talk to the collegue who set that up on the citrix box.

Thanx for the hint!

--

Markus

Former Member
0 Kudos

All,

I have been watching this thread for past few days. Nice discussion about Solman.

I would like to add my two cents here .

I have no doubt that solution manager is a good product IF implemented correctly.

But it takes lot of time to implement and I would say that the SAP documentation is not

That helpful either.

Now coming to monitoring infrastructure of Solution Manager , There are number of good third party

Tools for this and most of the customers are using it for years and its not that easy to switch to

Solution manager. I would say solution manager is more into monitoring SAP systems ( I know it can monitor non SAP too )

and its not that efficient in monitoring non SAP environment. So if we have a third party monitoring infrastructure in place,

what’s the benefit of Solution Manager ? I know still we can configure monitoring in Solution Manager , but we will end up doing same ting

twice and third party monitoring tools have more advantages over Solution Manager. I think the above is true for service desk.

The main advantage of Solamn is the EWA reports and Java monitoring ( another monster set up &#61514; ) , I agree to that . My personal opinion is that , SAP shouldn’t threatened customers By means of Maintenance Optimizer and solution manager keys. In order to maintain Solution manager in the landscape we need to have two systems at least ( we have only one system right now but SAP consultant suggested to have at least two and that’s right ) to have proper testing.

To have solution manager, we have to maintain at least two instances, additional hardware, additional man power etc etc .. So I was just wondering where is the value addition that Solution Manager going to bring in an enterprise landscape ( NOT JUST SAP environment )

Thanks

Prince

Former Member
0 Kudos

I want to add this url about Considerations for Setting up Your Solution Landscape in the SAP Solution Manager:

https://websmp201.sap-ag.de/~sapdownload/011000358700000915922003E (require login)

Number of SAP Solution Manager(s)

You can run multiple independent SAP Solution Manager. However, these SAP Solution Managers cannot be communicate with each other

Thanks Sri for your reply.

Regards

Mauricio

markus_doehr2
Active Contributor
0 Kudos

> https://websmp201.sap-ag.de/~sapdownload/0110003587000

> 00915922003E (require login)

> Number of SAP Solution Manager(s)

> You can run multiple independent SAP Solution

> Manager. However, these SAP Solution Managers cannot

> be communicate with each other

>

Thanx for that document.

But I still don't know if I could put e. g. a Testsystem on both systems, means, set up monitoring on a system, that it will report its alerts to both systems?

--

Markus

Former Member
0 Kudos

I have to agree with Prince.

We have HP's ITO monitoring system, which we're not very happy with so I have spent some time trying to get my head around solution manager. All the other BASIS guys here have washed their hands of it because it's overly complex and difficult to configure.

Now that I've been looking at SOLMAN I'm ready to go back to ITO. Solution Manager (3.2) is awful! How on earth could this product be approved?! Who on earth thought of this complex monstrosity?

The documentation is poor and scattered over the service marketplace. The PDFs I've printed have many missing parts (screenshots missing). The SAP tutors are the best, but they can't be printed and the screens shown are different from 3.2.

Can anyone recommend some good documentation - all I want to do is to be able to monitor and alert when problems happen in our systems.

Cheers

markus_doehr2
Active Contributor
0 Kudos

Hi Philip,

as everyone will recommend - did you try 4.0 instead of 3.2? Just curious about that...

You don´t need SolMan for "just" monitoring, you can set up a central monitoring with a WebAS 7.00 (ABAP) alone, check

http://service.sap.com/monitoring

--> Media Library

--> Documentation

and

--> Media Library

--> Presentations

There are a few very good guides with in-depth information.

However, WebAS ABAP is a complex beast itself so don´t expect a point-and-run installation, but you

definitely

don´t need SolMan for that purpose.

--

Markus

Former Member
0 Kudos

hi martin

i read all the opinions of SDNers. my opinion is when advantages outweighs disadvantages we should obviously accept it.

i request u and markus to once go through the value proposition document of solman.

at present ,if ur landscape is small u cant experience the real taste of solman.what not u can do with solman . from implementation to downloading patches all in one single box that too for whole landscape.

and regarding rkts ,as far i am concerned they were very helpful for me.

and regarding time consumption of installing it ... truly speaking it takes u 20 hrs on a 1 gb ram machine .u can install it on ur domestic resources even.

Former Member
0 Kudos

shabbir,

it sounds like you are sap-employee too !

former_member186439
Participant
0 Kudos

Below is a list of issues we had to work through during our Solution Manager installation. Each of these issues derailed the installation and configuration process by either hours or days. My advice, hire an SAP consultant to help, but make sure he has real experience installing the scenarios that you plan to implement.

- Struggles getting Profile Parameters correctly set.

- Problems with Solaris memory paramters.

- Difficultly creating /configuring RFC destinations using wizards.

- RFC needed to be adjusted to account for Unicode.

- S_USER_GRP (SAP_SV_FDB_NOTIF_BC_ADMIN) permission had to be added to service account used by "back" RFC's.

- Default security on satellite service accounts did not support support Business Partner creation.

- Difficult configuring the Landscape Fetch job to work properly (SMSY_SETUP versus SLDAPICUST).

- Problems getting the solution graphics to display.

- Setup for Business Partners was confusing.

- Undocument requirement for CHARM to use trusted RFC's.

- Difficulties with the SAPJSF account getting locked.

- Difficulty following instructions for applying BC Sets.

- Problems getting "S" accounts setup properly to bring data down from service marketplace.

- Problems configuring Service Level Reports to use data from CCMSPING.

- Problems with CHARM using the wrong RFC destination.

- EarlyWatch SDCCN automatic setup never completely works and has to be completely manually.

markus_doehr2
Active Contributor
0 Kudos

> hi martin

>

> all the opinions of SDNers. my opinion is when

> advantages outweighs disadvantages we should

> obviously accept it.

> i request u and markus to once go through the value

> proposition document of solman.

That is a very abstract document of marketing bla-bla. The main disadvantage is the COERCION of the system, customers have no choice - and no apparent "advantage" will outweight that.

> t present ,if ur landscape is small u cant

> experience the real taste of solman.what not u can do

> with solman . from implementation to downloading

> patches all in one single box that too for whole

> landscape.

who will pay the configuration of that? who will pay the time you need for that? who will pay the "startup pack"?

I was dealing very fine the last 12+ years by "manually" downloading them from the marketplace (earlier sapserv3) - I don't neither need nor want a separate system, that does nothing more than "select" what I will download.

[...]

> and regarding time consumption of installing it ...

> truly speaking it takes u 20 hrs on a 1 gb ram

> machine .u can install it on ur domestic resources

> even.

Sure one can. But you forget, that SolMan is becoming a critical component in the system landscape, because it will be used to deliver legal changes (e. g. for HR) that need to be implemented at a certain point without having to deal with technical and/or other issues. Of course, as playground I could install it "somewhere" and "play" - but you totally forget about the fact that

- it's a separate system you need to maintain (backups, database, patches, notes)

- it will become a critical box - so you also need at least two Solution Managers to "test" your upgrades, patches etc. - or would you apply SPs in a production system?

- the time and resources you need (even if it's "just" the 20 hours for initial installation)

Given the fact, that many bigger customers have a working monitoring, ticketing and maintenance environment why should they install another system? To set a few clicks in the inplace Internet Explorer do add it to the download basket? You can't be serious...

Compare it to you own personal computer at home - if you buy a computer and you are getting urged to buy a second one and pay for it just to download the patches for the first one and to monitor the first one, would you accept that without asking?

--

Markus

Former Member
0 Kudos

Markus thanks for your point of view.

The only correction from this post is that not is neccesary have 2 Solution Managers installed, only "ONE" is needed. The configuration of the system landscape (servers for Development, QA, PROD) is independent from Solution Manager (you define inside SOLMAN the logic of the solutions, you can transport the developments to another systems and sinchronize the distribution -another scenario for complex landscapes).

Regards

Mauricio

markus_doehr2
Active Contributor
0 Kudos

> Markus thanks for your point of view.

>

> The only correction from this post is that not is

> neccesary have 2 Solution Managers installed, only

> "ONE" is needed. The configuration of the system

> landscape (servers for Development, QA, PROD) is

> independent from Solution Manager (you define inside

> SOLMAN the logic of the solutions, you can transport

> the developments to another systems and sinchronize

> the distribution -another scenario for complex

> landscapes).

So you apply support packages for your solution manager system blindly without testing the first in a second system?

--

Markus

Former Member
0 Kudos

Markus, I have to foward this question to other person in my company.

As soons as answer me, reply the comments.

Thanks

Mauricio

Former Member
0 Kudos

After some days, here are the comments:

With a Solution Manager the introduction of new support packages to a productive enviroment has to be planned. Back up strategies has to be made previously and regressions of version in case of failure or errors in the system.

I can't recommend the correct solution because i don't have a technical profile and a deeper analysis always should be done (for ex. a cost-benefit analysis)

Searching for an alternative for reducing costs for the hardware architecture I found the strategy of virtualization.

There are some licensed solutions for virtualization depending of the hardware landscape (for the specific vendors).

Regards

Mauricio

markus_doehr2
Active Contributor
0 Kudos

[...]

> Searching for an alternative for reducing costs for

> the hardware architecture I found the strategy of

> virtualization.

> There are some licensed solutions for virtualization

> depending of the hardware landscape (for the specific

> vendors).

yes - of course you can do VMWare, Solaris Zones, XEN and other solutions but this doesn't diminishes the administrative tasks to be done - and it's additional $$$ (if you buy a virtualization solution).

--

Markus

raguraman_c
Active Contributor
0 Kudos

1. Connecting different systems to two solman systems - let me try to explore and get back to you at the earliest.

You can have 3 system or 2 system landscape for SOLMAN, but it doesn't affect any other system in your landscape. It is only for SOLMAN.

I would appreciate you opening a new thread for any specific questions, instead making this thread bulky and confusing.

--Ragu

markus_doehr2
Active Contributor
0 Kudos

> 1. Connecting different systems to two solman systems

> - let me try to explore and get back to you at the

> earliest.

>

> You can have 3 system or 2 system landscape for

> SOLMAN, but it doesn't affect any other system in

> your landscape. It is only for SOLMAN.

Of course it does - because one connected system can only report to ONE SolMan (in sense of alerting, feedback messages etc.)

>

>

> I would appreciate you opening a new thread for any

> specific questions, instead making this thread bulky

> and confusing.

we are still <b>on topic</b> discussing the necessity of a (or two or three) separate systems for the solution manager.

The most interesting part of this thread for me personally is the fact, <b>that nobody from SAP</b> (at least nobody that I know) is commenting on this. This just leads me to the conclusion that

1. we as customers are right with our opinion and our thoughts and nobody from SAP officially wants to get on the "hot chair" because the decision was made on a different level and is irreversible or

2. the interest of SAP in SolMan is not as big as hyped everywhere

Did anyone from some support for no matter what component ask you to get access to SolMan?

--

Markus

raguraman_c
Active Contributor
0 Kudos

Hi All,

Its not jus' about the installation key that everyone is worried/concerned about. Why can't we accept this as a tool which really pays you off immediately.

SOLMAN is the best one to watch your entire landscape. You will not know its usefulness untill you start using it. You will also come to know the importance once your landscape grows. Even if your landscape is small, it has got a lot to offer you.

Martin - SAP doesn't make it mandatory as any marketing strategy, it gives SOLMAN for free. The EWA which has been used at SAP for your systems, will now would be generated from you rSOLMAN. SAP Support thru' SOLMAN. SAP Note applying using Notes Assistant of SOLMAN, which would reduce your workload of going through hefty notes, analysing pre-requisite, going thru' side effects, removing all these pains and lot more.

then WHY NOT a own system?

--Ragu

Former Member
0 Kudos

why not a own system ?

it takes a lot of disk space, it needs resources from the server, and most important: our outsouring partner wants 650,-- euros each month for 'servicing' the solution manager ! thats the point !

raguraman_c
Active Contributor
0 Kudos

lot of disk space? no not at all, you can install in 70GB HDD, single processor, with 1-2 GB RAM. 650 Euros? - try if you can have any inhouse resource. It doesn't require much of maintenance work and any how its not going to stop your business, its gonna support your business.

--Ragu

Former Member
0 Kudos

70 gb is a lot of disk space.........specially when you want to install it on the test-server, where also sap-test-system is running.

the problem is that it was NOT planned. we have a 'sap erp-upgrade-project', and NOBODY told us about the 'MUST HAVE' about the sol. manager. thats the point that i am a little bit angry about.

raguraman_c
Active Contributor
0 Kudos

Hi,

Its really sad that no one told you about that, you can't blame anyone even SAP because it was insisting since 4.7 All you can blame is the marketing guy who came to you.

but you have got to upgrade, keep watching the industry. Anyhow all the best, don't take it as a grudge and implement SOLMAN, enjoy the features of SOLMAN, then you will enjoy this with your upgrade project. And moreover SOLMAN also supports you to have proper project planning for your upgrade/implamentation project.

all the best.

Feel free to revert back.

--Ragu

markus_doehr2
Active Contributor
0 Kudos

I asked the same question to our sales rep, I posted here in the forum, asked the "complain department" but no real answer, just, that we are urged to install and maintain it.

For certain customers it may be a real benefit, but for most of them it's just an additional system that needs to be maintained, backed up, patched - just for end in itself generating installation and upgrade keys and downloading support stacks.

Don't ask further, SAP insists and you need to do it, whether you want or not. They don't care if you have enough manpower, enough time and money to pay a consultant to set it up, a system that THEY want, not the customers.

SolMan is complex as hell, the iTutors on http://service.sap.com/rkt-solman are showing an ideal lab environment, everything works, everything is nice and nifty but reality is different - VERY different.

Maybe some day SAP will recognize, that coercing (small and medium size) companies to install such a complex system is not the way to go. I doubt that at 2nd of april all customers will have that installation done and set up working.

--

Markus

Former Member
0 Kudos

thank you markus, you are exactly hitting the point !

we have a sap-system with 130 users, only using fi/co and hr.

so for sap we are just 'a small fish'.

and thats the reason why i don't understand to install the whole **** just for getting patches and updates. i don't need all the other stuff the sol.man. is offering.

reg, Martin

former_member186439
Participant
0 Kudos

I completely agree with Markus. SolMan is complex as hell. It does the customer no good when SAP employees (Ragu) keep indicating that this installation is easy when it is not. It tooks us three months to do what some SAP employees indicated should take as little as three days. Maybe three days if your only goal is to generate installation keys. Releasing Maintenance Optimizer in January and requiring customers to have it working by April should have a lot of customers howling mad. We would be howling if we had not already completed our basic installation. Of course, we installed Stack 9 and Maintenance Optimizer doesn't work, but what else is new with this poorly executed product.

markus_doehr2
Active Contributor
0 Kudos

I talked to our sales reps just a few minute ago - and he was really stunned hearing, that SolMan is now mandatory. He said that only about 30 % of his customers have SolMan installed, 70 % do not have it. Apparently that information did not yet get through to the Sales Department...

I'm now wondering if the SAP consulting and the partners have enough resources and power to install that for all those customers in the next two months (if they use a NW2004s product).

--

Markus

Former Member
0 Kudos

yes markus, again you are right !

our outsourcing partner has A LOT of sap-customers, and they said they never heard about that sol.man. will be mandatory.

and my sap-consultant told me that every company got a LETTER, where this information was distributed.

i dont know WHO in our company got that letter, and maybe YOU don't know it too, right ?

markus_doehr2
Active Contributor
0 Kudos

Steven: 100 % ack.

I think if I would care my 10 hours of worktime every day dealing with SolMan I would also tell everyone, it's nice and that it indeed does work, but that's not my main business and I do not intend to change it.

If one ever tried to upgrade from 3.2 to 4.0 with 10+ ABAP-components, parallel ABAP + Java upgrade, 80+ notes and he is still telling, that it is "easy to maintain", it's nothing but a pure lie.

It's basically comparable to an SD consultant, who is now urged to customize HR just by using help.sap.com, /notes and /rkt.

And yes - I am (also) upset about that and it's really nice to hear, that not only me is having an issue with that.

--

Markus

markus_doehr2
Active Contributor
0 Kudos

> and my sap-consultant told me that every company got

> a LETTER, where this information was distributed.

>

> i dont know WHO in our company got that letter, and

> maybe YOU don't know it too, right ?

I got that letter - last friday, dated 01/25/2007.

It's also correct that one needed the SolMan to generate an installation key (for all products starting from ERP2004 (AFAIK)) - but it's all that.

At the end of last year I read by accident on service.sap.com/solutionmanager about "Maintenance Optimizer" - and I was stumped what that would mean for us - but I didn't knew (at that point) that it would become that bad.

--

Markus

raguraman_c
Active Contributor
0 Kudos

Hi,

Check my reply and others' aswell in this thread.

Feel free to revert back.

--Ragu

Former Member
0 Kudos

thanks for the link, BUT:

i still have no answer if it is a MUST to have sol. manager. the 'key' which is needed for installation, we will get in another way as i heard from sap.

so why should i use sol.manager, when i don't need it ????

Former Member
0 Kudos

Hello Martin,

to get an installation key for productive systems you need to have Solution Manager.

Best regards

Jürgen

Former Member
0 Kudos

hi Jürgen,

no, we don't have a sol.manager now and we will begin to upgrade to mysap ERP 2005 tomorrow ! and sap told us that we can get the key from somewhere else ! but from april 2007 on we have to use it.

so this is still my question: is it a MUST to have sol.manager or not ? the installation takes place without ! and SAP will do it itself tomorrow, so they have to know !

reg, Martin

DoloresCorrea
Product and Topic Expert
Product and Topic Expert
0 Kudos

Hello Martin,

In the installation guides you can see that to have a SOLMAN system is a requisite for the installation, mainly because of the installation key.

However since April 2006 it is also mandatory to have a SOLMAN system installed if you want to get the ERP 2005 stacks to maintain your ERP 2005 system.

Kind regards,

Dolores