Misc. questions about SAP's SOA software

[Former Member]

Hello,

I am a computer science student at the Fachhochschule Aachen in Germany and I'm writing my master thesis about serviceoriented architectures.

Amongst other products I plan to present what SAP has to offer for SOA. But I'm missing some information, which I couldn't find at the website. I hope somebody can help me with my questions:

1) What are the products you need for building a basic SOA? Is the Application Server + Business Intelligence + Exchange Infrastructure enough? And how about something like an ESB? Is Exchange Infrastructure an ESB?

2) In my thesis I describe several standards that help with serviceoriented architectures. I want to check if these standards are implemented and if they are, in which product, which version and how extensively? These standards are:

- WS-Policy, WS-Adressing

- JBI (Java Business Integration)

- SCA/SDO (Service Component Architecture/Service Data Objects)

- BPEL (Business Process Execution Language)

- WS-CDL (Web Service Choreography Description Language)

Are there other important (open) standards i didn't mention (other than the real basic stuff, WSDL, SOAP etc)?

3) What tools does SAP provide for testing and debugging the services and processes?

4) What tools does SAP provide for Business Process Management? What about process modelling?

5) What support does SAP provide for new customers, that are building their first SOA?

I know there is much documentation about all this stuff, but this will take only 2-3 pages of my thesis, so I don't have time to read hundreds of pages of documentation.

Every help would be appreciated. Thanks in advance.

[Former Member · Accepted solution]

Ok let me try...

1) One of the Key building blogs will be the SAP NetWeaver Process Integration 7.1. Its provides the ES Repository for Service Metadata and the ES Registry for the Service Endpoints. The Registry you use for finding and classifcation of your services. Any yes XI/PI could be used as ESB.

Another keybuilding block is the SAP NetWeaver Composition Enviroment 7.1. This one is used at Design and Runtime for Composite Process, Composite Views and Composite Application which consume Enterprise Services.

2) WS-Poilcy, WS-Adressing and BPEL is defenetly supported with PI 7.1(release planned for september 2007)

3) This a part of the NetWeaver Composition Enviroment. For Monitoring you need brokered Service communication... in this case you can use PI as integration Broker which is able to monitor your communication.

4) Exacutable Business Process(BPEL) are supported by PI 7.1

You are able to Design these processes with the Design tools of the PI.

For Highlevel Process modeling ARIS for SAP Netweaver is integrated.

So from High Level Process models drill down to theService Operations are all part of the Enterprise Service Repository and can be used to realise you business tasks.

5) SAP provide the ES Workplace and SAP Discovery System for Enterprise SOA

regards,

Robin

[former_member184494 · Accepted solution]

Some more information....

3) What tools does SAP provide for testing and debugging the services and processes?

As said - there are CATTS but then I am not sure how CATTS are used in the context of Services - have seen them being used for transactions - however the JAVA Web Application Server (WAS) provides for detailed logging of the web services and the Java Admin provides for the same and the same debugging can be done through the GUI via HTTP sessions also.

4) What tools does SAP provide for Business Process Management? What about process modelling?

Processes can be modeled using ARIS and then integrated with netweaver and processes can be modeled this way. You can find more details on this on "ARIS for Netweaver" topics on SDN

5) What support does SAP provide for new customers, that are building their first SOA?

SAP provides prebuilt IT scenarios which can be deployed and current EPR versions come with these IT scenarios that can be deployed with quick effect and are mmodelled on common business processes , and more specific versions are available with the IS offerings.

Arun

[Former Member]

First off, thank you very much for your help.

But there are a couple other questions:

1) I'm still not sure how PI fits into NetWeaver. In a marketing pdf I read, that PI is based on Exchange Infrastructure. But why is XI listed here, and PI not?: http://www.sap.com/platform/netweaver/components/index.epx ? Is it not a part of NetWeaver?

2) You talked about ARIS for NetWeaver. Is this included in NetWeaver? Is it the only tool for process modelling?

3) I read on the website that NetWeaver is compatible to .NET. What exactly does this mean? I don't think it's support for WCF, but what else? Using an Web Service, which is coded with .NET should always work, right?

Message was edited by:

Fabian Weisensee

[Former Member]

hi,

PI replaced XI in the new releases.

There was Netweaver 2004 .. there it was called XI 3.0

With NetWeaver 7.0(2004s) .. there is is called PI 7.0.

It had the same features just a different name.

In future there will be only PI 7.1. But in many documentatios you still find the shorty XI.

Of Course you can connect to .NET Webservices with NetWeaver. Netweaver supports the normal Webservice Standart (SOAP+WSDL).

But you can't deploy .NET Webservices on NetWeaver Application Server. This one only supports ABAP and JAVA.

There is a .NET Developerkit for the Enterprise Portal.. so you are able to develop Portal Components and Services with .NET.

regards,

Robin

[Former Member]

Hi,

For testing SAP provides an inbuilt tool called ECATT.Other than that we can use QTP,Test partner..

With Regards,

Sudha