Manage modeling content

An export of modeling content can be executed at different levels of a project structure, and applied to either a single file or a folder. After selecting a file or folder, you use the File → Download feature. You can also right-click the file or folder and choose Download in the context menu.

• A single design-time file is exported/downloaded as is, with the source file name and extension.

• A folder within the project structure (up to the project folder itself) is exported/downloaded as a .tar archive.

  To export an entire project opened as a workspace, you can right-click the blank area below the file structure and choose Download. You can also choose all the files and folders under the root of the project and choose File → Download.

• Several files and/or folders can be selected and exported/downloaded as a single .tar archive.

Corresponding to the export, you can either import an individual file or a .zip or .tar archive. Three features are available for that:

• Drag and drop from your file system into the Explorer view. Archives such as .zip and .tar files are not extracted. This can be done in command line in a terminal window.
• Upload Files (from the File menu) and Explorer view context menu. Archives are not extracted.
• Import (from the Welcome page) or Import Project(from the File menu). .zip and .tar archives will be extracted.
  Caution

  If the content you import is an entire project, for example a proj1.tar archive, you need to open the projects folder first, so that the imported project becomes a child of that folder: projects/proj1

After importing a project, you need to open its root folder as a workspace, or to add to a multiroot workspace. Please refer to the lesson, Creating a Project in SAP Business Application Studio.

When you copy/paste a design-time file within the same folder, you must provide a different name for the copy. This isn't the case if you copy/paste a file to a different folder where there isn't a file with the same name.

However, in any case, the content of the design-time file isn't modified at all. Which means you have in your HDB module two design-time files with identical content.

At least, you must ensure that you rename all the runtime objects defined in the design-time file to make these objects unique in the whole HDB module. And, if needed, you must also change the namespace according to the target folder namespace settings.

When moving modeling content, one key rule that you must think about is the namespace setting of the target folder.

• If the namespace settings for source and target folder are the same, moving the file has no particular impact on objects that reference the moved object.

  However, a deployment of the moved object can be successful only if the deploy scope includes the source folder, in order to execute/acknowledge the deletion of the moved file in its source folder. If not, the deployment will fail.

• If the namespace settings for source and target folder are different, you must at least adapt the namespace. In this case, you must first perform an impact analysis to check whether some existing objects reference the one you're about to move.

For the HDI deployer, renaming a design-time file is like deleting a design-time file and creating a new one with the same content. You must be aware of the following rules and recommendations:

• A design-time file that creates only one core runtime object (for example, a calculation view or a table function) should always have the same name as the runtime object it defines. For example, after renaming the design-time of a calculation view, it's recommended to also change its ID in the code by opening the ID of the runtime object.

  This isn't a technical requirement, but rather a best practice to keep your design-time content readable.

• You must check if database objects reference the object you plan to rename. Generally speaking, renaming objects that have dependencies requires modification to the references to this object in other objects. Ideally, you should do this only on exception, because it's error-prone, or limit this practice to test objects, typically when you copy – and rename – an existing object in order to test changes you make to this object while keeping the source object.

• You must be particularly careful with partial deployments. If you rename an object that was already built and had dependencies, the renamed file is seen by the HDI deployer as a new design-time. The original design-time file will be seen as deleted by the HDI deployer only when you deploy either the entire HDB module, or any of it subfolders that contains the renamed file.

Deleting modeling content can have surprising effects, especially in case of partial deployments. Indeed, the deleted design-time file is only seen as deleted by the HDI deployer when you deploy the entire HDB module, or any of the subfolders that contained the deleted file.

In other words, the smallest deploy scope you can think of, in order to validate the deletion of a design-time file, is the folder in which the deleted file was located. So, even if it's empty, this folder is extremely precious.

Indeed, if you delete this folder as well, you can only validate the deletion of the design-time files it contained by deploying a parent folder. Suppose that this parent folder issrc folder and it contains one (or several) models that you know can't be built at the moment (for whatever reason).

Therefore, when deleting modeling content, you should apply the following best practices:

• Before deleting a design-time file, always perform an impact analysis.

• Before deleting a folder, always perform a partial deployment at this folder level. If the deployment is successful, it means that all the runtime objects that were defined in design-time files from this folder have actually been (successfully) deleted.

SAP Business Application Studio offers several find/search and replace features that are useful to manage the renaming of objects and the code adjustments that must be performed manually.

• Within the Code Editor, you can use Edit → Find (Ctrl+F) or Edit → Replace (Ctrl+H) to locate easily (and replace if needed) the ID of an object.

• You can also use the Search view to look for a particular text string within the content of the design-time files. You can directly open a design-time time from the search results (not from the file name, but from one of the search hits within the file content).

  The Toggle search details button (…) allows you to define file/folder patterns to include and/or exclude.

• From the Explorer view, you can also right-click a folder and choose Find in folder. This will invoke the same Search view, but this time the folder you choose is defined as the "root" for the search.
• Another useful search feature is available for the file names inside the Explorer view. Just select an element (folder, file) in the workspace, or the blank area below, and start typing a string to search. A fuzzy search tool shows up, allowing you to highlight or filter matching file names.