Working with Migration Tools

The SAP BW/4HANA Readiness Check is a self-service offered by SAP. After implementing a few SAP notes, you are able to collect relevant data into a ZIP file, which can then be uploaded into an SAP cloud service that generates a Readiness Check cockpit. The cockpit covers three dimensions which give valuable details about the current system as a foundation to discuss future approaches towards SAP BW/4HANA:

1. Object Compatibility (aka Simplification Objects): This tile represents a compatibility check scanning your complete SAP BW 7.x system for all types of BW objects (TLOGOs). For each BW object type, the check counts the number of instances, for example, the number of InfoCubes, configured in your system and determines whether the objects are compatible with SAP BW/4HANA. Incompatible objects are split between objects that can be converted automatically—you can see which tool to use in the detailed view - and objects that will require a manual redesign (or a deletion). If incompatible objects are found, the corresponding simplification item and a link to its documentation is displayed. If you want a detailed analysis that tells you which individual objects (on line-item) in your system are compatible with SAP BW/4HANA can be converted automatically or need manual re-design, install and run the Pre-Checks (see below).You can also download the generated list to a MS Excel file, which enables you to easily cluster the listed object types into following clusters:

   1. Incompatible 3.x objects supported by the corresponding migration tool (transaction RSMIGRATE).

   2. Incompatible objects supported by the SAP BW/4HANA Transfer Tools.

   3. Incompatible objects that will be automatically deleted during the conversion process (for example, 0TCT-objects of the BW technical content)

   4. Incompatible objects that require manual re-design or additional manual activities

   5. All compatible objects are listed as well.

2. Add-On Compatibility: This check shows how many add-ons are installed in your system and whether they are compatible with SAP BW/4HANA. Not compatible add-ons have to be removed during an in-place conversion, so this information might have a decisive impact for the choice of the conversion approach. In the detail view, you find the names of the add-ons, the vendor (SAP, third party on SAP price list, third party unknown), and the compatibility status. This helps you to figure out whether you need to follow up with SAP third-party vendors to ensure the SAP BW/4HANA compatibility of an add-on. For more details about add-on compatibility, see SAP note 2189708.

3. Database Sizing: Here you find information about the total sizing estimation for SAP BW/4HANA. The values on the tile reflect the estimated size requirements for the initial installation (initial target size, ITS) of SAP BW/4HANA, based on the data in your system. For a more detailed analysis of the sizing report results, as well as a description of the results, please see SAP note 2296290. The sizing information is especially important when the initial system is not running on SAP HANA. If SAP BW is running on SAP HANA already, the expected HANA sizing for SAP BW/4HANA will be roughly the same.

4. Source System Readiness: This part validates whether the current source systems are supported in SAP BW/4HANA. For connected SAP sources the ODP framework is checked for example. Source types which are not supported in SAP BW/4HANA like DB-Connect, UD-Connect, WebService etc. will also be listed here with hints how to replace them.

5. Custom Code Check: You can also validate customer code in various areas for SAP BW/4HANA readiness. Typical challenges occur if customer coding refers to tables, table types or data elements which do stop existing in SAP BW/4HANA. Those occurrences will be highlighted in Transformation Rules, Update Rules, InfoPackage Filter Routines, DTP Filter Routines, Reports or Function Modules.

Please refer to following sources regarding setup and generation of the SAP BW/4HANA Readiness Check:

• SAP help portal for Readiness Checks https://help.sap.com/docs/SAP_READINESS_CHECK
• SAP note 2575059: SAP BW Note Analyzer for SAP Readiness Check for SAP BW/4HANA
• Blog: New Version of SAP Readiness Check for SAP BW/4HANA is now live https://community.sap.com/t5/technology-blogs-by-sap/new-version-of-sap-readiness-check-for-sap-bw-4hana-is-now-live/ba-p/13504387

The SAP BW/4HANA Transfer Cockpit (transaction RSB4HCONV) provides several tools to prepare and execute the transfer of SAP BW applications into SAP BW/4HANA-compliant objects and enables customers to get the system in shape for a conversion to SAP BW/4HANA. The most valuable is the so-called Pre-Check which lists all non-compatible BW objects on a line-item level, including the technical names. If the SAP BW/4HANA Transfer Cockpit is not available due to the low release of the current SAP BW system, these Pre-Check tools can also be installed individually.

As a follow-up of the SAP BW/4HANA Readiness Check, it is normally required to analyze compatibility of objects in your current system in much more detail because this provides valuable insights for the decision towards the best-suited conversion path. The SAP BW/4HANA Pre-Checks provide a detailed list of all objects in a system that need to be taken care of.

Depending on your release level, the SAP BW/4HANA Pre-Checks are available in the in following ways:

• To report RS_B4HANA_CONVERSION_CONTROL in older SAP BW releases, see SAP note 2448571.

• In SAP BW 7.5, there is the SAP BW/4HANA Transfer Cockpit (transaction RSB4HCONV), where you start the Pre-Checks by selecting the option to Execute Pre-Checks in the Prepare section. It can be setup via the BW Note Analyzer and SAP note 2383530.

• The most up-to-date version comes with a new report RS_B4HANA_RC which includes a new type of pre-check (starting from BW 7.30 SP21, 7.40 SP24, 7.50 SP18, SAP note 2777672). See also this blog: https://community.sap.com/t5/technology-blogs-by-members/at-last-a-readable-bw-4hana-readiness-check-report/ba-p/13433869 .

Additional features of the Prepare Phase provided by the SAP BW/4HANA Transfer Cockpit include:

1. Run Sizing Report (report /SDF/HANA_BW_SIZING); all details available in SAP note 2296290 (New Sizing report for SAP BW/4HANA) and its attachments.
2. Scan Coding (report RS_B4HANA_CODE_SCAN); see more information in SAP note 2462639 (BW/4HANA Interfaces and Customer-Specific ABAP Development).
3. Execute Cleanup Reports (Tasklist RS_B4H_CHK_CLEANUP).

Finally, there is an additional helpful tool available to facilitate your housekeeping activities in regard to cleaning up the SAP BW system: Report RS_DELETE_TLOGO lists (almost) all existing TLOGO objects and provides an efficient way to delete them. However, be careful using it because you do not want to remove objects that are still needed.

For most of the SAP BW classic modeling object types, the automatic conversion to SAP BW/4HANA modeling objects is supported by SAP BW/4HANA Transfer tools.

• InfoProviders are converted into SAP BW/4HANA InfoProviders as follows:
  • DataStore Objectsare converted to DataStore Objects (advanced).
  • InfoCubes are converted to DataStore Objects (advanced).
  • MultiProviders are converted to CompositeProviders.
  • InfoSets are converted to CompositeProviders.
• Service-API (S-API) DataSource are moved to Operational Data Provisioning (ODP_SAP).
• PSA is now obsolete but, if still required, can be converted to a DataStore Object (advanced).
• Transformations and Data Transfer Processes (DTP) are re-generated retaining the same logic.
• InfoPackages are converted to DTPs.
• Process Chainsare adapted (e.g. new DTPs, new variants for activation, etc.)
• Compatibility Views are created for legacy DataStore Objects (see below for details).
• Technical Names remain the same (in the Shell conversion approach, they can be changed, see in later lesson).
• Request IDsare transferred into the new request management.
• The transfer of Authorizations is supported as well.

Note

• BW Queries and re-usable query components such as Filters, Restricted and Calculated Key Figures, Structures, and Variables remain unchanged, but are now maintained only in the SAP BW/4HANA Modeling Tools in Eclipse.
• 3.x Data Flow objects have to be migrated to 7.x data flow objects first. For that, the transaction RSMIGRATE (since BW7.0) can be used, but not for 3.x Hierarchy data flows.
• Analysis Processes(Analysis Process Designer APD) are transferred with an additional tool, transaction RSB4HAPD.

The SAP BW/4HANA transfer tools also provide sophisticated methods to convert applications into SAP BW/4HANA compatible ones while keeping inbound and outbound interfaces stable. Depending on the conversion approach, the data is taken care of, which means loading requests are moved into the new Request Management and reporting remains unchanged.

In case of customer-specific enhancements, such as ABAP routines in transformations processing lookups on tables of DataStore Objects (classic) of type Standard, so-called Compatibility Views are created for the inbound and active table to provide a non-disruptive interface. Find more details in this blog post https://community.sap.com/t5/technology-blogs-by-sap/some-interesting-facts-of-compatibility-views-in-sap-bw-4hana-and-sap-s/ba-p/13542675 .

In the following example, you see the changes after the transfer into SAP BW/4HANA-compatible objects. The object in scope was the InfoCube initially, but due to dependencies many more objects have been impacted:

• The InfoCube has been replaced by a DataStore Object (advanced) with same technical name and modeling parameters.

• The MultiProvider has been replaced by a CompositeProvider with same technical name.

• All BW queries referring the MultiProvider remain unchanged and, as such, all reporting objects using them also remain unchanged.

• Both transformations into the InfoCube have been recreated with new technical names. However, they keep the same logic of mappings and routines. Now their target object is the new DataStore Object (advanced).

• Process chains covering this data flow might also be updated. If the process chain covers a compression of InfoCube requests, this one has been replaced by the equivalent successor process variant for DataStore Object (advanced) (Clean up ADSO).

For the following tools and object types which are not supported in SAP BW/4HANA, no conversion tool support is available. Manual redesign is required: