Archive for October, 2006
Mastering Enterprise SOA With SAP NetWeaver and mySAP ERP
October 29, 2006Reference Model for Service Oriented Architecture (SOA-RM) Approved
October 29, 2006Bönnen, C.; Herger, M.: SAP NetWeaver Visual Composer. First Edition, Bonn: Galileo Press, 2007. - German Edition fi rst published October 2006
Today I received my pre-ordered copy of the newly published Visual Composer book from SAP PRESS. At Amazon it still has pre-ordering status but this will change for sure during the next days.
The authors:
The book is written by Carsten Bönnen who is Product Manager for Visual Composer as well as Mario Herger who works on the structuring of the new Business Process Expert community and who might already be known from his previous book SAP xApps and the Composite Application Framework.
Overview:
The book starts with a short introduction about Visual Composer (VC) as a model-driven tool, an explanation of model-driven development and where it is especially used at SAP (SAP NetWeaver Business Intelligence (BI), Web Dynpro, Composite Application Framework, Visual Composer). Afterwards the architecture of Visual Composer is presented, which consists of the three main components VC Storyboard, VC Server and NetWeaver Portal.
The next chapter introduces all elements available in Visual Composer. Although much of this chapter is also similarly available in the VC Modeler’s Guide and the VC Reference Guide, it provides a good overview with compact explanations and thus is a very useful starting reference for modeling own VC applications.
The focus of the book is on chapter 6 (100 pages) and chapter 7 (119 pages). Chapter 6 provides a hands-on example for creating VC applications. It presents the elements introduced in chapter 5 in action using easy understandable scenarios like the sales order scenario or the well-know flight scenario. Chapter 7 explaines the BI Kit and shows how to use the relevant tools available in Visual Composer. It also offers a few examples on how to integrate Visual Composer applications with BI UI elements and knowledge management document storages.
A more wholistic few on the creation of VC applications is taken in the application lifecycle chapter. Here aspects like transporting, down porting, upgrading, versioning, personalization, localization, testing and monitoring are examined.
The last two chapters finally shortly present three business examples from SAP xApp Analytics (Chapter 9) and the link between Visual Composer and Enterprise SOA (Chapter 10).
Chapters of the book:
(As the chapters differ very much in size, I wrote the number of pages in brackets for better orientation)
- Introduction (7)
- SAP NetWeaver Visual Composer (29)
- Model-Driven Development (11)
- Architecture and Concepts (24)
- Visual Composer Basics (87)
- Building Applications (100)
- Analytical Applications (119)
- Application Lifecycle (28)
- Business Examples (7)
- Visual Composer and Enterprise SOA (4)
Final Assessment:
The book has a practical focus which is supported by a lot of screenshots. All in all I recommend it to anyone who thinks about acitvely working with Visual Composer.
CouchSurfing
October 21, 2006Wiki launched on SAP Developer Network
October 20, 2006Woods, D.; Mattern, T.: Enterprise SOA : Designing IT for Business Innovation. First Edition, Sebastopol: O’Reilly, 2006
Although not published through SAP Press and not visible otherwise from the front cover, one clearly has to state that this is a book which is discussing the SAP view on enterprise SOA / ESA. Dan Woods was already author of the first book about Enterprise Services Architecture published in 2003 (German version 2004: Enterprise Services Architecture). For this new book now he gets support from Thomas Mattern, which is the Solution Marketing Manager for ESA at SAP. This might be a little hint.
Short assessment: If you are already using SAP technology or if you are thinking about using it in the future, this book will give an overview and serve as a good entry point to get informed about new visions, concepts and products at SAP. If you just want to get informed about SOA and already know that you won’t implement your SOA using SAP technology, better keep on searching as large parts of the book are product focused.
Chapters of the book:
- ESA in the World of Information Technology
- The Business Case for ESA
- Evolving Toward ESA
- ESA Fundamentals: Learning to Think ESA
- The Structure of ESA
- The Enterprise Services Community
- Creating a Roadmap with the ESA Adoption Program
- The Enterprise Services Repository and the Enterprise Services Inventory
- Project Mendocino: A Product Based on Consuming Enterprise Services
- ESA at Work: Examples from the Field
- SAP xApps Composite Applications for Analytics
- The Architecture and Development Tools of Composite Applications
- Supporting Composite Applications
- Web Services Basics
- Creating Enterprise Services in ABAP
- Creating and Consuming Services in Java
- ESA and IT Governance
- ESA Life Cycle Management and Operations
- ESA Security
- Standards and ESA
Do expect:
- answers to questions you might have
- practical guidance supported by screenshots and images
- a business-oriented introduction why enterprise SOA is important
- to get an overview of SAP visions, applications, tools, consulting services and community initiatives in the context of SOA
Don’t expect:
- good structuring
- precise definitions of terms, concepts and technologies
- academical examination of SOA
- vendor-neutrality
SAP Visual Composer
October 18, 2006As a fellow student at my university is starting his diploma thesis on Visual Composer in connection with Enterprise Portal (EP), Business Intelligence (BI) and R/3, here a really short summary as well as the most important links.
“SAP NetWeaver Visual Composer allows you to compose model-based business applications in a flexible way — without manual coding.” (Source: sap.com)
As my graphic from the previous post shows, Visual Composer (VC) is in the context of enterprise SOA used for development of user interfaces. Model-based here really means that you create visual model items on the Visual Composer storyboard and link them by a line to create mappings between items. The model is saved in an XML format. When you deploy it to the server the respective code is generated. This has the big advantage that you are independent of UI technologies. You can define in the deployment options which output should be generated. Currently there exist options for Web Dynpro and Flash/Flex but of course more options might be added over time.
I really like the way the VC works. Compared to other SAP tools it is very handy and concise. For example you can just drag&drop your layout items (like forms and tables) from the sidebar onto the storyboard. Or in case you drop out from a data service a context menu opens which lets you choose an item by which the result should be displayed. The big disadvantage of VC is that as the code is generated automatically you have no chance to add own coding in case Visual Composer does not offer a certain functionality. Of course, VC is thought to be for business analysts or business process experts but in case they would need more functionality or different layout items programmers can’t help out. So if the functionality of Visual Composer is not enough for a certain project, all you can do is to switch to Web Dynpro freestyle development with NetWeaver Developer Studio.
I already mentioned data services. Visual Composer is not just about user interface design. In fact you can model whole applications. Visual Composer offers different connectors to data services. So there is a BI connector, JDBC connector, Web Service connector and so forth.
So once you have defined the connection parameters for your data service, you can drag&drop a specific service operation/query on your storyboard just like normal UI elements. In case the service needs input you place for example a form in front of it where the user can type in the required data, after the service you place for example a table where the output is diplayed. Especially for the use with BI there exist a lot of different graphical elements such as pie charts, gauge etc.
You can also define different layers in your model and the transition between layers. So for example you type in your data in the form, click the submit button, the form disappears and instead the result shows up in the table. For this transition there exist different possibilities which can easily configured, for example a wizard style (which shows the steps involved), tab style (so when you click on the second tab you see the table) and many more.
The output you generate with Visual Composer is an iView or page which is deployed to the portal environment. There you can use it like every other element created directly in the portal. But like my graphic from the previous post shows you can also use the VC element as one step in a bigger process and add it as a callable object to Guided Procedures where you define roles for the process step.
To bring output from SAP Business Warehouse (BW) into the portal, the BI connector is needed. I just worked with web services so far but I assume it is the same with BI querys. To access the R/3 you probably have to connect via BAPIs, iDocs or RFCs. Maybe the xAPP Analytics might be of interest as well. I don’t know it in detail but as it is a product I assume that a lot of scenarios are already modeled ready for use and can be adapted if needed.
The best resource for Visual Composer is the Visual Composer section at SDN. There are a lot of documents, including links to how-to guides, to the VC forum and VC Blogs. The Visual Composer Modeler’s Guide might be a good start.
And of course, there is the first Visual Composer book coming out in a few days.
Enterprise SOA with SAP NetWeaver 2004s
October 18, 2006Enterprise SOA currently is a very important topic at SAP and most SAP presentations you get to see (for example at SAPTeched which was starting today in Amsterdam) will probably include information and graphics about enterprise SOA, NetWeaver and the Business Process Platform. However, I made the experience that those graphics are either very simple (don’t provide information about included components, tool names etc.) or they focus on a specific application like Application Server, Exchange Infrastructure or Composite Application Framework. Thus for me it was very hard at the beginning to understand the coherences and differences between NetWeaver applications and to get an overall understanding what enterprise SOA means in terms of SAP tools and applications. Therefore I created my own picture which I extended over time. Of course it does not include all details but the chosen granualirity was a good basis for the discussions I had in the area of enterprise SOA. So here it is, maybe it’s of some help for you as well:
Enterprise SOA with SAP NetWeaver 2004s
The graphic might be a bit complex when you first see it but this is how the application reality in the context of enterprise SOA is. For the most important applications you find the respective development tools at the side in a box with striped background. The graphic also gives an orientation which applications are on the same layer. You see for example that web services can be created with XI or CAF Core, processes with ccBPM or Guided Procedures. So it might be interesting to explore the differences.
In case the graphic is helpful or you have an idea how to improve it, you can of course leave me a comment.
Book review: Service Orient or Be Doomed! (Bloomberg, Schmelzer)
October 15, 2006Bloomberg, J.; Schmelzer, R.: Service Orient or Be Doomed! : How Service Orientation Will Change Your Business. First Edition, Hoboken: Wiley, 2006
The exceptional title lets already assume that this book is different from others in the area of service orientation - and yes, it is!
As the authors state, their approach to the topic is that “this is a book about business concepts, where the business concept at hand is how companies can best leverage technology resources to meet their business goals.” They want to talk “about a range of business problems that are preventing companies from being efficient and competitive and then discuss the new approach [they] call Service Orientation to leveraging business resources to solve those problems”. So although there is a lot of technology in the book the approach is different. Whereas typical business/IT books according to Bloomberg and Schmelzer take the approach “Here’s some great technology, now let’s see what we can do with it”, they prefer the way “Here are some difficult business problems, let’s come up with a great way to solve them”. So when talking about IT, they are talking about “a set of business resources available to solve business problems”. The motivation for it is that “Service Orientation and the related technology concept Service-Oriented Architecture (SOA) are new approaches for businesses to leverage technology in a flexible, agile manner.” Therefore they want to “free this powerful concept from the clutches of the techies”.
By the way, the difference between “techies” (nerds / geeks / technologists) and “suits” (business people) is discussed very intensively at the beginning, so although the differences for sure exist, after a while I couldn’t here it anymore and got a bit bored. But maybe that’s because considering my studies (Business Informatics) I would classify myself more into those “technology/business crossovers”. So if neither business nor IT is completly new to you and you also heard about service orientation and the evolution of the internet before, you can jump directly into chapter four or five.
Maybe that’s the way business books are written, but (as an academic or a techie:) one has to be aware that not only the title is different from other SOA books I’ve seen before but also the way the content is written. The writing style is rather colloquial and the topics are introduced broadly. “It’s a pretty heavy concept that has far-reaching business implications. To explain it, therefore, let’s step back and tell a tale.” This statement found at the beginning of chapter 5 before explaining the concept of loose coupling, in my opinion is also true for most other parts of the book. So although there is a “Jargon Watch” to shortly clarify important terms which are touched while explaining, the terms which are really important in the context of the book (loose coupling, service orientation, architecture, …) are explained throughout several pages and including many aspects but unfortunately without a short summary or definition at the end. There are only one cost chart, three graphics (showing a “rats’ nest”, SOA view model and the two spheres of service oriented development) as well as one unreadable picture of the Zachman Framework, which in my opinion is not very much in order to back up the message of a whole book. But enough with those formal aspects now, because I really don’t want to say that the style is not good. It’s just important to know what to expect when ordering online.
Because in fact the content of this book is really good. The authors seem to have a lot of experience in the area of service orientation and in my opinion the approach from the business side (or the user side) they take is very important and useful. Not to say that IT-related problems like communication protocols, transaction concepts or security aspects should not be discussed in the SOA context (both sorts of books are needed) but I think its better to have first a clear vision what is best from the business or users perspective before thinking about how to get there by means of technology. Otherwise it can get very narrow-minded as you maybe don’t detect new possibilities at all because the technology might not (yet!) be ready to solve the problems completly in an easy manner.
The book includes the following chapters:
- The Business Inflexibility Trap
- If You’re in a Hole, the First Thing to Do Is Stop Digging
- What Really Happened to eBusiness
- What Do You Want Your IT to Do, Anyway?
- The Secret Sauce: Loose Coupling
- Service Orientation: Light at the End of the Tunnel
- Is There an Architect in the House?
- How to Think Service Oriented
- Okay, So Where Do We Start?
- Tackling the Inertia in the Organization
- Build Agility with Agility
- Becoming a Service-Oriented Enterprise
My advice for this book: Go and get it, it really stands out from other books in the way service orientation is described. I would even say it is useful not just for “suits” but also for “techies” or at least “crossovers”, which want to understand why the managers tell them service orientation is a new approach although they are still coding Java, C# or ABAP. But don’t expect to get fast facts on the different aspects of service orientation. Rather sit down in the evening, open up a beer and listen to the tales the authors have to tell - because what is finally important is that the tales are not fantasy tales but real world tales!
