Tuesday, July 5, 2011

Different SAP upgrade tools


As there are differences in SAP technology components along with evolution of SAP software there are also different SAP upgrade tools. Let me share short overview of them within this post.

1. SAPUp: is standard SAP upgrade tools coming in two flavors:    
a.    For ABAP Stack – SAPup
b.    For JAVA Stack - SAPJup
It consists of two programs:
a.    Upgrade program – performing the upgrade
b.    Control program -  so called GUI to upgrade process (Upgrade GUI of SDT GUI)

Upgrade GUI is user interface where you can see the upgrade phases/progress via roadmap steps. With this tool you can perform Combined Upgrade (CU) and Unicode Conversion (UC) as well.

2. SAP Enhancement Package Installer (SAP EhPi): Primarily used for Enhancement package (EhP) installations. EhP are aimed to enhance functionality of SAP Business Suite 7 and higher and SAP NetWeaver 7.0 and higher based systems. Used for systems based on both ABAP and JAVA Stacks. Moreover you can upgrade dual stack based system via synchronized procedures. You can also use SAPehpi for SAP Support Packages only.

Note: Effectively as of 21.4.2011 SAPehpi 7.10 is replaced by Software Update Manager (SUM) see below.

3. SPAM / SAINT / JSPM: tools to be used for installation and upgrade of add-ons, Support Packages, subsequent installation of additional technical usages of EhPs. Coming again in two flavors:    
a.    For ABAP Stack – SAINT
b.    For JAVA Stack - JSPM 

SPAM and SAINT are hosted directly by ABAP AS and therefore are platform independed.

4. Software Update Manager – SUM (Software Logistics Toolset) – Software logistics tool for different kinds of implementation processes.

5. Application Specific Upgrade (ASU) – Tool hosted by ABAP Stack to collect all before / after upgrade activities, tasks etc.

Speaking of not only tools but even about upgrade methodology there is an initiative within SAP started: Near Zero Downtime for ERP. The purpose is to reduce downtime of ERP system while upgrade. It uses technologies like synchronizing of software changes between system and its copies – delta reply (workbench from System Landscape Optimization (SLO)).

Resources:

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

the best tools i found is from SAP, i tested other tools which comes free will actually take something confidential from your system