Revisions of SAP BW/4HANA migration tools

SAP is offering a set of tools to help migration of BW systems to SAP BW/4HANA. So called readiness check is needed to be performed first to find out if there are an objects present in the system that are not supported by the BW/4HANA and thus they need to be reworked before the migration itself. Here are the tools that supports this task:

 

1 t-code RSB4HCONV - SAP BW/4HANA Transfer Cockpit (BW/4 Conversion) aka* SAP BW/4HANA Transfer Toolbox or Toolbox for conversion, program RS_B4HANA_CONVERSION_CONTROL, main SAP Note 2383530 - Conversion from SAP BW to SAP BW/4HANA

2 t-code RSB4HTRF - Transfer of Scenarios aka* Transfer of Scenarios program RS_B4HANA_TRF, to set the BW4 transfer scenario: in-place/remote/shell. See here.

3 t-code RSB4HAPD - APD Transformation Tool, program RS_B4HTAPD_ANALYZE

4 t-code RSB4HAPDR - APD Conversion Remote, program RS_B4HTAPD_APD_LIST

*- as there are several names of the tools mentioned in the SAP Notes, here I put “also known as” ones too

 

The tools are delivered via so-called revisions. The revisions are represented by SAP Notes. Each of the Note is normally dedicated to specific phase of BW to BW/4HANA conversion like: discovery/prepare, explore/realization, pre-check, source, in-place, target, code scan, post-conversion, etc.

 

As of 2022.01 there are following revisions available:

Note 1: that this is not comprehensive list of the revisions, there may be much more of then that these. Therefore, always upgrade the BW4 tools to the latest revisions available!

Note 2: I was trying to determine what tool does the particular SAP Note bring the revision to. However, in case of some revisions it was not clear. That is why some of the Notes are not associated with the tool name. Rule to decide what is the tool where does it below to should be that if it is in-place or target it is Transfer of scenarios tool.

2503455 - BW4HANA: Starter add-on changes (Transfer Toolbox Version 1)

2508989 - BW4HANA: Starter add-on changes (Transfer Toolbox Version 1 - INPLACE)

3066387 - Revision 1 - PREPARE_BW4 - SOURCE and PREPARE scopes of the transfer tool from BW/4 to Data Warehouse Cloud BW Bridge

2478899 – Revisions (Corrections) 1 & 2 on BW/4 Transfer InPlace Tasks

2586774 - Tools 2: APD (PREPARE), version 2 of APD Transformation Tool

2509205 - Revision 3 on BW/4 Transfer Toolbox InPlace Tasks

2537300 - BW4HANA: Starter add-on changes (Transfer Toolbox Version 1, Revision 4 - ADDON)

2555390 - Revision 5: ADDON Fixes of BW/4 in-place conversion (Transfer Cockpit) in systems where it is not possible

2594459 - Revision 5: (Transfer Cockpit) ADDON4750 (checks only), same as above but for BW systems of versions 750 and SP Level between 05 and 11

2555584 - Version 1.5 (Revision 5) of the SAP BW/4HANA Transfer In-Place Tasks (Transfer Cockpit)

2608859 - Revision 6: ADDON4750, Pre-Check Tasks of the Toolbox for Conversions to BW/4

2637856 - Revision 7: ADDON, Pre-Check Tasks of the Toolbox for Conversions to BW/4

2689663 - Revision 7 Hotfix: Table Fields missing for InfoSet Transfer

2637796 - Revision 7 - PREPARE & SOURCE of Transfer Toolbox

2726886 - Revision 8 – TRANSFER, revision Toolbox for Conversions to BW/4

2726850 - Revision 8 - PREPARE & SOURCE (Toolbox for Conversions)

2749972 - B4H conversion: Code scan report (revision 9), Transfer toolbox

2751585 - Revision 9 - INPLACE und TARGET

2748962 - Revision 9 - PREPARE & SOURCE

2792595 - Revision 10 - INPLACE und TARGET

2777672 - Revision 11: new check tool (7.3 - 7.5), Transfer of scenarios

2847587 - Revision 11: ADDON (7.5), Transfer Cockpit

2860021 - Revision 11 - PREPARE & SOURCE, Transfer Cockpit

2876024 - Revision 12 - CODESCAN, check program (RS_B4HANA_LOG_DISPLAY) for BW to BW/4HANA migration readiness. It scans ABAP code in the BW system and store all findings in a DB tables and is more flexible as the old application log-based check. More information about the scanning tool is available in Note 3119274 - Code Scan tool for migrations to BW/4 HANA.

Also older ABAP program RS_B4HANA_CODE_SCAN can be used. However, the older one does not store data to the DB tables. It uses SLG1 logs instead

2876006 - Revision 12 - PRECHECK

2876013 - Revision 12 - ADDON < 7.50, Transfer Cockpit

2908621 - Revision 13 - ADDON_750, INPLACE und TARGET, Transfer of scenarios

2940373 - Revision 14 - SOURCE und PREPARE, Transfer Toolbox

2940365 - Revision 14 - ADDON_750, INPLACE and TARGET, Transfer of scenarios

2964092 - Revision 15 - ADDON_750, INPLACE und TARGET

3001909 - Revision 16 - PRECHECK (please note: There are no Revisions 13, 14, 15 for PRECHECK)

3044301 - Revision 17 - ADDON_750, INPLACE and TARGET

3044272 - Revision 17 - PRECHECK

3044273 - Revision 17 - SOURCE and PREPARE, BW/4HANA transfer tool needed for in-place, remote and shell transfer.

3075477 - Revision 18 - SOURCE and PREPARE, BW/4HANA transfer tool needed for in-place, remote and shell transfer.

3075502 - Revision 18 - ADDON_750, INPLACE and TARGET, BW/4HANA transfer tool needed for in-place, remote and shell transfer

3102493 - Revision 19 - SOURCE and PREPARE, BW/4HANA transfer tool needed for in-place, remote and shell transfer

 

 

More information:

Converting BW system to BW/4HANA

Tools for migrating to SAP BW/4HANA

Wiki - New Features SAP BW/4HANA conversion

3061594 - SAP Readiness Check for SAP BW/4HANA

2575059 - SAP Readiness Check for SAP BW/4HANA

Converting BW system to BW/4HANA

As SAP NetWeaver will be sunsetting at some point of time (see details here: Life after life of SAP NetWeaver and Business Suite/ECC) same applies for one of the NetWeaver core component - BW.

SAP BW/4HANA positioned as SAP’s next generation data warehouse solution will be in nutshell replacing the BW. Needless to say that the BW4 is not a legal successor of BW rather it should be seen as a new product.

Customers are free to decide which way they choose to get to the BW4 level. In one of my previous posts Tools for migrating to SAP BW/4HANA (B4H) I wrote a little about the tools that are used for the conversion. In this posts I go a bit deeper into the tools that are available there.  In nutshell there are 5 options for the conversion:

 

1 New Installation - So called greenfield installation is nothing else just to starts with implementation from scratch. This involves whole implementation cycle, like gathering requirements, implementation, testing, go live, support etc. The tools that would be used here do not really have a sense, as we are not converting any existing system to the BW4. With an exception of a transport certain objects from the existing SAP BW system – see point no 4 below.

This type of installation (not conversion in this case) can be start from t-code STC01 (Task Manager for technical Configuration) by running task list called SAP_BW4_SETUP_SIMPLE. Basically, an initial setup of a newly installed SAP BW/4HANA system can be executed via the task list. Here are some of the included setup: activate web services for BW Modeling Tools, Maintain Allowed Characters in SAP BW/4HANA, creating RFC destination for After-Import Handling of Client-Dependent BW Objects (RSTPRFC), maintaining Query Executor Setting for Eclipse Query Designer and/or Workspace Query Designer, BW/4 Launchpad Setup, activating InA Services for SAP Analytics Cloud integration.

 

2 In-place Conversion - So called full system conversion means BW 75 system is turned to SAP BW/4HANA system. The new (converted) system has same SID as original one. It is conversion without reimplementation type of the conversion. The original BW objects are within step-by-step approach converted. In-place means transfer of classic objects types into their HANA-optimized counterparts. Downside is that original system needs to be on release Minimum start release SAP BW 7.5 SP 5 (recommended at SP12 and best for SAC is to be on SP15-16) powered by SAP HANA.

“SAP BW/4HANA Starter Add-on” is prerequisite for In-Place Conversions. The add-in is technically following software component:

BW4HANA     100     0001   SAPK-10001INBW4HANA    SAP BW/4HANA Starter Add-On

Within the add-on there is a SAP BW/4HANA Transfer Cockpit (t-code RSB4HCONV, prog RS_B4HANA_CONVERSION_CONTROL, there was a predecessor to this: RS_B4HANA_CHECK_ENABLE that is now obsolete) available where all the work is done. The Transfer Cockpit is divided to Prepare (includes pre-check tool, sizing report, code scan tool, clean-up reports, and initial run of authorization transfer) and Realization phase (includes scope transfer tool, delta run of authorization transfer, and change of operation mode).

Within the add-on installation, the system can be set to the following modes: BW Mode (add-on installed and particular BW models/flows/scenarios are being converted) -> Compatibility Mode (manual converting work is finished, BEx Query Designer is disabled, and incompatible scenarios still can run) -> B4H Mode -> Ready for Conversion (system can be converted).

The Transfer Cockpit also calls a starter of B4H Transfer Tool (t-code RSB4HTRF, program RS_B4HANA_TRF). 

In case of one chose, In-Place an ABAP program RS_B4HANA_INPLACE is called. In case of Remote a call of CL_CNVLTRL_BW4H_GEN_INFO =>load_bw4rc is performed. Finally, in case of Shell ABAP program RS_B4HANA_SHELL is called. In most of the cases STC01 task list are called.

 

3 Remote Conversion - So called system carve out / brownfield. Similar to the In-place Conversion. It starts with SAP BW/4HANA as green field installation (new SID) and BW data models/flows and data itself from original BW are transported to the new BW data models in the new system. Classic BW objects like cubes, DSO and PSAs are replaced by BW4 objects aDSO and composite providers. Minimum start release is SAP BW 7.0 or higher on any DB.

 

4 Shell Conversion - So called Accelerated Greenfield. Again, it is similar to remote conversion but without data transfer. Means only the BW data models/flows are transferred not the data itself. No transactional neither master data is transferred. Minimum start release is SAP BW 7.0 or higher on any DB.

5 BW Landscape transformation - So called system consolidation. In case there is a need to consolidate several BW systems into one e.g. multiple SAP BW, or SAP BW on SAP HANA systems to become one global system. Method of system conversion is typically mix of one several ones. Typically one in-place conversion and one or more remote or shell conversions.

 

For all the types of conversion very first things is check the original BW system before conversion. To support this here it is “SAP BW Migration Cockpit for SAP HANA” (program ZBW_HANA_MIGRATION_COCKPIT) available (see Tools for migrating to SAP BW/4HANA (B4H)). 

Other tools that are available within SAP BW/4HANA Transfer Cockpit (t-code RSB4HCONV includes:

1. Maintain BW/4 Transfer Tool Statistics (ABAP program RSB4H_STAT_MAINTAIN) – It enables maintenance and display of the statistics for scope transfers.

2. Table RSB4H_RCRDCOUNT - Precheck phase collects data into this table about record count for BW/4 Transfer Tool.

3. Deletion of Technical Content RS_DELETE_TECHNICAL_CONTENT – Classic BW technical content (objects like 0TCA* and 0TCT*) including the SAP BW Administration Cockpit are not compatible with BW4. This is available at button called “Delete Technical Content” in the Transfer Cockpit.

4. Transfers of Standard Authorizations (ABAP Program RS_B4HTAU_CREATE_RUN) - User roles including standard SAP BW authorizations are converted by transporting the original roles. This is available at button called “Transfer Standard Authorization”.

5. BW/4 Code Scan (ABAP program RS_B4HANA_CODE_SCAN) – or so called custom ABAP code scan does a compatibility checks of custom code with BW/4. This is available at button called “Scan coding”.

6. Sizing report (ABAP program /SDF/HANA_BW_SIZING) - Determine DB size relevant for BW/4HANA Sizing. This is available at button called “Run Sizing Report”.

7. B4 HANA Readiness check (ABAP program RS_B4HANA_RC) – Shows progress of the conversion. This is available at button called “Show Logs”.

8. Execute Prechecks button runs different method calls with respect to different phases of conversion like:

cl_rs_b4hana_util=>n_c_switch-standard_bw (val 0)

cl_rs_b4hana_util=>n_c_switch-prepare   (val 1)

cl_rs_b4hana_util=>n_c_switch-b4hana   (val 2)

9. table BW4HANAADMIN - used to store current mode of BW conversion. The table is access via methods of class CL_RS_B4HANA_UTIL_ADDON. It stored values of below modes:BW4HANA_READY4CONVERSION, BW4HANA_STRICT, BW4HANA_TRANSFER.

More information:

SAP BW/4HANA (B4H) versions

Tools for migrating to SAP BW/4HANA (B4H)

Conversion Guide for SAP BW/4HANA2.0

1909597 - SAP BW Migration Cockpit for SAP HANA

2351381 - SAP BW/4HANA task lists

2358953 - SAP BW/4HANA Conversion: Preparation Tasks

2383530 - Conversion from SAP BW to SAP BW/4HANA

2930058 - FAQ - SAP BW/4 Conversions

2285440 - Technical prerequisites in BW for "SAP BW Edition for SAP HANA" add-on