SAP BW Overview
Agenda
Reporting Comparison
BW Overview
BW Landscape & Architecture
BW Reporting Tools
Business Content
BW Website
Online Resources
Discussions/ Q&A
Reporting Comparison
Line Item Analysis
Relational & Multidimensional Analysis
Delivered Reports
Delivered Reports (aka Business Content)
Basic Reporting or Predefined (requires
Ad hoc or Predefined (can be designed
by users)
ABAP programmers)
Consumes Resources from
Transaction Processing
Real-time Analysis
Function Specific
Significantly Faster Processing
Current (according to update schedule)
& Historical Analysis
Cross Functional
BW Overview
The Business Information Warehouse (BW) is
SAPs architectural solution for data
warehousing.
Seamless integration with R/3
Built-in functionality that substantially reduces DW design,
development and maintenance
BW is a separate system from the R/3 transaction
processing system
BW data structures are optimized for reporting data
efficiently and quickly (analytical processing).
R/3 data structures are optimized for recording data
efficiently and quickly (transaction processing).
State System BW Landscape
BW Dev
DB1
Data
SAP R/3
DV1
DR1
DC1
BW QA
QB1
Data
SAP R/3
QA2
QR1
QC1
BW PRD
PB1
Data
SAP R/3
PRD
PR1
PC1
BW TRN
TB1
Data
SAP R/3
TRN
TR1
TC1
BW SB
SB1
Data
SAP R/3
SF1
SR1
Basic BW Architecture
BEx
SAP R/3
ODS
Non-SAP
Data Sources
(Flat file, XML
or DBConnect)
Data Sources
InfoCube
Data Detail Business Content
SAP-BW
Web
Based
BEx
Business
Explorer Tools
BW Reporting Tools
Business Explorer (BEx) Query Designer
1. MS-ExcelBased Analyzer
(Web or GUI)
2. Formatted
Reporting
3. Web Application
Designer
Business Explorer (BEx) Analyzer
Queries and solution workbooks embedded in MS Excel
Excel functionality can be utilized (calculations, charts,
VBA programming, etc.)
Queries are refreshed at each run; workbooks provide
pre-calculated queries
Incorporates BW Security and, therefore, eliminates the
need for an additional layer of security at the reporting
level
Seamless integration with BEx Analyzer for the Web
GUI Based or
SAP Menu Bar Add-in
Web-Based
What is Business Content?
Advantages of using Business Content
Pre-Configured SAP-delivered objects allow
rapid development (DataSources, Transfer
Structures, ODSs, InfoCubes, Queries, etc.)
Based on Best Practices
A solution to build upon
Provides a good baseline for enhancements of
functionality and data models.
http://www.sytecpa.org/BW/index.asp
Online Resources
SAP Online Documentation - help.sap.com
Service Marketplace - service.sap.com
OSS Notes
Installation and upgrade info
SAP Developers Network - sdn.sap.com
Online Forums
How Tos
SAP Fans www.sapfans.com