We are happy to announce the general availability of SAP Solution Manager 7.2.
The new release of the management platform provides significant improvements throughout the entire life cycle of SAP solutions:
SAP Solution Manager 7.2 provides best-in-class support for SAP S/4HANA by leveraging SAP Best Practices
SAP Solution Manager 7.2 is the deliveryplatformfor Digital Business Services providing model companies for jump-starting implementations and tight collaboration between customer projects and experts at SAP
User Experience has been a major investment area with clear focus on SAP Fiori-based user interfaces, the easy access via the launch pad, unification and simplification
SAP Solution Manager 7.2 has strengthened its business focus. The new Process Management provides state-of-the-art support from business processes modelling to business process operations. We also made it easier for business users to handle relevant SAP Solution Manager functions
Customers gain best-in-class support for agile innovation projects from requirements to deploy
SAP Solution Manager 7.2 continues to provide support of the latest technologies, like hybrid and cloud-based solutions
SAP Solution Manager 7.2 is the first release that leverages the SAP HANA database. SAP HANA for SAP Solution Manager 7.2 does not need to be licensed separately since it is included in the maintenance contract
More than 400 customers and partners have experienced the new release already as part of the Early Adopter Care program. We received very positive feedback.
Do you want to learn more about SAP Solution Manager 7.2?
There is a wide variety of options to do so:
Videos
Watch video playlists on YouTube to gain further details:
The SAP Solution Manager 7.2 Media Center contains educational video units for different roles ranging from manager overviews to expert sessions.
Early Knowledge Transfer
Register for the Early Knowledge Transfer for SAP Solution Manager 7.2, SP03 to access learning maps proven in early adopter care (
Trial Environment
The SAP Cloud Appliance Library offers the option that customers can order a private demo and sandbox environment to get hands-on experience of SAP Solution Manager 7.2. You can get an image copy of an SAP Solution Manager 7.2 images as 90-day trial version (please keep in mind that an AWS account is required).
Events
If your customers want to learn more about SAP Solution Manager 7.2, you can forward them to any of the upcoming events:
SAP TechEd 2016 will be at three locations: Las Vegas (Sept. 19-23); Bangalore (Oct. 5-7); and Barcelona (Nov. 8-10). SAP Solution Manager topics will be covered mainly in the IT & Cloud Management track.
The annual conference of the German-speaking user group (DSAG) will happen September 20-22 in Nürnberg, Germany
SAP Solution Manager Book
We have published a new book on SAP Solution Manager 7.2
Solution Manager 7.2 is now in General Availability and I would like to quickly show you how to generate stack files in Maintenance Planner to get the most recent SP.
To install Solution Manager 7.2 SP3 we need to proceed with generation of two stack files: one for ABAP instance and one for JAVA instance. Therefore, we execute Maintenance Planner twice.
On Select OS/DB dependent files choose User Interface Technology 7.50 (even if 7.40 is marked as recommended). Also choose files specific to your environment (like database / kernel).
I am facing an error while configuring the user experience monitoring in sap solution manager 7.2.
Able to upload the GUI and HTTP script successfully but getting the below error in the phase 3.4 below are the screenshot
Resources cannot be uploaded.;Script=Script1;H.N:nullcom.sap.smd.eem.executor.config.SecureStoreException: property not found in SecureStore: eem/Script/Script1/variable.sapgui.password
Resources cannot be uploaded.;Script=yash;H.N:nullcom.sap.smd.eem.executor.config.SecureStoreException: property not found in SecureStore: eem/Script/yash/http.proxy.password
In 2011 the Business Process Operations dashboard was shipped to customers. Since then several new features have been provided and especially we met many customers and learned how they use those dashboards for their respective Business Process Improvement activities. One key element is always to provide meaningful dashboards to the senior management so that everybody in the organisation can check where (further) progress is required or achieved. This blog shares this Best Practice knowledge derived over the years.
Setup analytical key figure instances (AKFIs) where you select which key figures should be displayed and how they should be filtered and which threshold values should be defined (either count based or value based)
Define a panel and assign one or several AKFIs to the panel. The panel defines how the data should be visualized within a dashboard. The clear best practice for Business Process Improvement related panels is the chart type Dynamic Rating Table 2
Define a dashboard and assign one or several panels
In order to limit the information for management on the initial entry of the dashboard, you should create virtual characteristics. This also allows a reporting on region, markets or business units et.al.
After you created the virtual characteristics, you have to assign them either as Characteristic for Category and/or Characteristic for Drilldown in the respective AKFI (see step 1). So it is possible to use one virtual characteristic (e.g. market) as category and at the same time a second virtual characteristic (e.g. business unit) as drilldown. Only when the virtual characteristics are assigned to an AKFI, they will show up as column or row in the dynamic rating table 2 (see step 2).
If you want to provide further drilldown navigation capabilities within the dashboard, then you can make use of so-called parent/child panel relationships.
Ideally copy an existing AKFI. The copy activity will not only take over the correct key figure, but also the corresponding filtering and threshold values from the parent AKFI. In the newly created child AKFI you just change the Characteristic for Category or Characteristic for Drilldown where you want to see some different (more granular) information, e.g. in the parent AKFI you split by region (NA, LATAM, EMEA, APJ) and in the new child AKFI you split the same data by sales organisation. The only other mandatory change in the child AFKI is that you define aone or two so-called runtime filters on the characteristic that you click on in the parent (in our example you would need a runtime filter on the virtual characteristic for region).
Create a new child panel - typically also with chart type Dynamic Rating Table 2. The new child panel gets the child AKFI assigned (see step 7).
Now go back to the parent panel (see step 2) and assign the child panel from step 8 as so-called Detail Panel.
If further drilldowns shall be provided, then repeat steps 7-9 accordingly.
By doing this you created a Management Dashboard for a selected number of key figures that would allow a global overview across region or markets and where the manager could further drilldown on demand and see details according to sales organisations or document types.
Now if you build the URL like
http://<server>:<port>/sap/bc/webdynpro/sap/ags_ri_dashboard?PIF_DASHBOARD_TECHNAME=<technical name of the dashboard> you can call it from any device and also make use of the created drilldowns.
Here you can see an example picture taken from an iPad where you see different finance key figures split according to markets.
When you click in one of the cells, then the child panel is called which is filtered on the market and key figure combination behind the cell and the new panel shows then details according to company code and trend of the last 3 months.
The following blogs (in chronological order) provide further details about Business Process Analytics and Business Process Monitoring functionalities within the SAP Solution Manager.
CCLM (Custom Code Lifecycle Management) is the central point of access to manage custom developments lifecycle. With Focused Insights you can easily access CCLM metrics repository and build nice dashboards to report on your custom solutions whether there are in development phase or already in production.
Focused Insights uses CCLM Ad-Hoc Reporting as data source. While CCLM Ad-Hoc Reporting provides full access to all custom code metrics, it only returns snapshot values but no historical values. Thus, Focused Insights brings its own infrastructure to supports historical values. In order to be collected by this infrastructure and used in a dashboard, a metric is first configured with a dedicated application (CCM Metric Instance Builder).
After the metric is configured in the CCM Metric Instance Builder, a new value is computed every day and stored in a dedicated repository. From there, it can be consumed to build reporting dashboards.
In the following example we’ll demonstrate how to build a CCM metric and display it in an OCC Dashboard.
Access Ad-Hoc Reporting from CCLM Work Center of Solution Manager
Create and test your CCLM query in Ad-Hoc Reporting.
In this example we want to monitor the number of custom reports for Sales process which are deployed on the production ERP. At this stage we don’t need to care about the frequency of the report (daily/weekly/monthly…) since we are only building a snapshot (current value).
To list the current custom Sales reports in the ERP production system, select the scenario “Object inventory” in Ad-Hoc Reporting and enter the proper filter values (Object Type, Development Class…).
Ad-Hoc Reporting returns a list of custom reports which match the filters. This is the size of this list we want to monitor in the OCC dashboard (number of custom reports).
When the Ad-Hoc Reporting query is tested successfully, start application “CCM Metric Instance Builder” of Focused Insights.
Create a new metric “Number of custom SALES reports (prod)”.
Several metric types are available to cover all CCLM dimensions (quantity, quality, usage…). In this case, select the metric type “Custom code object quantity”.
Indicate the number of months to keep in the history, in this example we keep 12 months of data. As the metric data points are generated every day, it’ll take 12 months to fill the history and start the housekeeping process.
A daily job calculates the value of metrics configured in CCM Metric Instance Builder and stores them in a dedicated repository (CCM History). Read only field “Current History Size (day)” indicates the number of days already collected by the daily job. Value of this field is equals to 0 when the metric is created and incremented by one every day after the job as ran successfully.
Check the current value for the metric with button Test. This value should correspond to the size of the objects list returned by CCLM Ad-Hoc Reporting.
The CCM metric is ready to be used.
Access OCC Dashboard and created a new gadget “Custom Sales Reports”.
Select data provider /STDF/DP_CCM
Select the metric “Nb custom SALES reports (prod)” we created in ”CCM Metric Instance Builder”. You can use the filter to quickly retrieve it in the list.
Enter “True” for option “Live Collect”. It means that the gadget will display the current metric’s value (snapshot) in addition to the historical values. Since the current value is calculated in live from CCLM Ad-Hoc Reporting and not retrieved from the history, the chart might take more time to show up.
Following the same approach, it is simple to configure additional custom code metrics and show them in OCC gadgets at various time frames (smaller significant period for the chart is Day as it is the data collection period).
Focused solutions for SAP Solution Manager, is the extension concept for SAP Solution Manager, with the idea of helping our customers meet their particular innovation needs on an individual basis, without the need for homegrown software or partner solutions.
The goal of Focused Insights is to build and distribute powerful customer-specific dashboards in minutes using state-of-the-art user experience.
The content delivered with Focused Insights has been designed to deliver, in real time, the most relevant and valuable information to the right people. While it provides full transparency of information stored inside SAP Solution Manager, it also takes into account the best practices and experience gained during numerous custom projects, offering a set of prepackaged dashboards tailored to your needs.
SAP Focused Insights offers specialized dashboards for experts as well as management or non-technical users. Whether they address the CIO or an expert, dashboards remain consistent among each other since they rely on the same data sources mixed up and presented in different granularities or aggregation levels.
Focused Insights comes with a rich content. It fully exploits the huge amount of data stored inside SAP Solution Manager. Metrics produced by the activation of a scenario, whether it is IT or business related, become immediately available to the prepackaged dashboards. Raw metrics can be grouped or combined to produce advanced metrics and high level KPIs.
Since July 26 2016 a new support package 1 is available for download for ST-A/PI 01S. With this plug-in support package close to 20 new key figures have been shipped for Business Process Analytics and Business Process Monitoring in SAP Solution Manager and around 50 existing key figures were updated. The plug-in support package contains (besides others)
Finance
New Open items without any payment methods (neither item nor vendor master)
New Overdue open customer items w/ master data
New Vendor master without payment methods
Exceptions during payment runs - enhanced with payment method info and credit/debit sign
Electronic bank statements/items not completely posted (additional batch input information)
Open item managed accounts w/o clearing rule (counting of entries in table BSIS now optional)
G/L Accounts w/ unnecessary line item display (counting of entries in table BSIS now optional)
Open item managed accounts w/o sort key (counting of entries in table BSIS now optional)
Sales & Logistics Execution
New Cancelling sales invoices
New Distinct exceptions during billing due processing
New Overdue sales requirement items with MRP list
New Outbound shipments not yet complete (overall status 0-4, info if delivery exists and if yes the document status)
New Inbound shipments not yet complete (overall status 0-4, info if delivery exists and if yes the document status)
Overdue entries in table VEPVG (now withVBTYP as group by)
Overdue sales schedule line items (delivery relevance info for item/schedule line)
Missing fields in incomplete sales document items (including header info)
Sales order items rejected / cancelled (lead time from item creation to rejection)
Billing plan dates not billed (advance payment info)
Sales document items overdue for billing (Customer Account Assignment Group)
Open and rescheduled sales schedule line items (new filter that only requested delivery dates in the past are considered)
Shipments within certain status (info if delivery exists)
Purchasing
New Automation rate: Purchase order items
All key figures allow now item category ‘9’ – Service
Purchase order items created (new group by to distinguish text/material items)
Purchase Requisition items open (new material master fields, different checks if autom. PO creation is possible)
Automation rate: MM invoices (invoice categories 'Aand 'Care no longer considered as automatic)
All contract and scheduling agreement item key figures now with item category & Acc. Assignment Cat. as group by
Open purchase order items w/o Service Entry Sheet (corrected logic)
Service entry sheets without acceptance / without 'final entry' (now with delivery date and corresponding overdue logic)
Manufacturing & Plant Maintenance
New Planned orders with overdue components
New Production/Process orders with assigned purchase order items (PO items w/o deletion flag)
New PM/CS orders with assigned purchase order items
Production/Process orders overdue for delivery completed (additional fields in result list)
Production/Process orders overdue for (technical) closure (additional fields in result list)
Production/Process order components overdue for consumption (direct procurement & bulk materials excluded, additional material valuation information)
Failed goods movements (COGI) – additional MRP list information
Inventory Management
All stock level key figures with new parameters older/younger than x months & lot size, MRP type info
All batch shelf life key figures with inventory valuation info
Note: The key figures mentioned in this blog are not yet reflected in the KPI catalog. They should show up with the 'New' or 'Updated' attribute in the upcoming weeks.
The following blogs (in chronological order) provide further details about Business Process Analytics and Business Process Monitoring functionalities within the SAP Solution Manager.
You should be already aware that something like Business Process Operations dashboards exist for some years. Perhaps you also played around with virtual characteristics and the drill-down within dashboards is perhaps still something new for you. In the above mentioned Best Practices blog the steps 7-9 are perhaps a little bit too concise to do it in your environment. So let's elaborate a little bit more on this.
You have have panels and analytical key figure instances defined according to your needs, perhaps similar to what was described in step 1-6 of the Best Practices blog. Now you would like to provide some drill-down capabilities to the dashboard end user. Normally the underlying key figure should remain the same and you just want to show the same data somewhat more filtered and/or according to different characteristic values / dimensions. The AKFI screenshot below shows that a virtual characteristic is assigned as Category and some threshold values were defined to have the rating table cells colored in green, yellow and red. The easiest way is now to copy this (parent) AKFI to a new one so that the key figure, connector instance, filtering and threshold values are taken over and you do not have to maintain it another time.
Now your new (child) AKFI got all this information inherited from the parent and you only need to specify
How the data shall be displayed differently (i.e. exchange the characteristic values for Category (here: Company Code) and/or Drilldown (here: Calendar month)
Which data from the parent AKFI should be used dynamically to filter the child accordingly (here: Runtime filter on Market)
For the new (child AKFI) you also have to create a corresponding (child) panel where you state how exactly the data shall be visualized (which chart type).
In a last step you have to actually interlink the two AKFIs. You do this on panel level where you assign now the (child) panel as Detail Panel to the corresponding entry in the (parent) panel.
Now that you defined some child panel you see an additional push button "Child Panel". When you click now into the respective cell of interest, then the (parent) panel checks which detail panel needs to be called and when calling the detail panel the newly defined runtime filter is applied and handed over, so in our case the market information is handed over and only company code assigned to this market are displayed.
The following blogs (in chronological order) provide further details about Business Process Analytics and Business Process Monitoring functionalities within the SAP Solution Manager.
The SAP Solution Manager already provides Business Process Analytics as a root cause analysis tool for application specific improvement activities. One year later the Business Process Operations dashboards were introduced as a management UI on top of this data. These dashboards easily allow to see where there is high, medium or low improvement potential in your organization. In 2015 another management application was introduced with the Dependency Diagrams, so that logical dependencies between different key figures, KPIs or process performance indicators could be visualized. But one thing was still missing for tracking Business Process Improvement projects. This gap is now closed with the Progress Management Board that has been shipped with SAP Solution Manager 7.2 support package stack 03 and addresses senior management needs up to CxO level.
On the one hand the Progress Management Boards allow the organizational progress tracking per key figure, i.e. you can easily see per key figure if
Only an initial analysis was performed,
Only IT is working on it so far,
Also the business department is already engaged,
A corresponding action plan is defined,
All involved parties did agree on some common target value that shall be achieved in the end,
First (one-time) clean-up activities are on its way,
A sustainable solution will be implemented so that the same problem shall no longer occur in the (near) future.
As you can see on the screenshot, you can also define some Business Priority for every key figure that you are tracking. The application was especially designed to track the improvement based on Business Process Analytics data, but the data source can be actually also Business Process Monitoring, Cross Database Comparison (CDC), or any defined BEx query from an external SAP BW system. As such you can also use the Progress Management Board to track the progress for any important business KPI that is reported in SAP BW. So like the Business Process Operations dashboards and the Dependency Diagrams application, also the Progress Management Board allows the mesh-up of SAP Solution Manager data and SAP BW data.
On the other hand the Progress Management Board allows a fact based tracking where you can see what the latest available measurement has been and how this measurement compares with
A defined baseline measurement - How did you progress compared to your starting point?
Last week/month - Did you (still) progress lately?
A defined target value - Did you already overachieve your ambitions or how far are you still away from the target?
Each connected managed system must have at least ST A/PI release 01P* installed.
All SAP notes need to be implemented in Solution Manager and managed systems as listed in the always updatedSAP note 2324106 “Business Process Improvement: requir.SAPnotes for ST7.2 SP03 or higher”.
In case you want to upgrade please also consider SAP note2319290 “Business Process Improvement: upgrading / starting with ST7.2 SP03”
The Progress Management Board functionality is a SAPUI5 application, therefore the activation of the corresponding HTTP services needs to be checked in transaction SICF:
/sap/bc/bsp/sap/ags_progress
/sap/ui5_ui5/bsp/sap/ags_progress
/sap/opu/odata/sap/ags_bpa_gw_progress_srv
You also need to assign a SAP system alias to the OData Service AGS_BPA_GW_PROGRESS_SRV_0001. With this assignment, an OData request from an SAP Gateway consumer can be routed to the corresponding backend system. The system can correctly identify the SAP system that is responsible for processing (managing and storing) the data of an inbound request.To do so enter the SAP Solution Manager Implementation Guide (via transaction SPRO) and follow the path SAP Customizing Implementation Guide -> SAP NetWeaver -> SAP Gateway -> OData Channel -> Administration -> General Settings -> Assign SAP System Aliases to OData Service
Setup of Progress Management Board
Similar to the Business Process Operations dashboards and the Dependency Diagrams application, you need to define data sources and Analytical Key Figure Instances (AKFIs) that shall be used and displayed in the Progress Management Board. If you are already using the Business Process Operations dashboards or Dependency Diagrams, then you might just want to re-use some of the AKFIs.
You can then access the Progress Management Board application via the work center “Business Process Improvement”. To do so start transaction SOLMAN_WORKCENTER, then go to tab “Business Process Improvement”) and click on tile “Progress Management Board” to start the application.
Alternatively you can create your own favorite for BSP Application AGS_PROGRESS with the start page index.html, so you can then directly enter the Progress Management Boards using this SAP favorite.
A more detailed description on how exactly the setup and configuration is done, shall follow in a separate blog.
The following blogs (in chronological order) provide further details about Business Process Analytics and Business Process Monitoring functionalities within the SAP Solution Manager.
In several previous blogs I already mentioned that you can bridge data silos and bring external SAP BW data into applications like Business Process Operations dashboards, Dependency Diagrams or Progress Management Board via BEx query. In Business Process Operations dashboards that means that you can report on SAP Solution Manager and SAP BW data in parallel. With the help of Dependency Diagrams you can easily visualize how operational, problem-oriented Business Process Analytics key figures can have an impact on your overarching Business KPIs (e.g. Days Sales Outstanding) which will be measured in SAP BW. The Progress Management Board allows then the progress tracking of Business Process Analytics key figures or SAP BW business KPIs.
This blog explains the steps you need to perform in order to see the external BW data in the above mentioned SAP Solution Manager applications. The description is basically taken from chapter 4.4 of the Best Practice document about Dependency Diagrams (~15 pages in total).
SAP BW Connector Setup
The first step is that you create once a corresponding connector instance, so that the SAP Solution Manager knows which SAP BW system should be connected and which RFC connection should be used.
As of SAP Solution Manager 7.1 SP14 you will find under BPO Reporting Structure the tab for the Data Source Manager. Under Connector you will find the BW Query Connector called BPO_BW_Query.
Go to the Tab Data Source Manager
Select the BPO_BW_Query Connector
Click ‘add’ to configure a Connector Instance to your BW system.
Maintain a Name and a Description for the Connector Instance
Select the Read RFC Connection to your BW system and enter the system Name.
Under Application you add the BPO Dashboards as Application by clicking on ‘Add’
Create your Connector Instance
Save it. If you reload the tab you should see two green lights under Status and Active
The next step is to maintain an Analytical Key Figure (AKF) that specifies which BEx query should be used for data retrieval from which Info Provider. This query needs to be defined in SAP BW obviously.
We are still in the same UI where we just created the connector instance and click on the button Maintain BW Query AKF.
Click ‘Add’.
Enter a technical name and a Description.
Select the Connector Instance you created before.
Use the F4 Help to find your BW Query. The Info Cube will be automatically selected if you add the Query.
Use the F4 Help to select the key figure. This is basically the measurement coming from the Query (i.e. the amount of days in this example).
The RFC User maintained in the Read RFC Connection to your SAP BW system for the BEx query needs the following authorizations:
Object
Authorization Field
S_RFC
RFC_TYPE=FUGR
RFC_NAME= RZX0
RFC_NAME=/SDF/E2EEM_COLLECTORS
RFC_NAME=AGS_BPM_RI_CONN;
RFC_NAME=SYST;
RFC_NAME=SUNI;
ACTVT=16
S_RFC
RFC_TYPE=FUNC
RFC_NAME=RSZ_X_COMPONENT_LIST_GET
RFC_NAME=/SDF/E2EEM_GET_DATA
ACTVT=16
/SDF/E2E
ACTVT=03
S_SRT_ELOG
ACTVT=03
S_SRT_PLOA
WS_NAME=*;USR_ACCESS=1;
ACTVT=03
AI_DIAGE2E
ACTVT=03
Use the AKF in the respective SAP Solution Manager application
Now that you created you AKF for the respective BEx query it can be used like any other AKFI that you created previously based on Business Process Analytics. So you can go now into the Business Process Operations setup and assign the new BW AKF to some panel, or you can go into the Dependency Diagram setup and use the AKF as root or child tile, or you assign the AKF to your newly created Progress Management Board.
The following blogs (in chronological order) provide further details about Business Process Analytics and Business Process Monitoring functionalities within the SAP Solution Manager.
Solution Manager 7.2 comes with a new solution documentation and with Fiori. Test management wasn’t available in the ramp up SP’s. With SP3, test management is back. I want to show you, what it looks like and how easy it is to implement test management, especially when you can get a best practice package for solution documentation from SAP.
Then you select the required test cases from your solution documentation. This can be test documents or transactions (make sure you select the required option in ‘Settings’ above).
For the test package, you again select the test cases you want and you assign testers to the package. After saving the package, you are ready to test.
Step 3: Testing
The testers receive emails as soon as they are due for a test (activate workflow for this!). They can logon, run the tests from their worklist and document the test.
IT-PPM ( IT - SAP Project and Portfolio Management 6.1 ) is now available within SAP Solution Manager 7.2. The older release of IT –PPM 5.0 has been available for SAP Solution Manager 7.1 since with SP09 and SP10.. The purpose of this blog with related links is to give an overall understanding of the IT PPM 6.1 functionality in SAP Solution Manager 7.2 covering the below topics:
1) Overview of SAP Project and Portfolio Management
1.1 Building blocks
1.2 IT PPM as a software component in SAP Solution Manager 7.2
1.3 Licensing
2) IT-PPM in SAP Solution Manager 7.2 Details
2.1 Setup and Configuration (SOLMAN_SETUP, SPRO) and (Roles & Authorizations)
2.2 Detailed Functionality including
2.2.1 Project Management
2.2.2 Resource Management
2.2.3 Reporting
2.3 Project data Export/Import (MS Project,etc..)
3) Integration Topics
3.1 SAP Solution Manager 7.2 : Process Management, Change Control Management,
Requirements Management
3.3 Integration with SAP ERP, HR, and other modules
4) Related Links & Further information
1) Overview of SAP Project and Portfolio Management
SAP Portfolio and Project Management consists of the following application areas:
Portfolio Management
Project Management
SAP Portfolio and Project Management comprises an SAP NetWeaver Application Server, Foundation components, and the SAP Portfolio and Project Management add-on component (CPRXPRM).
1.1 Building blocks
Portfolio Management
Portfolio Management is designed to manage the capacity and deployment of human capital assets across multiple projects. Portfolio Management integrates information from existing project management, human resources, and financial systems to provide a complete overview of an organization’s project portfolio with easy drill-down to details for portfolio managers, project managers, and resource managers. Moreover, you can use initiatives to link to projects and documents in Project Management. You can synchronize objects between Portfolio and Project Management (horizontal synchronization), or objects within Portfolio and Project Management (vertical synchronization).
Portfolio Management can be integrated with existing SAP and non-SAP back-end applications such as the following:
SAP applications:
SAP Product Lifecycle Management – Project System (PLM PS)
SAP Human Capital Management (HCM)
SAP Financial and Controlling (FI-CO)
Non-SAP applications:
Microsoft Project
Project Management
Project Management covers the entire range of project management activities in development and consultancy projects, from planning to implementation to project completion. Project Management supports organizations to grow their project management excellence by providing solid standalone project management core support
offering a wide range of integration options.
Since Project Management‘s birth as development project management for the automotive industry, it has emerged to a flexible project management solution for all industries and focused on various project types, including new product development and introduction consulting projects, IT projects
SAP provides the SAP Solution Manager as the highly recommended platform to efficiently support the implementation of your solution. Using SAP Solution Manager will significantly accelerate the implementation process and help you to achieve your business goals. At the same time, SAP will be able to deliver Support Services based on the business scenarios designed and documented in SAP Solution Manager. Implementation content for your solution may further accelerate the implementation process
Note: With the standard maintenance agreement, The standard functionality of IT-PPM for SAP Solution Manager 7.1 or 7.2 is limited to Project Management. The details are explained within the section 1.3 Licensing
1.2 IT PPM as a software component in SAP Solution Manager 7.2
PPM/SAP Solution Manager is only available if PPM deployed on SAP Solution Manager. IT PPM software component is included in SAP Solution Manager Stack as shown below:
Initial configuration of IT PPM /Project management in SAP Solution Manager is done by executing the transaction /UI2/FLP for SAP Fiori Launchpad or directly by the transaction 'SOLMAN_SETUP, under Project Management. Follow the guided procedure as shown below:'
The required Roles and Authorizations are for the standard functionality can be maintained in the transaction SOLMAN_SETUP for Project Management, under Create Template User step.
Below technical landscape details the communication of the various User groups within the application component.
To use project management in SAP Solution Manager 7.2, you need to set it up and, if you are upgrading from SAP Solution Manager 7.1, activate your projects.
IT PPM Functionality can be accessed using SAP Fiori LaunchPad:
Creates SAP Best Practices Work Breakdown Structures in projects including predefined roles.
Solution Documentation
With the integration to Process Documentation; it creates links to project organization and project execution in order to manage the scope. Along with;
gathering information on branch, sub landscapes, change cycles where the Requirements can be implemented.
Staffing
Role-based resource management functionality enables easy resource pre-planning, resource staffing on project structure and task levels to
ensure integrated time/duration feedback, and work progress confirmation across all employee activities: levels,where
Project Scope
Define the scope for project execution and differentiate between the Initial Scope(IT Requirements) and Scope Changes using Change Request Management.
Drill down functionality enables to see the further details about the changes.
Scope Reporting
Available through the side panes where additional information can be displayed about the project and its tasks.
Time Reporting
Supports flexible time recording functionality which can be limited staffed resources and specific tasks, along with the time recorded on project tasks,
request for change, IT Requirements . The data is synchronized via report.
Project Analysis
Provides information regarding the overall project status, countdown, schedule, quality gates, milestones, tasks, initial scopes, scopes changes, completion rates, and
Resource Management is a role based tool that supports decoupled project and resource management process. Resource staffing and responsibilities can be distributed on project level and/or across projects.
Project Resource Planning provides a planning tool for you to optimize your human resource deployment. It focuses on using your employees efficiently and assigning them to projects or orders based on demand, qualifications, and availability.
You have the following options for carrying out project resource planning:
You can do all your planning in Project Management.
You can select the resources by their availability. To do this, you can either use the resource planning application (RPA) from Service Resource Planning in SAP Customer Relationship Management (SAP CRM) or you can predefine the capacity of the resources by means of Customizing in Project Management; the latter is the simpler option.
You can schedule the resources with Portfolio Management
The system provides a number of different report templates depending on the project type. Project leads and project managers can use the project reporting in SAP Solution Manager 7.2 to get an overview of the projects for which they are responsible. Coupled with Data Analytics using several data sources; the predefined dash boards provide information for:
Project Plan and Schedule: Project Execution Project Assets
With this function you can export or import data of a project, a version, or a project associated with a portfolio item. The following project management systems and formats are supported by Portfolio and Project Management:
Microsoft Project
XML file
MicroSoft Project
You can import/ export a project or version in Project Management or a project associated with a portfolio item to a Microsoft Project (*.mpp) file. You can navigate to this function from the item details screen on the Overview view, the toolbar above the project, the project work-list, or the project version work-list.
After the export, you can use all the functions available in Microsoft Project.
Prior to this process, The following prerequisites must be met before you can import a project or a project schedule from Microsoft Project:
Microsoft Project is installed on your PC. For more information about the supported versions of Microsoft Project see SAP Note 1326709.
You have write authorization for all project elements and admin authorization for all portfolio items.
If you want to import newly created phases, checklists or tasks from MSP, you have to use the object types defined in Project Management. The phase types, checklist types, and task types must have been assigned to a corresponding enterprise field (user-defined field) in Microsoft Project. For more information, see Customizing for SAP Portfolio and Project Management under ->Project Management ->Define Phase Types ->, Define Checklist Types, or Define Task Types.
The corresponding activities in Customizing for SAP Portfolio and Project Management under ->Common Functions ->Import and Export of Project Data ->Microsoft Project Integration have been performed. The required target options for the import have been defined. For more information, see Customizing for SAP Portfolio and Project Management under ->Project Management ->Structure ->Define Project Types.
For more information about the prerequisites, see SAP Note 1326709
XML File
You can import/export a project or version in Project Management or a project associated with a portfolio item from an XML file. SAP supplies a predefined XML schema for this purpose.
You can navigate to this function from the item details screen on the Overview view, the project worklist, or the project version worklist.
You can also import project templates and checklist templates. You can find the corresponding functions under >Portfolio and Project Administration
Prior to this process, The following prerequisites must be met before you can import a project
If you want to export templates, you have made a corresponding entry for area 0013 Additional Features, setting 0002 Export/Import of Templates in Customizing for SAP Portfolio and Project Management under ->Project Management ->Basic Settings ->Override Default Global Settings
In order to realize "Portfolio to Project" and it's association to the other value chains; PPM Projects need to be linked to 1)Process Documentation, and 2) Change Control Management,& Requirements Management once the Project Management initial configuration is completed within the transaction "SOLMAN_SETUP
IT PPM project integration with the Process Management (Solution Administration -> Branches )
You can assign SAP Solution Manager data of a project, directly, or from the selection help. The selection help uses branch, sub-landscape, and change cycle: You can select only SAP Solution Manager data that is not yet assigned to a project, and that is of the same project type, according to the customizing settings.
To link a PPM project to Solution Administration/Process Document:
1.Click on the My Projects (Project Management) icon on SAP Fiori LaunchPad
2. Open the Project where you want to maintain the link to Process Documentation
3. Navigate to the Project Element area and click on the project header(project name) and browse the "Solution Documentation" tab within elements detail. Maintain the the process documentation information (Assign, Change, Remove)
IT PPM project integration with the Change Control Management & Requirement Management
IT PPM Projects can be linked with Change Control Management & Requirements Management through:
- Creating a Business Transaction from a Task
You can create a business transaction of type request for change, IT requirement, or change document, from a project task, and manage the new business transactions in
the project. You can also assign existing requests for change, IT requirements, and change documents, to project tasks. You can also assign change documents of
any type to a project task, including independent change documents, which were not created from a request for change or IT requirement.
Based on the initial configuration of Project Management (SOLMAN_SETUP); the request for change, IT requirement, or change document is created
automatically. Otherwise you have to create it manually.
In Change Request Management, you can create a project task from a request for change, or change document. To do so, these business transactions must be connected to the solution documentation that is assigned to the project. You can only create a task for projects that can still be changed, not for projects that are completed, archived or canceled.
You can record the time that you have spent on a request for change, IT requirement, or change document. The recorded time is also transferred to the assigned
project task on which you are working.
You have the following options:
Restricted time recording, for staffed resources only:Time is only recorded for resources that are staffed on a project task. The time is synchronized to the Parties involved assignment block.
Unrestricted time recording for all users:Time is recorded for all resources.
Synchronization with the project is asynchronous in the report DPR_CATS_CPR_TRANSF . The report collects all time recording entries from business transactions that are connected to tasks
3.3 Further integration with SAP ERP, HR, and other module Business Objects
Projects can be related in various ways to business objects in other applications, such as sales orders or purchase orders in SAP ERP, or facilities in SAP Environmental Compliance. These business objects can be located in the same system or in a different system, for example, a separate ERP system. By creating object links, you can connect project elements to business objects of predefined object types in order to achieve the following:
Provide an overview of all objects relevant for a project element
Enable the display of detailed header data for these objects within Project Management
Provide access to predefined applications related to these objects, allowing you to, for example, display master data, or analyze and edit transactional data.
Prerequisites
This extended configuration requires some activities in transaction SPRO. SAP delivers a number of predefined object types. You can, however, also define further object types. For information about how to configure the predefined object types for usage in Project Management, SAP Portfolio and Project Management: Configuration in SAP Note 2026421 under ->Project Management: Configuration ->Business Customizing ->Project Management ->Setting Up Object Links
I want to share the following information in this place, because SAP Solution Manager is also the Service Desk. And it also possible to improve it by using KNOA.
SAP UEM by Knoa has a number of features to monitor user actions in SAP applications. In addition to identifying the gaps in knowledge of end-users, to control processing in the systems and other benefits of the SAP UEM, I would like to share capabilities that support staff can get in their daily work, using a Knoa solution, in this article.
For example, employees of SAP application support often have some difficulties in communication with the end-users in terms of opportunities and correctness of description the users action procedure that led to the error. One of the basic SAP UEM features - a «log» of user's actions in the system - allows you to identify a user's actions, just before the error occurred, and it can help in accurate diagnosis of the error cause.
So what are the typical problems exist in the support working process? What solutions can offer SAP UEM by Knoa?
SAP UEM by KNOA allows users to identify users who commit a large number of errors. The analysis of Knoa reports allows you to determine the causes that may be related to the system, or with the working process of the user.
Identification of mistakes will eliminate the cause of their appearance before the creation of the Service Desk request, which will significantly reduce the amount of incidents created.
Being able to see the user's actions, which led to the error, as well as statistics on errors, reduces the time to find the causes of the problems and their solutions.
Detailed analytics on all the actions of users, accessible in real time, will reduce the time to resolution of incidents, and free up resources for analytical work and improvement of support processes.
SAP UEM by KNOA can improve user satisfaction and reduce the number of support calls.
These are the main benefits for the Service Desk that you can get using SAP UEM by KNOA. If you go back to the problems, that were listed in the previous section, it is now possible to bring them solutions in the following table:
Problem
Solution
Number of requests
Reduction due to the early detection of errors and their causes analysts
Security requests and access issues to SAP systems
Display all missing authorization errors and detection of their causes
The lack of detailed
Detailed reporting allows you to identify the details of the error.
Incident reproducing
User workflow report allows you to see the action that led to the error
Searching of missing information
Knoa Reporting makes it possible not to spend time on communication with the end user
User and System errors
Sorted errors, allowing to identify the actual functional error or incorrect end-user action
Details about users actions
The ability to go to the detailed report on the user workflow from the incident
Root causes of errors
SAP UEM by KNOA can't identify the root cause immediately, but provide detailed analytics to identify it
Using Knoa Reporting
You can obtain all above mentioned benefits after analyzing of data collected from the end users, using standard Knoa reports. There are both, a higher-level analytics viadashboards to help you choose the problem area, as well as more detailed information reports that allows you to get the result of the analysis in figures and names.
Nowadays the standard Knoa reporting has more than 50 different reports, here are some examples:
Except of standard Knoa reports the development of Service Desk user interface can be very useful. It can be CRM-interface of SAP Solution Manager or any other one used in the company. Simple development will allow Service Desk staff go directly from the incident to one of the Knoa reports, allowing to see the working process of end user – the author of the incident. It allows to see the actions that preceded the error very quickly. So there’s no need to waste your time on long communication with the user, that created the incident, to find out “which button he pressed?”.
Requirements Management is a new standard process released by SAP Solution Manager 7.2. Note that there is also a requirements management for SAP Solution Manager in release 7.1 available. This is the so-called ST-OST, the focused solution. In addition, there is a Change Request Management add-on for SAP Solution Manager 7.1 provided by consulting.
This article tackles only the new SAP Solution Manager 7.2 standard Requirements Management. As the leading developer, I would like to give you a detailed overview of what you can expect in SAP Solution Manager 7.2.
Overview (Process and Architecture):
Requirements Management in release 7.2 consists of two new documents in the CRM Web UI: the Business Requirement and the IT Requirement.
The Business Requirement (SMBR) is used by the LoB for documenting and requesting new requirements. The IT Requirement is used by the IT department for evaluating requirements. There is an integration with Change Request Management, which means that you can create change documents via the IT Requirement and implement by using Change Request Management functionality. In many ways, the IT Requirement is with respect to its functionality an equivalent to the Request for Change. However, there are some differences, which we will explore later on. The full scenario runs now from the Business Requirement via the IT Requirement to the change documents. Normally, in larger companies, the LoB and the IT department are different departments with different cost centers. The LoB department pays the IT department for its services. In some scenarios, the IT department is outsourced and thus a separate company like a service provider.
That is why architecturally we decided to separate the process into two different documents, one for each department. It is a lot easier to differentiate authorities or other functionalities in CRM Web UI if you have two separate documents.
Yet if the LoB and the IT department are not separated or work very closely, you can as well use the IT Requirement standalone without the Business Requirement. This will simplify matters.
Currently, the relationship between the Business Requirement (BR) and IT Requirement (ITR) is 1:1. We are aware that this should be expanded and therefore are working towards a 1:N relationship for a future release.
Technically, Requirements Management builds upon the Change Request Management framework. For Change Request Management consultants, this makes Requirements Management a natural choice for expanding their consulting services.
For you to obtain an insight view into the Change Request Management framework, I provide some information
Standard Requirements Management is delivered with eight roles.
Role
Document/Area
Description
Configuration user
SAP Solution Manager Configuration
Used to setup Requirements Management in SAP Solution Manager Configuration
Business process expert
Business Requirement
The business process expert knows the specific business process he is responsible for. He is the connection between business department and IT department. He is contacted for new requirements by the business department. He creates the Business Requirement and fills it with information on how it should work.
Business manager
Business Requirement
The business manager prioritizes Business Requirements and decides which requirements shall be evaluated by IT. He gives the final commitment from the business side so the implementation of the requirement can start.
BR admin
Business Requirement
The BR admin is the administrator for the Business Requirement document. He is able to set all user statuses, can view all document information, and searches and creates Business Requirements. He's the power user for the Business Requirement.
Solution architect
IT Requirement
The solution architect processes the IT Requirement in Change Request Management. He acts as a leading developer. He evaluates the requirement, which are requested by the LoB. He creates the high-level design. He knows the landscape and releases cycles. He knows the development team and the systems as well as techniques involved. He communicates with the development team to get an evaluation regarding capacity, cost, and feasibility. If the requirement gets implemented, he is authorized to create change documents as follow-up documents from the ITR. If there are questions, he communicates with the business process owner to clarify them.
Requirements manager
IT Requirement
The requirements manager is the manager of the IT Requirement. He prioritizes IT Requirements, hands the IT Requirements over to the solution architect so the requirements can be evaluated and analyzed. He approves the evaluation and commits from the IT side that the requirement can be implemented for a particular release and date at a specific expense and with a specific capacity and technique.
IT admin
IT Requirement
The IT admin is the administrator for the IT Requirement document. He is able to set all user statuses and access all its information. It’s a power user role for an IT Requirement. He can do everything that a solution architect and requirements manager can do combined.
Display user
Business Requirement and IT Requirement
The display user is able to search for and display the entire requirements process, meaning
all IT Requirements, Business Requirements and Change Request Management documents.
The General Process Flow:
The process starts with the business process expert who gets a requirement by an optional channel (e-mail, discussion, etc.). He creates a business requirement and defines it by describing the requirement, filling in the relevant business manager and possibly the requirements manager.
My recommendation for you isto attach a link to the Attachment assignment block to the document because the link is copied to the IT Requirement later. Then all people involved will see the working document in its latest version. Yet, you could as well use the solution documentation feature and assign the involved process and the document there.
After the Business Requirement is reviewed and was approved by the business manager, the requirement is handed over to IT. This means that automatically an IT Requirement is created as a follow-up document. The responsible requirements manager fills in a solution architect who checks the requirement in respect of capacity, cost, and feasibility.
After the analysis is approved by the requirements manager in the IT Requirement, this status is reflected in the Business Requirement by the specific user status. The business manager checks the proposal from IT again and approves that the requirement should be implemented in the proposed way.
After the approval has been done, the solution architect can now start implementing on the IT Requirement and create follow-up change documents as well as assign them to the relevant developers.
The implementations are done using Change Request Management functionality, which provides TMS integration. Later, all developments are done and the requirement has been tested successfully and is productive. This is reflected back to the IT and Business Requirement by the change documents. Now the IT Requirement and Business Requirement can be closed as well.
Status and their meaning
Business Requirement
Status
Meaning
Define
Requirement is described by the business processexpert.
Submitted for Validation
Requirement has been described and awaits review and priorization. It is similar to a queue status.
Being Checked
Requirement is priorized and reviewed by the business manager.
Rejected
Requirement will not be realized because for various reasons such as budget, company strategy.
Postponed
Requirement remains currently in focus but is kept for later. Parking queue.
Handed Over to IT
Business manager has decided that the requirement should be analyzed by the IT department because it is in focus. The IT Requirement will be created.
Requirement Rejected by IT
The IT department has rejected the IT Requirement. There are sound reasons why it cannot be done. There could be technical, budget, capacity or budget reasons. The solution architect and the business process expert should clarify if the requirement should be changed in a way that it fits. Otherwise, it should be rejected in the Business Requirement. This would set the IT requirement to Completed.
Postponed by IT
The IT department has set the IT Requirement to Postponed for various reasons such as capacity.
Committed by IT
IT department has analyzed the requirement based on capacity, cost, and feasibility and they commit that they can execute it to the agreed terms.
Implemented
The requirement is productive.
Completed
The process is completed.
IT Requirement
Status
Meaning
Define
The requirement is handed over to the IT department so the evaluation can start. The requirements manager checks and identifies a solution architect.
Submitted for Validation
This is the working queue for the solution architect. He can check which requirements he needs to analyze.
Being Checked
The solution architect is working on the requirement and evaluates it with respect to capacity, cost, and feasibility.
Rejected
There are reasons why the requirement cannot be implemented. The business requirement is set to Rejected by IT so the business process expert knows that he has to speak to the solution architect.
Submitted for Approval
Evaluation is finished and the requirement is in the queue to be approved.
Postponed
The approval is postponed, maybe due to lack of capacity despite being ok with regard to function and expense.
Approval
The requirement is approved and committed by the requirements manager to be implemented based on capacity, cost, and feasibility. The Business Requirement is set to Committed by IT.
Submitted for Implementation
The business manager has accepted the commitment of the IT department. Implementation can start now. Technical information like change cycle, systems, and scope is maintained by the solution architect.
Implement
The requirement is implemented. Change documents are created and additional ones can be easily created by enhancing the scope. The implementation process continues with theocuments.
Implemented
The requirement is tested successfully and productively. The business requirement is set to Implemented.
Completed
The process in the IT requirement is completed.
Here is a complete overview of the statuses that are available in the process and how you can set/reach them. There is more technical Information, for example, the name of the PPF actions. Setting the user status are listed as well.Image may be NSFW. Clik here to view.
Enhanced Change Request Management Framework:
Somebody who is familiar with the ChaRM framework and checking the status process overview above will notice that the Business Requirement pushes the status of the IT Requirement in same cases. The ChaRM Framework in release 7.10 has the so-called set predecessor functionality, which sets the status of a predecessor document depending on the status of all successor documents of the specific predecessor document.
Yet setting the status of a successor document is new in release 7.20. If you check the Customizing activity Make Settings for Change Transaction Types (also available in SAP Solution Manager Configuration), you find new Customizing for setting the predecessor status.
The screenshot displays the Customizing that defines that the Business Requirement which has status Accepted sets the status Submitted for Implementation in the IT Requirement.
The Fiori app was developed because the LoB is used on simple and up-to-date UIs. Fiori as the current state-of-the-art SAP UI is the best choice.
The My Business Requirements Fiori app is a classic master/detail Fiori app. Thanks to a tile you can see the number of Business Requirements to which your business partner is assigned and which of them are not completed.
When you enter the app, you see the master/detail screen with the list of your Business Requirements. On the right side, you have the detail screen with further information. You can display and edit the data or create new Business Requirements.
The displayed data is visible on three tabs. The header information which is as well displayed on the master list consists of the description, the priority, and the user status.
The Conversation tab includes the texts which are entered. Additionally, it is possible to enter further text.
The Details tab includes the Business Requirement number (object ID), the creator and creation date, the first three business partners customized on the CRM Web UI, the priority and the category. The texts of the business partners are read dynamically from the backend which means that if you customize other first three business partners in the CRM Web UI, this is applied here automatically.
...and filtered by user status. Both status data is read from the backend. It shows in the screenshot where you can only see German status texts in the system. This means you add a new status to your process. This works automatically.
Technical background: As in Requirements Management the user status is changed by a PPF action using the
ChaRM framework, the relevant PPF actions are defined first. The customized PPF action container element USER_STATUS defines which status should be set. This technical user status is defined and the description is read from the technical user status. That's why you see here that the user status is to be set. In the screenshot further down, it is displayed by the German text Zur Prüfung eingereicht, which is equivalent to Submitted for Validation.
You can create new Business Requirements. Both the edit and create mode support a live search of the business partners. In addition, you can search by the criteria Name or the Business Partner Number.
IT Requirement vs Request for Change: Similarities and Differences
Primarily the IT requirement as it is created from a business requirement is used in the field of innovations, the request for change is used for maintenance purposes.
Approval Procedure
The standard IT Requirement does not require an approval procedure like the Request for Change. Also, it has a different status flow. Therefore, you do not need the 'Extend Scope' process part like you would for the Request for Change.
Requirements Management provides a mutual commitment.
I see strong similarities between this process and a bid invitation, bid and purchase.
When we compare them, it looks like this: First the LoB 'creates a bid invitation', which refers to the Business Requirement changing to status Handed Over to IT. On the IT Requirement side, the IT department analyzes and 'commits the bid' by setting the status Approved. The LoB checks the additional cost for roll-out, etc., and commits itself by 'purchasing' the implementation service.
Remark: It is possible to use the approval procedure functionality for the IT Requirement (as well as for the Business Requirement). It just has to be customized.
Checklist
For evaluation of the requirement, the standard IT Requirement has a Checklist assignment block delivered by SAP. Via this assignment block, a standard checklist can be selected which supports the solution architect by validating the requirement. We just deliver an example checklist as we assume each customer customizes one of his own.
If the IT Requirement has status Submitted for Implementation or Implement, it is generally considered to be approved by LoB. As it is a new requirement and will mainly be implemented by running a project, the creation of change documents is only a technical procedure to process the implementation. Therefore, you can just add additional scope items and create the change documents by choosing the Actions pushbutton at these statuses.
Dependency on Business Requirement
The IT Requirement has a Business Requirement as a predecessor document. The Request for Change normally has an incident as a predecessor document.
ITPPM Integration
Naturally, as new requirements are innovative and are handled by projects, there is a strong ITPPM integration equivalent to the Request for Change.
BPCA Integration
There is no difference between an IT Requirement and a Request for Change. It is possible to perform a BPCA integration for both documents.
Solution Documentation Integration
The IT Requirement has the same full support for solution documentation as the Request for Change.
If you choose the link of a specific related document type, you can view more details and assign further documents. In addition, you can delete existing ones or jump directly to the CRM Web UI to create a specific new document of this particular type (a business requirement as you can see below).
That's basically all that comes to my mind. I hope I was able to provide an update. If you find errors or want to give feedback, feel free to get in contact with me.
Focused Insights SP4 has introduced a new tool: Focused Insights Launchpad.
This new application provides you with a starting page to access Focused Insights dashboards instances and models.
The Launchpad is based on a two views:
The first view displays a list of Launch tiles corresponding to the seven Focused Insights Dashboard Models:
Operations, OCC, Tactical, Service Level, Readiness, Strategic.
The second view provides a drilldown of dashboard Instances per models. In this view, Launch tiles are used to represent the individual dashboard instances.
Depending on user’s authorizations, only granted instances are accessible from the Launchpad.
In addition, based on the URL option: &admin=true the following links are added:
Dashboard configuration application for each model.
Setup wizard for Focused Insights.
This tool is mainly intended to be used by Dashboard Factory Administrators.
The Focused Insights application is accessible from the following URL:
Focused Insights (https://support.sap.com/focused-insights) is part of the Focused Solutions catalog. SAP Focused Solutions are turnkey solutions based on SAP Solution Manager – made for immediate consumption. They are ready-to-run, highly integrated, preconfigured, and automated. Focused Solutions deliver all you need and include additional features and dashboards, and all related training. They are available to all customers.
Focused Insights for SAP Solution Manager delivers content based on SAP Solution Manager to build and distribute powerful customer-specific dashboards in minutes using state-of-the-art user experience.
The content delivered with Focused Insights has been designed to deliver, in real time, the most relevant and valuable information to the right people. While it provides full transparency of information stored inside SAP Solution Manager, it also takes into account the best practices and experience gained during numerous custom projects, offering a set of prepackaged dashboards tailored to your needs.
SAP Focused Insights offers specialized dashboards for experts as well as management or non-technical users. Whether they address the CIO or an expert, dashboards remain consistent among each other since they rely on the same data sources mixed up and presented in different granularities or aggregation levels
Focused Insights comes with a rich content. It fully exploits the huge amount of data stored inside SAP Solution Manager. Metrics produced by the activation of a scenario, whether it is IT or business related, become immediately available to the prepackaged dashboards. Raw metrics can be grouped or combined to produce advanced metrics and high level KPIs.
The main goal of a Service Level Report (SLR) Dashboards is to define, control and meet SAP IT Services expectations from the Business.
The SLR dashboard lists services objectives which have a target value and a rating showing if the current value is either above or below that target value for a selected period of time.
Each instance of service level dashboard will report an aggregated rating for the list of services objectives based on a worst-case rule.
With SLRFocused Insights:
you check online your service level agreements (SLAs) in a very convenient manner.
you can activate SLR dashboard for large SAP landscapes with a few clicks.
Focused Insights offers two different possibilities to implement an SLR dashboard:
SLR Automatic
Active the automatic reporting on a predefined and recommended best practices catalog of KPIs with the SLR dashboard model.
SLR Customized View
Build customized SLR views based the different SAP Solution Manager data sources with the OCC dashboard model.
SLR Automatic Reporting
Focused Insights comes with a predefined Metric Catalog based on SAP best practices:
The following metrics, among others, are available in the catalog:
Availability (e.g., system, database)
CPU (e.g., average, maximum)
User load (e.g.,average, maximum, hourly peak)
Performance (e.g., system average, system maximum, top 10 transactions, custom transactions, RFCs)
Alerts (e.g., total, availability, performance)
RFCs (e.g., response time, errors, tRFCs)
Batch jobs, incidents, business analytics
Several periods of time are possible, like the “Good Morning Page” (yesterday’s values), the “Monthly Reporting Page” (last month’s values), the “Early Detection” (last 8 hours) or the “System Application Check” (last 24 hours).
SLAs statuses are updated in real time and displayed in a convenient and compact way.
You can quickly spot the breaches and get more information in detailed views (e.g. “On which days did we breach the SLA for KPI XYZ last month?”). Mass setup and comparison between different systems is easy.
The main view of the SLR dashboard display two views:
With Focused Insights SP4, a new OCC renderer has been introduced to build SLR views tailored to your needs based on the data sources selection and the period/resolution selection already available in the OCC dashboard.
With this new renderer, any OCC gadget can be changed into a SLR view as shown in the example below:
When using an SLR renderer, each series of data returned by the gadget queries is translated into an SLA representation based of the type of SLA configured for each query.
In the current version, four SLA types are available:
MAX: current value is the maximum value of the series.
MIN: current value is the minimum value of the series.
AVG: current value is the average of the series.
SUM: current value is the sum of all values in the series
The SLR renderer is selected as any renderer as shown below:
Focused Insights(https://support.sap.com/focused-insights)is part of theFocused Solutionscatalog. SAP Focused Solutions areturnkey solutionsbased on SAP Solution Manager – made for immediate consumption. They are ready-to-run, highly integrated, preconfigured, and automated. Focused Solutions deliver all you need and include additional features and dashboards, and all related training. They are available to all customers.
Focused Insightsfor SAP Solution Managerdelivers content based on SAP Solution Manager tobuild and distribute powerful customer-specific dashboards in minutes using state-of-the-art user experience.
The content delivered with Focused Insights has been designed to deliver, in real time, the most relevant and valuable information to the right people. While it provides full transparency of information stored inside SAP Solution Manager, it also takes into account the best practices and experience gained during numerous custom projects, offering a set of prepackaged dashboards tailored to your needs.
SAP Focused Insights offers specialized dashboards for experts as well as management or non-technical users. Whether they address the CIO or an expert, dashboards remain consistent among each other since they rely on the same data sources mixed up and presented in different granularities or aggregation levels
Focused Insights comes with a rich content. It fully exploits the huge amount of data stored inside SAP Solution Manager. Metrics produced by the activation of a scenario, whether it is IT or business related, become immediately available to the prepackaged dashboards. Raw metrics can be grouped or combined to produce advanced metrics and high level KPIs.
For many IT organizations, SAP Solution Manager is the centerpiece of their support practices for solution deployment, system monitoring, and landscape improvement. Not only are they optimizing their core processes and IT infrastructure, but managers are also getting real-time insight that uncovers hidden opportunities or emerging risks that could impact the overall success of their digital initiatives.
Like every step in the digital transformation journey, the system that supports it must evolve. SAP, for example, recently announced that SAP Solution Manager 7.1 will be no longer supported after December 2017. While this bit of news may be perceived as a potential problem, many IT leaders see it as an opportunity to further enhance the performance of their infrastructure amidst the growing digital economy.
Two reasons why you should upgrade to SAP Solution Manager 7.2
Change never comes easy. But then again, your competitors are most likely engaged in digital initiatives to innovate faster and uncover maximum value before you do. With so much at stake, can your business afford not to embrace these advantages of SAP Solution Manager 7.2, which could serve as a gateway to reinvention and innovation?
1. Do everything you’re doing now – just better
The beauty of the 7.2 version of SAP Solution Manager is that it still encompasses all of the capabilities our customers rely on, including the management of projects, IT services, IT landscape, and data volume. At the same time, users can experience more streamlined workflows, intuitive interfaces, and applied logic when managing application operations, change control, customer code, processes, business process operations, and testing.
With these updates, you can still run a high-performing software landscape – the only exception is that it’s easier to manage and more insightful than ever before. For instance, the update provides a graphical environment that allows business functions to model processes freely while enabling technical users to assign systems to those process steps. As a result, IT resources can then free themselves up to focus more strategic initiatives that will improve user experiences, landscape performance, and insight delivery.
2. Take system performance to a new level even as your data continues to grow
Let’s face it: The growth of data entering your IT systems is showing no signs of slowing down. To drive maximum value from your solution environment, you will receive an optional free license for the SAP HANA database to be used along with SAP Solution Manager 7.2 as part of the support contract. This offer allows you to experience the in-memory computing power and high-speed processing and storage capability of the SAP HANA database.
By combining SAP Solution Manager with SAP HANA, you gain a single, secure environment for mission-critical data assets. This approach allows better management of increasingly large volumes of structured and unstructured data efficiently to decrease total cost of ownership. Simultaneously, you can consolidate multiple workloads, use full-text search without connecting, or provide a text retrieval and information extraction (TREX) search engine.
What does this all mean for your business? A simpler IT landscape that requires less administrative effort and budget to support it.
How to upgrade SAP Solution Manager quickly – and still save money
Digital transformation can be defined in a variety of ways. Many companies choose to standardize core processes. Some incrementally transition to the cloud. And others decide that swift transformation into an entirely digital business is required.
No matter your digital enterprise vision, SAP Solution Manager 7.2 can complement it. However, because every company’s IT landscape is unique, upgrading any technology is no longer as easy as plugging in a new application and letting it run. You need the support of upgrade services to help ensure your investment in SAP Solution Manager 7.2 and the rest of your IT architecture operates smoothly without disruption.
Whether you plan to upgrade an earlier license or install SAP Solution Manager for the first time, our upgrade services team from SAP Digital Business Services is committed to securing your success. Our expertise can help you accelerate the delivery of standard functions and realize predictable outcomes scaled to your unique business needs.
Customers considering the upgrade should also be aware that rework of individual customization and coding may be required after the technical upgrade, especially if custom code or consulting solutions were used to implement the 7.1 version of SAP Solution Manager.
With SAP Solution Manager 7.2 with SAP Digital Business Services, your business gains a competitive edge that is essential for meeting the demands of an ever-evolving digital economy. Are you ready to unleash the power of your digital strategy and secure ongoing, competitive value?
For more information about upgrade services for SAP Solution Manager 7.2, visit our support portal for updates or contact Frank Holzkamp (Germany), Andreas Bohnstedt (all countries except Germany), or Martin Biet (all countries except Germany).
Now I am writing series of documents which helps you to install SAP solution manager 7.2 SR1 with SAP Support pack stack 03.
Note: This documents is for SAP Solution Manager 7.2 SR1 on MS Windows with MS SQL server (One Server for ABAP and JAVA Stack of Solution Manager including SQL Server 2012)
Run SWPM and select Options as below (SAP Solution Manager 7.2 Support Release 1 >> SAP Solution Manager 7.2 ABAP Support Release 1 >> MS SQL Server >> SAP System >> Application Server ABAP >> Standard System >> Standard System )
Note: I have MS SQL server installed on same server
You already have your ABAP stack running now its time to install JAVA stack on same server you have ABAP stack running
Sun SWPM and select following (SAP Solution Manager 7.2 Support Release 1 >> SAP Solution Manager 7.2 JAVAP Support Release 1 >> MS SQL Server >> SAP System >> Application Server JAVA >> Standard System >> Standard System )
Register System in SLD (Existing SLD if you have any where you have SAP Solution Manager Connected and LMDB configured)
Note: If you do not have LMDB configured you need to configure your SAP Solution Manager without installaing SPS03 and perform rest of the steps from 'ABAP LMDB Push'
Maintenance Planner System Data
Once your system data populated in LMDB register both systems in Maintenance Planner performing following steps
ABAP Upload to SAP Support portal
Login to LMDB administration through SAP transaction code LMDB in your solution Manager and search for ABAP system
