SAP's ABAP/4 -- the basics

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A logic all your own The essence of logical databases in SAP is not simply the creation of business objects from related data items, but it's also about tying together disparate data items that go into those business objects from physically separate databases, which can be on altogether separate platforms. This powerful concept sets ABAP/4 apart from most of its 4GL cousins. Pulling data items together is simply database management, and many systems can do it. But ABAP/4 is equipped to simplify the access process, despite the often harrowing physical and logical complexity of the actual storage in a company's server network. A logical database is, in SAP terms, nothing more than a stored retrieval plan for the information needed to build your app's business objects. You have several tools at your disposal here: a view of the data within the source database, the specifics of how the data will be accessed from the source database, and a screen that allows you to specify the data's selection criteria. You can fine-tune the access methods of your logical database as you please, until the reports and user dialogues in your app are as fast as it is possible for them to be. And you can store your work, meaning that this well-tuned, rapid access is now available for other apps to make use of. (In fact, any change to a logical database will immediately take effect in all apps using it.) Calling other systems Another piece of SAP core technology available to the developer through ABAP/4 is the remote function call (RFC). While database access is central to the handling of data in SAP, the sending and receiving of that data between systems is equally important, and RFCs facilitate that communication. Essentially, RFCs, instantiated as Business Application Programming Interfaces, are SAP's bridges between systems. One of ERP's major features is the steady flow of data between systems, and ABAP/4 permits the use of RFCs to execute this communication, whether between SAP systems, a SAP system and a non-SAP system, or between SAP and external applications. In short, ABAP/4 offers the developer RFCs as the primary component for integrating systems. Both synchronous and asynchronous protocols are supported, so RFCs relieve the developer from dealing with protocols and other cumbersome details. As a building block for distributed applications, RFCs could scarcely be more convenient, and ABAP/4 makes them fully accessible. As powerful as these features are, they can only take life within the hands of the developer, who must have a clear understanding of how best to handle the language itself.

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Talkback

i want to learn SAP-ABAP .i did m.sc in mathematics,is it helpful for me after completion after this?

via Facebook 7 April, 2006 04:08

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