SAP HANA: Handling Dynamic Select Column List and Multiple values in input parameter

In this document we will be discussing on how to handle multiple values passed in to filter condition using “REPLACE” Function in procedure and also Dynamic SQL using Execute Immediate.

Note: We followed this approach since our reporting tool is HTML5 web dashboards and we cannot consume Variables with "Multiple Values" for the same.

A) Problem Description:

--> How to handle multiple values in filter condition ?

Example:

If we have “Region” as a filtering criterion and we have 3 Regions namely: AMR, APAC and EMEA and the user want the flexibility to select the list of regions for which he wants to analyze the data.

Delta Backups

This blog will be about a new feature in HANA SP10, delta backups.

What is a Delta Backup?
Starting with SPS 10 delta backups were introduced, this feature allows users to perform backup and recoveries quicker. Delta backups only capture the data changed since the last backup or delta backup, meaning less log backups are read for a recovery.
There are two options available when creating a delta backup:
Differential Backup - stores all data changed since the last full backup.
Incremental Backup - Stores the data changed since the last full or last delta backup. These backups are smaller than the differential backups.

How to Create a Delta Backup?
First choose a user that has the BACKUP ADMIN authorization, in this case we will be using the SYSTEM user.
Right click on the system you would like to create a backup for

Bye bye "Standart Jobs function"

Standart Jobs function (transaction SM36) is obsolete in SAP S/4HANA for sap technical jobs. Instead of it, we have a new easy way: Technical Job Repository.

Technical Job Repository carries out the scheduling of periodic technical sap jobs in the client.

Also this mechanism is carried out automatically by the system. You do not need any interaction and scheduling, unlike the earlier Standard Jobs function in SM36.

New Job Repository function calls the transaction SJOBREPO.
SJOBREPO displays an overview of all job definitions delivered and scheduled by SAP in the technical job repository.
You can use SJOBREPO to change a job definition within certain limits or to completely deactivate it.

How to Guide for Tier Based HANA System-Replication

SAP HANA System Replication is used in most of the SAP HANA implmentation for HA or DR scnearios.

In this blog, is more for the technology consultants, a bit inclined to technical people.

I have installed three HANA instances with same SID and instance number. So won't be talking any thing on installing SAP HANA systems.

Hana security: Authentication model Kerberos/SPNEGO

In security , I’ll explain how to configure SAP Hana authentication method based on:

• Hana SSO with Kerberos authentication
• Single Sign-on with SPNEGO 

My configuration will be based on a single container database architecture with my internal network.

For my setup I’ll use my lab environment based on VMware, Microsoft Server 2008 R2, SAP Hana Rev 101 on SLES 11 SP3 and Windows 7 Enterprise.

Disclaimer: For my deployment I’ll issue local certificate with no outside exposure.

In order execution

• Register SLES server into DNS
• Step-by-step check on Hana server
• Create Hana Database service user in AD
• Register service Principal Name (SPN) in AD
• Generate the keytab file
• Configure Kerberos from Hana studio
• Configure SPNEGO for XS application

Computing rates using SAP HANA calculation view

When using SAP HANA for analytical purposes, it is interesting to have rates (interest, participation, benefit, etc) being computed by HANA, instead of BI tools, for performance reasons. It is very easy to use a calculation view to compute those rates.

Let's take an example the following calculation view, which is using one analytical view (called SALES) and one attribute view (called PRODUCT). There is a join in between the 2 views on PRODUCTKEY, and some objects have been added to output. I want to compute the benefit between the SALESAMOUNT and the TOTALPRODUCTCOST as a rate, the formula would be SALESAMOUNT/TOTALCOST*100 (to get a percentage) so I added the BENEFIT to the output of the JOIN; well this is a MISTAKE, let's see why!

JDE Date Conversion in SAP HANA

I spent some considerable time investigating for any standard option to convert the date from JD Edwards (JDE) standard "CYYDDD" date format to the humanly recognizable Gregorian Date, but there seems to be no known function available out of the box.

For those who are new to the concept of JD Edwards date (like me), here is a brief intro.

In JDE, the format for Date is C-YY-DDD. (C for Century, YY for the two digit year and DDD for a number between 1 to 365 (or 366 for leap year)) Since JDE was invented in the 20th century (obviously), I believe they started this format which supports for only dates starting year 1900, (as I understand, JDE does not support dates before the year 1900).

Here are a few examples of JDE dates and their equivalent Gregorian date.
115141 - May 21, 2015
102317 - November 13, 2002
99054 - February 23, 1999

Troubleshooting SAP HANA High CPU Utilisation

High CPU Utilisation

Whilst using HANA i.e. running reports, executing queries, etc. you can see an alert in HANA Studio that the system has consumed CPU resources and the system has reached full utilisation or hangs.

Before performing any traces, please check to see if you have Transparent HugePages enabled on your system. THP should be disabled across your landscape until SAP has recommended activating them once again. Please see the relevant notes in relation to TransparentHugesPages:

HUGEPAGES 

SAP Note 1944799 - SAP HANA Guidelines for SLES Operating System Installation
SAP Note 1824819 - SAP HANA DB: Recommended OS settings for SLES 11 / SLES for SAP Applications 11 SP2
SAP Note 2131662 - Transparent Huge Pages (THP) on SAP HANA Servers
SAP Note 1954788 - SAP HANA DB: Recommended OS settings for SLES 11 / SLES for SAP Applications 11 SP3

Troubleshooting Hanging Situations in HANA

Purpose
The purpose of this document is to instruct SAP customers on how to analyse hanging situations in their HANA system.

Overview
Analyzing hanging situations.

So what constituencies a hanging situation in HANA? When we talk about a hanging situation we generally refer to a whole system wide hang, as opposed to highlighting one specific activity, ie: queries or operations. This means we are going to look at the systems conditions (performance) which leads the DB to run slowly, or not at all in some cases.

Like all other software systems, SAP HANA relies on hardware to run its processes. Even when looking at the most basic single sever, single host, we can see many areas which over lap and interact with one another, in other words, when you see a hang do not just assume the cause is all related to HANA.

S4HANA Basics for a Technology Consultant

“S4HANA”, the new generation business suite has already arrived and am one of the lucky chaps to have a hands-on.

As you know there is lot of material on help.sap.com and SCN to provider a deeper insight on the product, I think I read all of it and want to put everything in this blog.  Well that was sarcasm, in this blog I will summarize my view point as a Technology consultant interested in technology stack and migration paths and scenarios.

Architectural changes:

“If we have many ways to achieve the very same thing, then we lack standardization on the product”
If you want to give me all the credit for the phrase then please....

Well not my words, I picked it form one of the speaker at a conference.  They really make sense.

Many people might disagree with the above statement but the argument I have is, we need to invest in many product which give me same functionality.
S4HANA is re-imaged business suite to re-image your business. SAP say they used  "principle of one" in building S4HANA.

SAP HANA: importing and exporting Landscapes in HANA STUDIO

In this document I would like to explain about, “export” and “import” of system “landscapes”.
In our project, we have different architectures for landscapes like” quality”, ”development”, ”production”. So this can be done by adding “multiple hana systems” which connects to different server instances.
1. This feature helps to monitor the systems from single hana studio interface. In this example you can see below, that I have 2 systems named DCC and DCD. Both are connecting to 2 different server instances. Now let us see how do we “export” and “import” our landscapes. In case if you want to use a new HANA studio installed and you want to get your existing landscapes into your newly installed “studio” you can use this feature.
As shown above, you can see 2 systems named DCC and DCD.

Now go to “quick launch” and select “export” and choose “landscapes” as shown below:

Text Analysis with SAP HANA

As many are aware, twenty-first century corporations are facing a crisis. Many corporations have been accurately and comprehensively storing data for years. The data is in variety of forms like social media posts, email, blogs, news, feedback, tweets, business documents etc.

It is very important to extract meaningful information without having to read every single sentence. Now, what is meaningful information? The extraction process should identify the “who”, “what”, “where”, “when” and “how much” (among other things) from these data.
For example, use social media data to find out -

• What people are saying about my brand or products?
• How many people recommend my brand vs. advocate against it? 

Text Analysis is the solution of all this problem.
In this article we will explain:

• What is Text Analysis?
• Why Text Analysis is so important for business?
• How does SAP HANA support text analysis?

BLOB and CLOB Data Types - How Data Preview Looks - Example

I am going to show example --> How data preview looks for BLOB and CLOB data types.

I have created table with columns having BLOB and CLOB data types.

I have inserted the unstructured data to both columns (same data). Then I have checked the data preview of the table.

Text I Inserted (Starts With):   Strong demand ..

Column having CLOB Data Type:   It shows the same value as I inserted. (String Format)

Column Having BLOB Data Type:  It shows the value in Hexadecimal Format - (Hexadecimal Value calculated based on Binary digits)

Increased schema flexibility in SAP HANA

Schema flexibility is one of the key capabilities  in SAP HANA that majorly helps to bring in flexibility with the column store table definition. A brief insight with a good example can be seen in this  Getting flexible with SAP HANA.

Let us now understand the new capabilities in schema flexibility with this document.

With HANA SPS11 customers can now avail the increases capabilities of schema flexibility in SAP HANA, let us now understand the same via some examples.

Create a column table to store the employee details considering his Name, ID and Age by giving a room to add the other necessary information of employee based on the needs at run time by using the below syntax :

Create column table employee_Details (emp_id int, emp_name varchar(100), AGE int) with schema flexibility;

Loading data from flat file into SAP HANA DB – The ever simplest way with SPS04

In this document, I would like to explain how the data can be uploaded into HANA DB through the “Data From Local File” option which is a new feature of HANA Studio Revision 28 (SPS04).

Pain in the past:

So far, uploading data into HANA from flat file is not a straight forward approach.

The user has to create some control (.ctl) files, have to place the flat file along with control file into server location, execute SQL scripts to import the data.

Or some users’ would have used SAP Information Composer to achieve this.

Instant Solution:

Now everything made so simple through “Data From Local File” import option. Through this option one can upload data from xls,xlsx and csv files.

Getting flexible with SAP HANA

Most of you might not be aware of a feature introduced on SAP HANA SPS5. This new feature is called "Flexible Tables", which means that you can define a table that will grow depending on your needs. Let's see an example...

You define a table with ID, NAME and LAST_NAME. The table works fine, but you realize that you need to also add the PhoneNumber and Address...in a normal situation, you will need to open the definition and add those fields...but using Flexibles Tables, you will need to only add those fields as part of the INSERT query and let SAP HANA do it's magic...

Of course, that scenario is very unlikely to happen, because for a couple of fields, it doesn't make sense...so...where do we use this Flexible Tables? Enterprise Search, were we need to have all products on one table, and this table can have a really big amount of columns...as different products will have different characteristics...

So...for this blog...I really break my head trying to find a simple scenario that could cover Flexible Tables...what I came up with? SAP HANA, Flexible Tables, R and Twitter...

The code is very complex, so I'm not going to explain line by line how it works...but of course, I'm going to give a nice overview...

Troubleshooting ABAP Dumps in relation to SAP HANA

Purpose
The purpose of this document is to instruct SAP customers on how to analyse ABAP dumps.

Overview
How to troubleshoot ABAP Dumps

Troubleshooting
When looking at an ABAP system you can sometimes come across runtime errors in Transaction ST22:

Upload data to HANA table with SAPUI5 FileLoader and HANA Extended Services

All, there could be many instances where end users would require the ability to upload a file of data to a table in HANA on a day to day basis where the Table Import functionality is not sufficient. In this blog I demonstrate the File upload capability using SAPUI5 and HANA Extended Services. Note: this is on SPS06.

- Create a new SAPUI5 Application Project

Dynamic Analytic Privileges Using Procedures in SAP HANA

The analysis authorizations in SAP HANA give control on how you can control the users while viewing the data in HANA Artifacts. SAP HANA provides several different layers of security from which you can benefit, and in this article we'll be looking at Analytics privileges. We'll examine how we can create dynamic Analytics privileges on HANA Artifacts and how they control the data for different users while they are accessing HANA Models from Studio or from Third party reporting tools.

Here we have analytic view AN_EMPLOYEE which contains Employee salary data based on region and Country wise

SAP HANA System Copy- Homogeneous Backup/Recovery Method

SAP HANA system copy Procedure-  Below is the HANA System copy (SWPM) using Backup/Recovery method from PRD to QAS.

--- SID of HANA production is PRD- > So, schema will be SAPPRD
--- SID of HANA Quality is QAS- > So, Schema will be SAPQAS

1. Take the backup of HANA Prd system
2. Copy/Move the the backup form PRD Host to QAS Host
3. Ensure that QAS is having enough space for Backup.
4. Download SWPM latest
5. Download Kernel.
6. Download SAP HANA License of QAS

Start SWPM and select Database refresh or DB Move

[SAP HANA Academy] Discover How to Connect SAP HANA to Facebook with the Apache Camel Facebook Adapter

In a trio of tutorial videos the SAP HANA Academy's Tahir Hussain "Bob" Babar details how to setup and use the Camel Facebook Adapter. The Camel Facebook Adapter is used to connect SAP HANA to Facebook. These videos are part of the SAP HANA Academy's What's New in SAP HANA SPS 11 series, with a specific focus on the new features of Smart Data Integration.

How to Setup the Data Provisioning Agent

The first video in the series shows how to setup the Data Provisioning Agent. Follow along with the video below.