Blog recommendation: Dennis Howlett

Time to re-evaluate SAP?
by DENNIS HOWLETT on DECEMBER 16, 2009

Most professionals I know take one look at SAP and go: ‘Harrumph…way too expensive.’ Well – that may in part be true. SAP has always commanded a premium price but then so does a BMW or Mercedes-Benz. You can argue whether the comparison is appropriate but then we are talking German engineering. Anyhoo – last week I was SAP’s guest at its Business Influencer Summit in Boston along with 274 other analysts, media and customers. I spent most of my time learning more about what SAP calls its SME business applications: Business ByDesign, Business One and All-in-One Solution.

click here for full blog post

The New SAP Blue Book

Normally I am the type of person who writes to sum up something (a book, movie, lecture, event) and it is as much of an organizational exercise for myself as it is an effort to produce something for someone else. I retain better when I write. So imagine, if you will, my dilemma.

The New SAP Blue Book is quite a read. In fact I am not yet finished with it (it isn't a big book or anything it is just that whole "busy" thing we all complain about). It is a book I recommend to anybody. Seasoned SAP Guru? Read the book. I feel quite confident it will offer a different and possibly enlightening view in at least one of the many topics it covers. Clueless Novice? (moi) It is written from a perspective that is far less overwhelming than many of the pieces of literature on SAP that I have attempted thus far.

The dilemma, however, stems from its concise presentation. I cannot sum it up better than it is already written. So my options are, read it a few times and just keep telling everyone that they too ought to at least skim it, or plagiarize the whole darn thing.

I would like to suggest that you read it.

The New SAP Blue Book
Michael Doane

Rock Band or something like it

There has been a bit of a weather system hanging out in the Hampton Roads area of Virginia. Loss of power plagues many. Including a few of DataXstream's own.

It also just happens to be the 9th Birthday of one of the Future Geeks Of DataXstream. Inspired by said birthday a few of the true geeks went shopping and showed up with "Lego Rock Band."

Allow me to illustrate:
That is Matt on vocals and Wess on drums...



Wess surrounded by future geeks


Tim Cooper singing along and waiting his turn

Have you see these blog posts?

SAP Standard Customer Cross Reference for Inbound IDOC Processing by D. Koch
Have you ever had a project where you are converting a customer file into an SAP Sales Document IDOC (ex: ORDERS05) and the customer file contains their Internal Customer Number? So you need to determine what the SAP Customer Number will be on the IDOC. If you are not familiar with the SAP interface process you may hardcode the SAP Customer Number or create external tables in your third party mapping software to accomplish this conversion process. However, this involves customer specific logic or updating the tables with your SAP Customer Numbers and having a process to maintain this table as new SAP Customer Numbers are created. There is a much easier way to perform this conversion with no additional coding as it is a standard SAP utility read full post

SAP Standard Sale Reference for Inbound IDOC Processing by D. Koch
If you have ever converted an external file into a SAP Sales Document IDOC (ex: ORDERS05) you may have hard coded the E1EDK14 segments of the IDOC which specify Sales Area and order type for the SAP Sales Document. However, these segments are not required if you populate the E1EDKA1-LIFNR segment of the IDOC with the External Customer Number and populate the EDSDC table with the Sales Area and Order Type for the customer. Your SAP system contains a standard utility that converts the External Customer Number to the Sales Area values and Order Type value contained in this table. read full post

Discovering Something Old in SAP - Using an External Program as a Batch Job Step by M. Salvo
The question now becomes, how do we execute the ftp script after the first step of the batch job which creates the outbound data file? It turns out that SAP provides a facility to do just that. Effectively, SAP will allow the ftp script to be entered as a step in a batch job. read full post

Excel Returns Blank Workbooks in SAPGUI by Wess Tobler
Don’t you hate it when you’re trying to view a report as a spreadsheet in SAPGui and it returns a blank workbook? The problem could be due a security settings inside of Excel that is preventing the data from being displayed. It is real easy to fix. Use the following instructions for your version Microsoft Office. read full post

And a pick from Red Monk:
The Need for Timely Software - SAP TECHED 2009 by Michael Cote

DataXstream Job Board

DataXstream launches the job board this week:
http://www.dataxstream.com/contact-us/sap-integration-consulting-jobs-and-careers/

currently listed are:

SAP Interface Developer

SAP ABAP Developer

SAP Middleware Developer

SAP Basis Consultant

Pictures from SAP TechEd Phoenix

Craig blogging live from SAP TechEd





Adam Blum hanging out in the DataXstream booth

sapteched.com/LIVE -

SAP TechEd has a site up with interviews and replays taken throughout the day at TechEd. If you aren't here it is the next best thing -

Visit www.sapteched.com/LIVE for the latest video replays including highlights from the keynote and these interviews recorded live today from the Community Clubhouse:

Mark Yolton — SAP Community Network Highlights
Christian Oehler — SAP Business Suite
Kaj van de Loo — Developing Timeless Software
Thomas Jung — Next Generation ABAP
Tales from the SAP Co-Innovation Lab — Greg Turco (Owens Corning), David Cruickshank (SAP), Markus Voigt (SUN), and Christine Puccio (SUN)
Susan Martin and Jon Reed — SAP Skills Certification
Dagfinn Parnas — on the "Company of the Future"
Don Whittington — CIO Florida Crystals, ASUG Board Member and Chairman of the ASUG CIO Council
Richard Probst — SAP Guidelines for Best-Built Applications