BizTalk 2009 - All you need to
know about the SAP Adapter
Kent Weare
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Worked with BizTalk since 2004
Architected and built integration projects
using BizTalk and SAP
2 time Microsoft MVP for BizTalk Server
Member of Connect Systems Advisory
group
Currently manage a team of Microsoft
Solution Developers
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SAP Background Information
Why do companies use SAP?
Challenges with Integrating with SAP
Previous SAP Adapters
BizTalk Adapter Pack 2.0
Demos
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SAP is the world’s second largest software
company (more than 80 000 customers)
Specializes in business solution software
Core product focuses on Enterprise Resource
Planning (ERP)
Has business specific modules that are tailored to
specific industries or functions
SAP HR – Human Resources
SAP MM - Materials Management
SAP SD – Sales and Distribution
ISU - Utilities
Competing Middleware product called NetWeaver
PI (Process Integration)
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Larger companies tend to run SAP due to
complexity and cost involved in running it
SAP systems tend to be mission critical and the
“source of truth” or “system of record”
Historically, most SAP deployments have run on a
flavor of Unix and Oracle
SAP and Microsoft established a strong alliance on
May 12, 2004
http://www.microsoft.com/isv/sap/alliance.aspx
In more recent years, many companies have
chosen to run SAP on the Intel platform using
Windows Server and SQL Server
SAP fully supports and endorses using Windows:
https://www.sdn.sap.com/irj/sdn/windows?rid=/webcontent/uui
d/901e077f-d0c5-2a10-90ba-bb5b8acc243c
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SAP is highly configurable:
IDocs (Intermediate Documents)
Data exchange format
BAPIs (Business Application Programming
Interface )
Provide Access to processes and data
Custom tables
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SAP Background Information
Why do companies use SAP?
Challenges with Integrating with SAP
Previous SAP Adapters
BizTalk Adapter Pack 2.0
Demos
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Buy vs Build
Not re-inventing the wheel
One stop shop for business applications
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SAP Background Information
Why do companies use SAP?
Challenges with Integrating with SAP
Previous SAP Adapters
BizTalk Adapter Pack 2.0
Demos
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Since SAP systems tend to be the “source of
truth” or “system of record”, SAP resources are
not anxious to have outside systems connect
Perception: Microsoft technologies are inferior
Politics:
Microsoft technologies tend to be easier to use
Microsoft resources tend to be in greater supply
Microsoft resources tend to cost less than SAP
resources
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Testing
May be difficult due to the skills sets required
BizTalk unit testing usually performed with file
adapter
New WCF SAP binding may change this
On large integrated projects, I recommend
locking project team in conference room to
complete integration tests
Usually a lot of finger pointing occurs in these
sessions
Having all team members in same room improves
communication and ensures the correct message is
being sent
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SAP Background Information
Why do companies use SAP?
Challenges with Integrating with SAP
Previous SAP Adapters
BizTalk Adapter Pack 2.0
Demos
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In BizTalk 2004, you initially had to look to
3rd parties for SAP Adapters. Popular
vendors included IWay and TopXml.
In 2005 Microsoft bought IWay’s adapter IP
Microsoft later released a Microsoft branded
SAP adapter for BizTalk 2004
In BizTalk 2006, Microsoft included this
adapter in the “BizTalk Adapters for
Enterprise Applications” pack
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BizTalk 2004 and 2006 adapters were
based upon .Net Connector
.NET Connector is a component that is
distributed by SAP.
Allows you to connect to SAP systems from
.NET applications
Prerequisite component for BizTalk 2006
adapter
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SAP Background Information
Why do companies use SAP?
Challenges with Integrating with SAP
Previous SAP Adapters
BizTalk Adapter Pack 2.0
Demos
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Adapter Pack 1.0 debut in BizTalk 2006 R2
Current version of Adapter Pack includes
SAP, Siebel ebusiness, Oracle Db, Oracle
E-Business Suite, SQL Server and MQ?
Supported in BizTalk 2006 R2 and 2009
Adapter pack is based upon WCF
.NET Connector is not used, librfc32u.dll and
libsapu16vcXX.dll are used instead
Adapters considered a Custom-WCF adapter
with technology specific bindings
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Pre-requisites (Not including SAP Dlls)
SAP dlls
http://tinyurl.com/qj4qj6
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Adapters can also be used outside of
BizTalk:
.NET application
ADO interface
Microsoft SharePoint portal
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SAP Background Information
Why do companies use SAP?
Challenges with Integrating with SAP
Previous SAP Adapters
BizTalk Adapter Pack 2.0
Demos
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Jump to Code
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Operation Name must match Logical Port
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EnableBizTalkCompatibilityMode
True: Properties the first control record received will be
pushed into message context. These include
DOCNUM, IDOCTYP, SNDPOR, RCVPOR
AutoConfirmSentIdocs
True: the adapter automatically commits the tRFC used
to send the IDOC.
False: You are responsible for invoking
RfcConfirmTransID transaction in order commit the
previously sent IDOC. You invoke this operation with
the GUID associated with the IDOC.
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EnableSafeTyping
True: Strings are used for values coming in and out of
SAP. This approach is loosely typed and the adapter
will not validate values
False: .NET strongly typed values will be used which
could result in errors if data is not provided
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receivedIdocFormat
Typed: Since the WCF adapter is based on SOAP, all
data that flows through adapter is encapsulated within a
SOAP message.
String: Message is a string, but happens to be
wrapped in an XML tag. Use XPath to pull message
body out so that it can be
processed by pipeline
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Jump to Code
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Encourage others to suspend disbelief
Adapter is certified by SAP
http://tinyurl.com/r34qry
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Microsoft BizTalk Adapter v2.0 for mySAP
Business Suite has been deprecated with
release of Microsoft BizTalk Server 2009
Microsoft has provided guidance in the Adapter
Pack documentation on how to migrate from
previous version of adapter
Using BizTalk to integrate with SAP provides
a tremendous amount of value – embrace it
Try to avoid the politics that may take place on big
integration projects. The value that you and
BizTalk bring to the project will be realized
“Find a friend” on the SAP team – BASIS
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BizTalk Adapter Pack Documentation Microsoft BizTalk Adapter 3.0 for mySAP
Business Suite Help
BizTalk Adapter Pack Forums http://social.msdn.microsoft.com/Forums/e
n-US/biztalkr2adapters/threads
BizTalk Adapter Pack team blog:
http://blogs.msdn.com/adapters/default.asp
x
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Email me through my blog:
http://kentweare.blogspot.com
Check out my other Webcast: Creating a
Highly Available BizTalk 2009 environment
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BizTalk Light and Easy Webcast Series
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