Services

customise and Simplify Apps on Devices

Here's a funny - or maybe, annoying - thing: to be able to customise SAP on-device scenarios, you need to know a fair bit about SAP. But to rollout policy-consistent, logo-branded, secure, UX-friendly configured SAP Components on macOS, Windows, etc, you need to know a fair bit about devices running macOS, Windows, etc. 

 

Now as it happens, the Marmot Set have been installing and customising SAPGUI and other apps on their home computers (and in employee role, on work computers) for years. And we've packaged those base-installations with a coding layer, that supplies all wanted or needed customisations as part of the install process... on our MacBooks, on our Windows VMs, on our Ubuntu, openSUSE, and Fedora VMs. (For Android tablets, iPhones and so on, we use SAPGUI-for-HTML, and/or server-side Fiori configuration). 

 

"You say that, but do they actually work?" Yep. Demo requests considered.

 

"Ok maybe your POCs work, but what about our special requirements?" Whatever is technically feasible, the Marmot Set can implement. (Note: though we don't run any delivery channel instances like Jamf or Intune on our Marmot-LAN, we know how to build compliant media for those).

 

"What about the SAPUI Landscape file?". Options for handling HTTP and non-HTTP locations - tested and working.

 

"Could the SAP install-server handle all the SAPGUI stuff?". It's a useful tool (though only for Windows devices), we can set it up for you, and it offers basic customisations... though anything more complex, you will still need coding help - for example, to change override-HKCU registry keys, so that the users' old IE preference is switched to Edge.

 

"Hmm, but what about SAP HANA Studio, SAP AFO, SAP NWBC...?" Sure, bring it on, we know, we've done.

DNS, SNC, SSO, HTTPS...

SAP systems are typically using the client-server paradigm - server-side: big computers running databases and business logic; client-side: devices the human and non-human users use to interact with the server-side. So it's important not just to think of the client-side devices, but about the server-side boxes they connect to, and the network that constitutes, enables, yet constrains those connections.

 

The Marmot Set are firmly of the opinion that DNS addresses for the SAP servers should be configured, and those addresses should always be used by the clients when connecting to the server-side. This isn't a Networking for Dummies tutorial so we'll spare you the argumentation for our opinion here.

 

Also we are firmly of the opinion that secured communication is much more secure than unsecured communication - yes, all the top insights we're giving you here! So as well as using HTTPS (and SAP Web Dispatcher) for web pages, you should use SAP SNC (Secure Network Communication) and if possible SSO (Single Sign-On) for SAPGUI and RFC traffic. (We assume you don't prefer that everyone's SAP userIDs, passwords and other data are available to hackers using simple packet sniffing techniques, so that's the reason you have to want secured comms).

 

Let us know if you'd like to discuss such topics, generally and also for possible solutions at a system config level.

Make POCs easier for devs...

SAP provide two useful tools for those of Abap and Basis persuasion to test out their ideas on a so called "mini-SAP" box, which you can easily run as a VM (virtual machine) or Linux container on a variety of laptop computers.

 

Unusually perhaps given that we are talking about SAP, this is all free, and the materials are downloadable either using a SAP Community User ID (also free) or from Docker Hub. The only tricky part, is knowing how to get everything installed and running, as the SAP guides are not let's say all that clear.

 

Anyway the Main Marmot has over the years provided blogs (like this one, this one and this one) which can help you get everything working. So good luck with that... if you are stuck, or if you would want some educational workshop or even installation-as-a-service, then contact us for help.

AOB

One thing the Marmot Set and many other SAP-techies have realised, is that nobody knows everything about SAP-tech. Instead, our various life/work-histories mean that all the self-styled governors actually tend to know an awful lot about a few things, and then just quite a lot about many other things.

 

For the Marmot Set, that means that we are not going to sit around smoking cigars and kidding anyone on that we are the complete Basis experts, the complete Abap and Software Logistics experts, the complete SAP-on-cloud experts, etcetera. But if anyone wants our thoughts on SAP-tech themes, then we're opinionated but honest, and all our advice and dialogue proceeds on those premises.