SAP Solution Manager; a tool for the techies..Right? Wrong!

SAP Solution Manager supports the documentation of the IT solution, both during the initial implementation and throughout its ongoing maintenance and operation.  This documentation can vary from ‘lean‘ documentation, comprising of just the installed SAP products and systems; to ‘fully defined’ business processes with  associated documentation, process flows, transaction codes and programs.

SAP Solution Manager used in this manner becomes a central repository of information describing the SAP Solution, with this vital information being available for the lifetime of the SAP estate, not just for the length of time the implementation team are available. Having access to such information facilitates a mush more effective and informed support of the SAP solution, allowing those providing support to understand what has been implemented and how this was achieved. In addition, this information becomes a valuable asset; providing a comprehensive knowledge base for future projects.

SAP Solution Manager can manage all aspects of the testing process and now also includes a full test automation solution without the need to rely on other 3rd party tools such as HP QTP.

Integrating with the Solution Documentation functionality, your Test Assets (Test Scripts, Test Data etc.) can be stored against the appropriate business processes to help promote their reuse.

Change Impact Analysis functionality exists (known as the Business Process Change Analyser) to help you identify, for a given change, what processes are actually impacted and where you should focus your test efforts. The Test Scope Optimisation functionality can also enable you to remove the redundancy that is prevalent in test execution, thus reducing the duration and effort required during typical regression test cycles.

Test Plans and Test Packages can be created to govern the test execution, controlling who should execute which test and in which sequence. Test results can be recorded, including the ability to raise and track defects through to resolution. Of course, all progress can be reported upon, allowing a Test Manager to keep track on progress and identify where testing is still to be undertaken.

This is a fully functioning, comprehensive test management suite that provides strong competition against the traditional, licensed products in the marketplace.

The Change Request Management (ChaRM) functionality provides a fully auditable SAP change management and change deployment process. Changes must be requested, validated and approved before development commences. Once underway the development and test lifecycle are captured, transports are tracked and no untested code can progress into production.

Flexibility is provided through the provision of Urgent Changes to allow the resolution of ‘fix when broke’ incidents in the fastest possible time, whilst still maintaining control and visibility over the progress.

ChaRM is complemented by Quality Gate Management (QGM) which provides a ‘lighter’ change management toolset, more suited to large scale implementation projects where the full rigour of a change process may not be required, but visibility and control over transport logistics is vital. If you’re projects are struggling to keep track of their transports, having difficulty with transport sequencing or very reliant on spreadsheets; then this could be the solution you’ve been looking for.

In addition to the two main Change Management toolsets above, Change Validation functionality is available to report on changes that have taken place, ensuring that all changes (technical and functional) are fully transparent and your landscape is aligned.

Most organisations already have an Incident Management solution in place, but for those SAP customers that don’t or for those that are reviewing their existing provider, the ITSM solution within SAP Solution Manager has now really come of age and should seriously be considered as a competitor to licensed solutions. It provides an ITIL compliant Incident, Problem and Knowledge Management solution all without additional licensing costs.

Integrated workflow ensures that users of the solution are kept up to date with progress and notified when they have an action to take in the system. All information is stored centrally and is combined with comprehensive reporting and analytical tools to ensure that Incident Managers have full visibility without the need to speak to individual resolver groups.

Now utilising a web based CRM front end, the toolset is much more accessible and user friendly than previous releases.

This is the functionality that SAP Solution Manager is most associated with, primarily comprising of Technical System Monitoring and Root Cause Analysis Tools.

The Technical System Monitoring functionality has progressed massively over the last few years, now using Diagnostic Agents to fully monitor the technical system operation, for example resource usage, response times and system errors. The monitoring is automated, helping you to ‘Run SAP like a factory’ i.e. reduce the burdensome, manual, monitoring activities with automated monitoring objects; utilising defined Key Performance Indicators and Threshold Values that are specific to your implementation. In this manner your technical experts can be automatically alerted to potential problems before they have a significant impact on the system, thus making the move from ‘reactive’ to ‘proactive’ support.

Powerful Root Cause Analysis tools are also available to help diagnose any identified problems: End to End Workload Analysis. Trace Analysis, Error Analysis and Change Analysis. These tools allow a deep insight into the underlying technical systems, all from one central application – SAP Solution Manager. 

SAP Solution Manager is an excellent tool for monitoring the technical aspects of the system, but did you know that the same principles of automated monitoring and alerting can be applied to the execution of your core business processes?

Through identifying key monitoring objects, known as ‘Throughput and Backlog Indicators’ and ‘Cross Application Monitoring Objects’, SAP Solution Manager can automatically monitor the health of your core business processes and raise alerts for the attention of the relevant Business Process Operation or Technical teams (as appropriate) when specified threshold values have been exceeded. For example, if there was a backlog of unapproved Purchase Orders in the system then this could have a severe impact on Production if it went unnoticed; using the Business Process and Interface Monitoring (BPIM) functionality we can monitor the number of unapproved or blocked Purchase Orders and raise alerts when this exceeds a specified threshold. When coupled with monitors on performance of the core transactions (e.g. response time of transaction MIGO) and automated monitoring of associated interface records (e.g. IDoc failures) a comprehensive monitoring solution can very quickly be established, thus helping to prevent isolated problems from having a significant impact on downstream business processes.

Utilising these monitoring objects also allows for a history of process performance to be captured, therefore empowering you to analyse process execution and identify areas for future optimisation activities. For example, you might want to compare the throughput / backlog of records across sales organisations or manufacturing plants to identify where aspects of the business processes are underperforming or have room for improvement.

In addition to monitoring business process execution, tools to govern the documentation of batch jobs, monitor the growth and size of data (Data Volume Management), provide visibility of potential data integrity and transactional consistency issues, also exist to help ensure the continued and smooth operation of the SAP business processes.

If you don’t believe you utilise SAP Solution Manager at all, then this is the one aspect of the tool that will be being used in the background by your Basis team.

SAP Solution Manager contains the Maintenance Optimiser used to support the correct patching and updating of the SAP estate, as well as informing of critical updates. It is now mandatory for certain patches and software downloads to be managed via the tool. To make the best use of the functionality it is imperative that your SAP landscape has been defined correctly and accurately within SAP Solution Manager, therefore tools such as the Landscape Management Database (LMDB) and its automated Landscape Verification become vitally important.

Do you want to know how much Custom Code your SAP solution contains? If so, do you also want to know how much is actually being used?

The Custom Code Lifecycle Management functionality of SAP Solution Manager answers these core questions and more. Allowing you to understand through the Custom Development Management Cockpit which custom code will be impacted by an upgrade and which code should be remediated as a result. Using the Clearing Analysis functionality allows you to identify where remediation efforts can be saved, by removing potentially unused/unwanted code thus helping to reduce maintenance costs and reduce the time associated with upgrade activities. 

Embarking on an upgrade project? Then using SAP Solution Manager and ALM processes can bring significant benefits and savings to your project.

Unsure how? Well here are just a few suggestions:

• Identify the new Business Functions and processes that are relevant to you by using the Business Function Prediction service.
• Reduce the efforts involved for code remediation during the upgrade process by identifying unwanted / unused custom code through use of the Custom Development Management Cockpit Code.
• Use the Solution Implementation functionality with the relevant Upgrade Roadmap to define the blueprint and manage the configuration exercise.
• Test Management workbench should be used to document and manage the test execution, thus ensuring that the upgraded solution works. Test Automation can help expedite the regression test process and provide a valuable asset for the future.
• Utilise the Maintenance Optimiser to download the correct software packages; remove the guesswork!

…and much, much more!