Brief introduction on R/3 System and NetWeaver

Session 1: Brief introduction on R/3 System and NetWeaver

 

SAP (Systems, Applications and Products in Data Processing) is basically an ERP system. SAP R/3 is three-tier Architecture with Presentation, Business and Data logic.

 

They are written in ABAP programming language and it uses Open SQL for connecting to data logic. We have some other ERP systems like JDEdwards, Oracle Fusion, Concur etc for this but why we need to use SAP?

 

Then SAP came with new integrated platform for everything that is SAP NetWeaver which has lot of this such as Portal, Process Integration, Business warehouse, Business intelligence etc which is written in J2EE and it supports all JCA connectors.

 

Now we use SAP R/3 engine installed in one server which is written in ABAP and we use SAP NetWeaver in another server which is written in J2EE and it is tightly coupled to R/3.

 

So, simply we can say R/3 is the emperor of SAP which controls others and anything you need it will be available in SAP R/3 which is customised to every business.

 

eXchange Infrastructure (XI) which is now Process Integration (PI) is developed in J2EE which supports all types of protocols and connectors which imports the functions from R/3 in a simple way for using it. It supports protocols such as SOAP, FTP, SFTP, NNTP etc., now days any third party system should connect to this XI for data which in some way connects to R/3.

 

SAP NetWeaver architecture contains mainly four blocks. They are People integration, Process Integration, Information Integration and Application Platform.

 

Learn more about SOAP and JCA for understanding next Session.