De Nederlandse BI Podcast: SAP TechEd 2023

We’re back!! 😉

SAP TechEd 2023 is inmiddels weer achter de rug. Wat is er allemaal aangekondigd? Wat viel op tijdens de keynote? Wat is er nieuw in SAC en Datasphere? Dit en meer in een splinternieuwe aflevering van De Nederlandse BI Podcast!

[Sorry, Dutch only, but maybe some AI tool can translate the podcast! 😀]

De Nederlandse BI Podcast: SAP TechEd 2021

“TechEd 2021 is a wrap!” Wederom een virtueel event, met als belangrijkste aankondiging de BW Bridge. We behandelen onder andere de volgende onderwerpen:

• Wat gaat er met BW/4HANA gebeuren?
• Wat ga je doen als klant als je nu nog op BW 7.3, 7.4 of 7.5 zit?
• Wat is de pricing?
• Is er een impact op de front end? 

Veel plezier bij het luisteren!

SAP TechEd 2020 – Running SAP Data Warehouse Cloud in a Live Environment [CM103]

SAP TechEd 2020 was a completely virtual event and we (the Interdobs DWC team) were given the opportunity to host session CM103 to talk a bit about our experiences with SAP Data Warehouse Cloud (and SAP Analytics Cloud) in a live environment.

Obviously it always better to be in Las Vegas for TechEd, but I must say that this virtual studio event was very well setup and executed by SAP. And, the best thing about virtual events is that you can watch specific content on demand whenever you want. So check the replay of our session below.

Running SAP Data Warehouse Cloud in a Live Environment [CM103]
Explore best practices for running the SAP Data Warehouse Cloud solution in a complex environment with multiple data sources.

SAP Analytics Cloud and SAP Data Warehouse Cloud: Early Insights

One of the projects that I’m currently working on involves a very interesting setup with the brand new SAP Data Warehouse Cloud (DWC) as its datawarehousing solution. As front-end  we use SAP Analytics Cloud (SAC), which is available as an embedded offering within DWC. This is actually the first DWC implementation in Europe so that’s very exciting and cool to be part of!

In the following video the project is introduced and the solution architecture is shown, plus a demo on how the data models were created in DWC. At the end of the video a demo is given of one of the dashboards that we created in SAC on top of these DWC models.

Spaces

From the SAP Analytics Cloud side there are a few things that we need to take into account with this approach. The embedded SAC tenant is very much linked to its DWC counterpart. You have to work within an isolated “space” and make sure that all SAC users also are made a member of the space that you built the stories in. This is in addition to the DWC role(s) that have to be assigned to these users. Unfortunately these spaces lack any form of structure or options for management. There are no folders and the sharing settings of documents cannot be adjusted. This could maybe work with a very small user base but is something you really don’t want for a large audience. As there are no (public) folders, all objects (SAC stories, DWC views) are listed in a single list of documents. 

Models

The SAC classic setup, where a model must be built first before the data can be consumed in the SAC story, is altered in the embedded SAC version. If you want to use a DWC view in a SAC story, you need to go to the respective space in DWC and create a story from there. A pop-up will appear that lists all available DWC views; no separate model is required anymore. Via this workflow it is also possible to add additional DWC views to the same story. 

A step that is left out of this workflow is the option to use a story template, which is an important asset to develop a consistent line of reporting. If you switch from the DWC side of the tenant to the SAC side, the standard option to create a story is still available, including the template selection step. However, the problem here is that there is no option to select the DWC views, as this probably requires you to be within the particular DWC space first.

Data Warehouse Cloud Live Connection

Luckily the solution for the above problems is already available in a live data connections for DWC. With this we can let DWC act as any other live data source (SAP BW, SAP HANA). The only difference is that the creation of a model is not necessary, even when the DWC live connection is used from a standalone tenant (which is actually a plus!).

Conclusion

So in conclusion I think it is a very good approach to offer an out of the box SAC environment within DWC. The developments and testing of DWC views and SAC stories went in extremely short cycles, which meant that we were able to make a huge progress in a very short time frame. I’m not convinced though whether the idea of using spaces is really the way to go. If the audience consists of isolated (business) teams that build their own DWC views and SAC stories it looks like a handy approach, but in a classic setup where a dedicated team creates a set of reports for a large, company wide audience better platform management options are required. Good thing is that we can achieve this with the new DWC live connection!