Part 1 of my notes on today's ASUG webcast is here BI4 Patching Strategies & Best Patches - ASUG Webcast Part 1
Part 2 covers SAP's plans to Improve the BI Support Process.
SAP wants to provide a "better customer experience through streamlining our support process". The timeline is the second half of this year.
SAP's Lawell Kiing said they want to provide a better customer experience especially for BI side
Figure 1: Source: SAP
Figure 1 covers the current support process and the proposed.
Currently the customer finds an issue, and if it is not answerable by product support & requires a fix, product support will open an ADAPT and provide to the customer. They will hand over to development on ADAPT
Development works on correction, it is logged into a fixed issues PDF file in release notes
Fixes is includes in SP or patch
Customer searches for issue or if it has been fixed – go to fixed issues list, CTRL F and search for the patch or SP
Planned process to streamline – customer provides issue to SAP, product support will try to resolve it. If not resolved, it is given to development, the developer knows correction and will document in SAP note and then it goes in delivery of SP and patch.
They can search incident or note or SMP
Question & Answer ( a subset)
Q: When do you upgrade the client machines - when the non-Prod systems are upgraded or when the Production systems are upgraded?
A: I recommended they have one to two client PC dedicated to testing which we would upgrade those machines. This way, you avoid any disruption to their production environment until testing is complete.
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Q: Where should Crystal Reports be patched in the recommended order, before or after the BI Client tools?
A: after
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Q: Can you please advise us we can run inplace upgrade vs create a new installation
A: Up to discussion and would rather see in place - depends on how you want to go live‑
Also see SCN; if on 3.1 and go to 4.1 - new installation, promotion; if on 4.0 SP8 and go to 4.1 - prefer in-place upgrade‑
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Q: Is it always neccessary to update latest TOMCAT as well along with upgrading BI4.x ?
A: If you have your own version of TomCat, please update it to the latest that PAM supports; if it is one from the default installer let the installer do it.‑
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Q: Do you only have one CMS running or multiple when you start the install?
A: If you are updating using Parallel Patching, One CMS first and if any other CMS starts you will keep that until the end of the process.‑
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Q: Is it a best practise to install the Client tools in the CMS server? why?
A: No it is not, because of the issue I just mentioned about overlapping components and complications of updating the system, however it is a supported scenario.‑
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Q: In case CMS is split in 2 (intelligence tier and Processing tier) how would you go about it?
A: Same rules apply. One CMS and FRS need to be up and running during the update and the rest stopped.‑
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Q: We have custom bi properties and we include them in the custom folder, but they seem to get overwritten everytime anyway. What is the point of that folder then?
A: Recommend look at the BI Admin guide - there are 2 custom folders‑
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Q: Has there been improvements to the uninstall procedures if a repair is needed?
A: Repair - reinstalls everything; yes getting better with each release‑
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Q: What is the best way to avoid that with an upgrade or patch NEW issues show up, e.i: a report issue is fixed with the upgrade but another comes up
A: You can avoid that with a test environment - fair question‑
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Q: If we are on BI4.0 SP4 and would move to BI 4.0 SP7. so would it be a full install or an upgrade ?
A: Since your major release is the same 4.x, and you are just upgrading from SP4 to SP7, I would personally perform an upgrade without the full install which is not necessary.‑
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Q: You are recommending upgrading server and then client tools, but if that desktop with client tools can be connected to test (4.1) and prod servers (4.0), is that OK?
A: According to Foroohar, if both client and server are not version compliant (same version), then SAP support cannot assist if there are issues. I would recommend having a dedicated client PC for your testing, to avoid touching the production env.‑
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Q: Is BI4.1 SP2 supports in place upgrade on top of BI4.0 SP6??
A: Yes you can but first go to BI4.1 base first then SP2‑
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Q: For ADAPT are fixed then SAP release the solution via notes, any option to get the fixed issue alert(SAP notes) once released from SAP via email instead of go and search for each issue?
A: There is a way to set up support notifications for this‑
The link where you can configure you support notificaitons is...
http://service.sap.com/sbop-updates
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Q: When you are going from 4.0 SP5 to 4.1 SPx, do you go to 4.1 SP1 first and then up to SPx, or do you go straight to 4.1 SPx in step?
A: You go to base release first bi4.1 then the SP‑
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Q: Is there any link which shows all the adapts and their associated SP/patch info?
A: It is all accumulated in release notes..not one documet‑
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Q: When you are going from 4.0 SP5 to 4.1 SPx, do you go to 4.1 SP1 first and then up to SPx, or do you go straight to 4.1 SPx in step?
A: You go to base release first bi4.1 then the SP‑
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Q: If I'm on SP5 Patch 7 and I want to upgrade to SP8, do I need to uninstall either Patch 7 or SP5 from the server?
A: No
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Q: Why Forward Fit Plans are not released right after the release of patches ? FF Plan helps us to understand what is included and what it forward fits to
A: FF = when the new release is planned they need time to be included
More: Questions Answered After the Webcast
1.) What is the Patch & Upgrade impact of the Two (2) new stand-alone “Add-On” server components (Design Studio & Analysis Office) for the Platform…?
Design Studio: You must patch both Client and the Server.
Analysis for Office: Is a pure client installation (however, there’s an add-on to BOE for scheduling), however patching is independent in this case. If there should be any dependencies, it will be documented upon release.
2.) Do these stand-alone “Add-On” servers need to be patched in a stand-alone fashion, or are they detected and patched by a regular SP deployment on the Platform…?
They need to be patched in a stand-alone fashion. Nothing is detected.
Design Studio: You can go to “Add or Remove Programs” on Windows or “modifyOrRemoveProducts.sh” on *NIX to find out which versions are installed.
Analysis for Office: The Add-on installer (for scheduling) requires a BOE node on Windows (.NET is required for pre-calculation). So, only check will be via “Add or Remove Programs” on Windows for both the Client and the Server.
3.) At some point, will the Two (2) new stand-alone “Add-On” server components (Design Studio & Analysis Office) just become a BASE-LINE part of the Platform install & upgrade (eg. 4.2, etc)…?
Design Studio: Not planned at this point.
Analysis for Office: Not planned, however product is available on other platforms (Netweaver, HANA).
4.) In large organizations, is there any “pop-up” messaging available on the various desktop clients to alert them that they are “out of synch” with the version/patch on the server…?
Design Studio: These checks and user messages are implemented.
Analysis for Office: No such implementation
5.) What is the “SAP runs SAP” internal-process to manage the detection/enforcement that all your BOE Servers and (*assumed) thousands of Desktop clients on the same Server/Patch level..?
I haven’t been able to contact the right group yet to give you their version of how they are managing all the Servers and Clients. It might take a while. Please stay tuned until I’ll get the right response.
Related:
Join ASUG June 2nd for ASUG Annual Conference BI4.1 pre-conference session: Jump Start ASUG Annual Conference SAPPHIRE with a Pre-Conference Session - Back and Better than Ever
Related Upcoming ASUG Webcasts:
- April 9: Learning Rooms: New Learning Hub Options
- April 16: Backup and Recovery of the BI Platform
- April 21: BI Security Model and Best Practices
- SAP Managed Tags:
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