SAP on IBM i

SAP on IBM i - Update week 37 2012: Information events

Thomas Obermeier — Thu, 13 Sep 2012 07:26:50 GMT

Welcome at the SAP on IBM i update! This time I'd like to shortly point to two upcoming information events a colleague in the

IBM SAP International Competence Center (ISICC) in Walldorf made me aware of.

Webinar and Infoday

Both events will be held in German and are free of charge. Intending to help participants plan their SAP on IBM i landscape they pick up topics of today's interest which we partly already adressed in this blog series. One major objective is to discuss options regarding the end of support for IBM i V5.4 in 2013 (cf. SAP on IBM i - Update week 07 2012, IBM announced End of Support for V5R4). Another is to give participants the opportunity to get an overview of current SAP IBM i technology.

Give it a look and follow the links below for more details and registration:

The Webinar In die Zukunft mit SAP und IBM i will last one hour at September 8, 2012 14:00 CET. Register at http://www.worldbit.de/ibm-anmeldung-zum-webinar-18-09-2012/
The Generation i Infoday is a one day informational seminar at the IBM SAP International Competence Center (ISICC) in Walldorf/Germany. It will take place at October 18, 2012. Register at https://www-950.ibm.com/events/swgeer/swgeer06.nsf/signin?openform&seminar=kwogmia8xlhcz&lang=en

Looking forward to see you discuss your experiences with the space discussions!

SAP on IBM i - Update week 33 2012: SAP on DB2 for IBM i Monitoring Roadmap

Thomas Obermeier — Tue, 14 Aug 2012 06:07:32 GMT

Welcome at the SAP on IBM i update! This time I have the pleasure to forward a contribution out of our development team, stuff you really will benefit from:

Database monitoring is a key element to support performance analysis in SAP installations. Information about table sizes and growth, usage statistics and SQL statements can be analyzed using SAP transactions DB02, ST04 and DBACOCKPIT. Up to now, database performance analysis on DB2 for IBM i was bound to an ABAP application server, because the background jobs to collect statistical data for the database were all executed in the ABAP application server. As SAP is integrating more and more monitoring functions into the SAP Solution Manager, this old concept is no longer working well. Beginning last year, the SAP on IBM i Porting team has started a major project to rework the database monitoring functions with SAP on DB2 for IBM i.

Independent Backend for Data Collection

The first step consisted in the separation of the collection component from the ABAP application server. The new SAP Database Performance Collector for IBM i can run on IBM i V5R4 and higher releases. It is shipped through the SAP Software Distribution Center with the latest SAPHOSTAGENT package in release 7.20 or 7.20 EXT and can be installed independent from any SAP system, so it can monitor even Java only or MDM systems. Note 1031096 - Installing Package SAPHOSTAGENT explains how to install the SAPHOSTAGENT package, Note 1622665 - IBM i: SAP Database Performance Collector explains how to setup the SAP Database Performance Collector and has a detailed documentation for it attached as a PDF file. The SAP Database Performance Collector for IBM i is a prerequisite for the next two steps.

Integration of the Backend

In the second step, the existing transactions DB02, ST04 and DBACOCKPIT were reworked to allow using the new SAP Database Performance Collector for IBM i instead of the performance collector jobs that were integrated in the ABAP application server. These changes were implemented in all SAP Basis releases 4.6C and higher. Note 1634283 - IBM i: Changes to Show Data of SAP Database Perf. Collector lists the support packages or correction instructions that are needed to implement these changes. You can activate the changes by setting profile parameter as4/dbmon/central_collector to 1, “on” or "ON". By activating these changes for all systems in your landscape, you avoid duplicate data collection between the SAP Database Performance Collector for IBM i and the existing ABAP systems.

Performance Warehouse

A third step was completed right now and will be available with SAP Solution Manager 7.1 Support Package Stack 06 plus the correction instructions in Note 1672318 - IBM i: Database Performance Warehouse BI content/extractors or Support Package Stack 07: With these changes, SAP is introducing the extractors and report definitions for the SAP Performance Warehouse for IBM i. The Performance Warehouse offers remote monitoring capabilities, graphical representation of the data, performance history and many reporting and configuration options for reports. Note 1666390 - IBM i: Solution Manager 7.1 Database Performance Warehouse describes how to setup the Performance Warehouse in the SAP Solution Manager and how to register remote SAP systems for reporting. The note also contains an attachment with a detailed description of the reports that are shipped with the Performance Warehouse.

Not the End of the Story

Please stay tuned for future enhancements in the Performance Warehouse and transaction DBACOCKPIT based on the SAP Database Performance Collector for IBM i. There is more to come, and we will inform you through this blog when it is ready.

And not to forget: let us know your opinion, comment to the blog or email to the author - we are always eager to improve.

SAP on IBM i - Update week 29 2012: IBM i 7.1 TR4 and Live Partition Mobility

Thomas Obermeier — Fri, 20 Jul 2012 07:12:43 GMT

Welcome at the SAP on IBM i update! This time new features available from IBM are in the focus, which we were really longing for:

IBM i 7.1 TR4

In April 2012, IBM announced the availability of Technology Refresh (TR) 4 for IBM i 7.1. TRs are IBM's way to deliver enhancements without urging customers into a major release upgrade. Besides support for new hardware components, TRs also provide new and enhanced features for virtualization, high availability, database and operating system. For example with TR4, IBM i is enabled to run on the new IBM Pure Flex compute nodes. A new type of SSD (Solid State Disk) drive and disk controller is supported, with doubled capacity and throughput compared to the previous model. Also the lock handling of the DB2 for i database has been significantly improved for many record locks, this is expected to reduce query runtimes especially in SAP Business Warehouse applications.

Live Partition Mobility

The highlight of TR4 is for sure the support of PowerVM Live Partition Mobility (LPM) for IBM i. LPM enables you to move a partition from one physical server to another with no interruption of the running processes. This function comes in handy when you need to perform hardware or firmware maintenance on one server for example. LPM has been tested with running SAP systems in our lab and is therefore supported by SAP. Take a look at SAP note 1102760 for details about the requirements that have to be fulfilled to do LPM with IBM i.

IBM 7.1 TR4 is available since May 2012 and can be ordered with group PTF SF99707 level 4.

For more details about the TR contents have a look at the IBM i Technology Updates page in the developerWorks wiki.

SAP on IBM i - Update week 28 2012, SAP Landscape Virtualization Manager ready for IBM i

Thomas Obermeier — Thu, 12 Jul 2012 07:32:37 GMT

Welcome at the SAP on IBM i update! This time I'd like to draw your attention to a new product and its roadmap for SAP on IBM i:

SAP Landscape Virtualization Manager ready for IBM i

SAP Landscape Virtualization Manager (LVM) is SAP’s tool to manage SAP systems running on virtualized hardware resources. On June 18^th the SP3 of SAP LVM has been released to the Service Marketplace. With SP3 LVM can now work with SAP landscapes running on IBM i.

In this initial step basic use cases are supported like end-to-end monitoring, landscape visualization and system start/stop. But this is, of course, not the end of the story as we plan to deliver further uses cases with future SPs for LVM. Look at the grey parts of the picture below to get an idea of about what is to come.

For all the details and an up to date list of currently supported use cases refer to Note 1527538 - SAP NetWeaver Landscape Virtualization Management 1.0 as a starting point. A nice overview and further reading can be found in the recent SAP NetWeaver Landscape Virtualization Management at a Glance article and space Virtualization and Cloud Infrastructure.

Get involved with the community

Make the SAP on IBM i space an even more active and helpful forum by contributing yourself. Give feedback, raise questions, start polls and get help from all the experts around. As a first step into this direction I'd like to encourage you to follow our space and start receiving email notifications - it is just one click away!

SAP on IBM i - Update week 26 2012, High Availability Documentation Trilogy

Thomas Obermeier — Wed, 27 Jun 2012 12:53:23 GMT

Welcome at the SAP on IBM i update! In this edition I'd like to highlight completion of a documentation series out of our team.

In SAP on IBM i - Update week 49 2011, Power HA I pointed to a technical description of integration of IBM PowerHA and SAP on IBM i. Just recently my colleagues complemented their work by publishing an additional paper, which completes the picture to a

SAP High Availability on IBM i documentation trilogy

The final installment in this trilogy has just been published on IBM Techdocs. This concise whitepaper with a long title,

High Availability Options for SAP Using IBM PowerHA SystemMirror for i,

provides a very precise portrayal of SAP high availability on IBM i. The purpose of this paper, written by the experts, is to be able to make design decisions; then, along with the other referenced materials, be able to implement a highly integrated highly available SAP solution.

This white paper can be found at: http://www.ibm.com/support/techdocs/atsmastr.nsf/WebIndex/WP102130.

The other two papers in the trilogy are accessible via SAP notes:

Note 568820 - IBM i: Implementing an Independent ASP (iASP) System

Note 1635602 - DB4: SAP Integration into PowerHA for IBM i containing the SAP High Availability on IBM i Configuration Guide

Feedback welcome

Make the SAP on IBM i space an even more active and helpful forum by contributing yourself. Give feedback, raise questions, start polls and get help from all the experts around.

SAP on IBM i - Update week 18 2012, SAP JVM 4 switch

Thomas Obermeier — Fri, 04 May 2012 14:01:43 GMT

Welcome back at the SAP on IBM i update blog series!

It's about time to restart posting heads up information from the development team now that the discussion forum seems to recover after the big SCN switch back in March. The first topic I'd like to bring to your attention is again about switching to SAP JVM 4. It has already been addressed in a former posting and in the entry page of our SAP on IBM i space. Reason for iterating on this is the tight schedule you have and may not quite be aware of.

SAP JVM 4 replacing vendor JVMs

SAP published its Java 1.4 based JVM in August 2011 with the intention to replace all vendor 1.4JVMs for SAP NetWeaver 6.40 and 7.0x based applications. Starting October 2012, SAP will no longer provide support for vendor 1.4 JVMs. By then you should have switched your IBM Java 1.4 VMs to SAP JVM 4. This date is only half a year from today.

Benefits for you are the extended support lifecycle for your SAP Java applications and an equal or better runtime performance compared to IBM IT4J or classic JVM. The administration of SAP JVM 4 can still be performed with the known JVM CONFIGTOOL.

You may have noticed that a colleague of mine provided a presentation SAP JVM 4 and IBM i that guides you through the necessary steps to perform the switch procedure on our platform. The presentation contains links to the SAP JVM and the switch tool as well as to all relevant SAP notes in this context.

Feedback more than welcome

We are eager to learn what is your gut feeling regarding SAP JVM. Feel encouraged to comment to this blog, post questions and remarks or just share your experiences with SAP JVM in our discussion forum.

SAP on IBM i - Update week 09 2012, JDBC driver overview

Thomas Obermeier — Fri, 02 Mar 2012 02:44:32 GMT

Welcome at the SAP on IBM i update! In this edition I refer to a recently published set of slides based on a presentation held for customers by a colleague of mine.

JDBC driver overview

The slide set is headlined Java Database Connectivity with IBM i and pretty comprehensively addresses questions that might come to your mind when dealing with JDBC drivers. Let me list a view:

What are the drivers good for and which flavors, types and versions are available?
Which drivers are supported in which context, i.e., when to switch latest from Native Driver to JTOpen/Toolbox?
What are the basic maintenance and configuration operations, how to exchange drivers in particular?
How can driver activity be monitored?

There are more answers in the slides than I want to list questions, here. Give it a look and also find directions for further reading if you should need to go into the full details.

Stay tuned...

As the development team intends to maintain a consistent format, editions of the series will continue to be published on my name. Set feeds accordingly if you are interested in following the series.

SAP on IBM i - Update week 07 2012, IBM announced End of Support for V5R4

Thomas Obermeier — Thu, 16 Feb 2012 02:05:52 GMT

Welcome at the SAP on IBM i update! In this edition I will reflect on the V5R4 End of Support by IBM and what it means for our platform.

End of Program Support for V5R4

Only few days ago the date was officially announced to be end of september 2013. You find the details for this and other releases at IBM's Upgrade planning site, and some generic thoughts about the topic in the recent edition of Steve Will's You and i blog series.

SAP information

Let me take this event as an opportunity to route you to the Product Availability Matrix, where you can find details for every SAP product in terms of supported OS releases, database releasess Java VMs and many more.

But there is more to know, and you may appreciate to have specific information collected at a few spots like the following set of SAP notes. They collect known issues and their solutions for specific OS releases, where the ones relevant in the current context should be:

Note 1148480 - IBM i: Known Issues with V6R1Mx and
Note 1432783 - IBM i: Known Issues with OS Release IBM i V710
Note 68440 - AS/400: How do I upgrade to a higher OS/400 Release? is kind of serving as root for those release specific ones. From the naming you can tell that it has been there as an anchor for many years...

More associations

In addition to the pretty formal stuff above, I'd like to share some thoughts, which came to my mind quite immediatly when starting to write.

IBM i 7.1 is precondition to use the 7.20 EXT kernel with optimized performance. So one could think of taking advantage of a downward compatible kernel and of its optimized version on 7.1.

How to handle Java? Until we shipped SAP JVM you were bound to use IBM Classic VM on IBM i in SAP Web Application Server 6.40 and SAP NetWeaver 7.0. It is known to be very different in many respects compared to any other Java VM you may know from other platforms. In later OS releases you are encouraged or urged to switch to IT4J. Might be a good idea to switch to SAPJVM as a preparation step before an OS upgrade in order to avoid an additional switch, which will come from an already announced End of Support for the IBM JVMs.

Stay tuned...

As the development team intends to maintain a consistent format, editions of the series will continue to be published on my name. Set feeds accordingly if you are interested in following the series.

SAP on IBM i - Update week 04 2012, RFC options

Thomas Obermeier — Fri, 27 Jan 2012 06:29:53 GMT

Welcome back at the SAP on IBM i update! Also in 2012 I want to continue with this series and invite you to participate in the news from our development team.

A disappearing executable

Having installed a 7.20 kernel you will sooner or later realize that programs rfcexec and startrfc are no longer part of the kernel shipment as some of your processes might depend on their existence. You will search for Note 1581595 - rfcexec and startrfc missing after upgrade, which gives general instructions for how to repair the situation on the one hand but also offers a perfect chance to get lost and confused within the world of SAP notes when going after some referenced details.

Don't get me wrong: Most of the reference notes were created on a fair reason and are helpful to find solutions in a variety of situations. And the notes were improved according to recent feedback as well. My hope is simply that a high level overview of the available RFC options could be helpful when you walk through the notes to collect all the steps for fixing the above problem.

So let's get started with the very basics: SAP ships different versions of RFC packages. The old stuff, named Classic RFC or SAP RFC SDK is still in use at many places but not favored by SAP anymore. The currently favored package is called SAP NetWeaver RFC SDK, dubbed nwrfcsdk in many cases. It has been shipped since 2007 to my knowledge. Note 1005832 - Overview on RFC Libraries and SDKs gives an overview of what the single versions are good for.

Classic RFC: SAP RFC SDK

This is definitely not what you need to fix the above scenario. But you should make sure you understand if some note you find is dealing with this version.

Independently of the platform, Note 413708 - Current RFC library tells you which version to use in which OS release and context and where to find it on the Service Marketplace. For IBM i you would go after Note 84685 - AS/400: Availability of RFC in 4.x, 6.x and 7.00 to detect the latest versions and follow instructions of Note 450870 - AS/400 and iSeries: Installing RFC SDK for installation.

SAP NetWeaver RFC SDK

Central note for installing nwrfcsdk on IBM i is Note 1097997 - Installing SAP NW RFC SDK in system i. Details for compilation are given in Note 1056696 - Compiling and Linking RFC Programs with the SAP NW RFC SDK for all platforms.

For solution of the above problem you will now have to install the UNICODE version of nwrfcsdk into any directory /DIR independent of the 7.20 kernel. Subdirectory /DIR/nwrfcsdk/lib needs to be made visible to executables by adding this directory to the library path of the system. Note 1149088 - iSeries: Adding a directory to a work process simply explains that this can be done via parameter as4/ADDLIBPATH to the instance profile. Now you can configure connections in transaction SM59 using the full path /DIR/nwrfcsdk/bin/rfcexec or /DIR/nwrfcsdk/bin/startrfc.

Stay tuned...

As the development team intends to maintain a consistent format, editions of the series will continue to be published on my name. Set feeds accordingly if you are interested in following the series.

SAP on IBM i - Update week 50 2011, sapcpe boost

Thomas Obermeier — Fri, 16 Dec 2011 03:39:56 GMT

Welcome at the SAP on IBM i update! Feedback triggers improvement. Here is a recent example from kernel logistics. Feel encouraged to give feedback yourselves...

Asynchronous update of kernel on IBM i

Coming latest with the 7.20 DCK you are able to configure your system to make use of the sapcpe mechanism. This procedure ensures you are able to maintain your kernel at any time at a central location and let the system replicate updated binaries to local instances at startup time - a major improvement in logistics, I would say.

The bad thing is: sapcpe has to really do it, and it has to do it at system start: It may take a while until binaries are copied to the file system and ILE parts have to be extracted.

So here is the good news: Available with level 106 of patch ILE the tools APYSIDKRN, which your administrator uses to maintain the central kernel repository, takes care of and triggers the replication for all IBM i instances into side directories and libraries. These will be renamed at system start so that sapcpe is instantly done with its work.

Need details? Here are some links for technical deep dive - SMP login required as usual:

Stay tuned...

As the development team intends to maintain a consistent format, editions of the series will continue to be published on my name. Set feeds accordingly if you are interested in following the series.

SAP on IBM i - Update week 49 2011, Power HA

Thomas Obermeier — Tue, 06 Dec 2011 07:09:49 GMT

Welcome at the SAP on IBM i update! Let me highlight a platform specific implementation note on HA this time.

High Availability for IBM i

Just recently, colleagues of our team released their results from proof of concept efforts regarding integration of Power HA into the SAP on IBM i or vice versa. Their Note 1635602 - DB4: SAP Integration into PowerHA for IBM i (SMP login required) is now also quoted at the High Availability Partner Information page of SDNs generic High Availability spot below Home > Application Lifecycle Management > Technical Enablement > Landscape Design.

Attached to the note is the real document as pdf. Within some twenty pages it gives a conceptual overview of the components for an SAP HA implementation on the one hand, and all the necessary details to implement it based on Power HA on the other.

You may have recognized that our SAP on DB2 for i has a dedicated section for Business Continuity with SAP on IBM i in its knowledge center, where we will point to this note very soon as well.

Stay tuned...

As the development team intends to maintain a consistent format, editions of the series will continue to be published on my name. Set feeds accordingly if you are interested in following the series.

SAP on IBM i - Update week 47 2011, Technical Updates

Thomas Obermeier — Mon, 21 Nov 2011 23:27:49 GMT

Welcome at the SAP on IBM i update! This time I'd like to point to a very helpful compilation of platform specific information.

Technical Updates for IBM i

Weeks ago, a colleague of mine made me aware of a place within IBM developerWorks containing lists of significant updates for certain IBM i related topics. Meanwhile, I find this referred to and talked about at many places.

Entering the IBM i Technology Updates pages we see a set of categories like DB2 for i, General IBM i operating system, Hard- and Firmware and others. There is featured content for each of them, which should help us to stay informed and guided regarding a specific topic.

In my eyes this is a reasonable attempt to keep us from getting lost in all the distributed sources of information available from IBM. One very nice example is the updates section for the database: New and relevant(!) PTFs are grouped into themes like security and performance.

Check it out at

http://www.ibm.com/developerworks/ibmi/techupdates

You will not find explicit information for SAP on IBM i, but remember, with the info APARs at IBM's SAP on IBM i page we have a dedicated source referencing all PTFs SAP and IBM assess as necessary to run SAP on i.

Stay tuned...

As the development team intends to maintain a consistent format, editions of the series will continue to be published on my name. Set feeds accordingly if you are interested in following the series.

SAP on IBM i - Update week 45 2011: STARTSAP/STOPSAP remotely

Thomas Obermeier — Thu, 10 Nov 2011 22:54:44 GMT

Welcome at the SAP on IBM i update after a little pause! This time I'd like to direct your attention to a improved behaviour of our tools triggered by a forum discussion.

h2. STARTSAP/STOPSAP remotely

In a remotely stop\start your Windows Dialog Instance from System i CI of the SAP on IBM i forum, it was discussed if and how dialog instances running on Windows could be started or stopped from the central instance being an IBM i host. So far we had SAP notes, referred to by the proposed solution, which enabled you to write dedicated scripts for either side, which then would interact. To me this setup looks error prone. So I happily read the final post to the thread, which should make it obsolete.

Feel invited to look into the SAP solution to this problem in SAP note 1644051 (SMP login required as always), which is available for the downward compatible 7.20 kernel: The latest version of START/STOPSAP simply makes use of the existing communication of sapstartsrv and can be obtained by applying a small set of patches. With that all instances of a system on all hosts can be stopped by one command:) INSTANCE(ALL) INSTHOST(ALL)

h3. Stay tuned...

As the development team intends to maintain a consistent format, editions of the series will continue to be published on my name. Set feeds accordingly if you are interested in following the series.</p>

SAP on IBM i - Update week 42 2011: IBM i 7.1 TR3

Thomas Obermeier — Wed, 19 Oct 2011 22:14:51 GMT

Welcome at the SAP on IBM i update! This time I'd like to highlight a collaboration effort between IBM and SAP and point to sources for further reading.

IBM i 7.1 TR3

Last week, IBM announced availablility of Technology Refresh 3 for IBM i. In general, TRs are IBM's way to deliver enhancements without urging customers into a major release upgrade. This particular one was headed for by IBM and SAP efforts to optimize the SAP on IBM i experience.

Find the general overview message at IBM's Technology Updates section at developerWorks.

In addition, an IBM techdoc flash sheds light on the specific implications for SAP on IBM i and on the efforts that were made in the labs of either side. Key topics cirlce around

PowerHA enhancements and integration with SAP
7.20 SAP kernel enhancements and
database enhancements that address SAP upgrade donwtime.

Stay tuned...

As the development team intends to maintain a consistent format, editions of the series will continue to be published on my name. Set feeds accordingly if you are interested in following the series.

SAP on IBM i - Update week 40 2011: NZD offerings available for i

Thomas Obermeier — Mon, 03 Oct 2011 22:58:14 GMT

Welcome at the SAP on IBM i update! This time I refer to a service offering of SAP Active Global Support.

SAP AGS Near Zero Downtime Offerings available for SAP on IBM i

Did you know that the SAP Active Global Support Near Zero Downtime offerings for release upgrades, implementation of Enhancement Packages, installation of Support Package stacks and codepage conversions are also available for SAP on IBM i customers? The NZD offerings are able to significantly reduce business downtime for these tasks within a customer specific project.

Find technical details of the available procedures in the architecture bluebook Near Zero Downtime - Reduction of Business Downtime, which is available in the SDN article library.

If you would like to get in touch with SAP AGS about NZD you can write a mail to mds@sap.com

Stay tuned...

As the development team intends to maintain a consistent format, editions of the series will continue to be published on my name. Set feeds accordingly if you are interested in following the series.