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SAP Certified Technology Specialist: SAP HANA Installation (Edition 2015) - by the SAP HANA Academy

dvankempen
Product and Topic Expert
Product and Topic Expert
‎02-03-2016 5:09 PM








LATEST UPDATE: November, 2020 =========================================

The SAP Certified Technology Specialist: SAP HANA Installation certifications are no longer valid.

For the latest information, visit our blog post series about SAP HANA certification:

For the SAP Press Certification Success Guide, see

For the blog post, see




Update August 17, 2016


A new version of this blog is now available: SAP Certified Technology Associate: C_HANATEC - by the SAP HANA Academy

Update June 20, 2016


As you may have read on the blog by haythem.oueslati on SCN: SAP HANA Education - Course & Certification Program 2015, the E_HANAINS exam will be retired by the end of 2016.

The current recommendation is

  • for those new to the program, to take the C_HANATEC_11 exam

  • for anyone already C_HANATECxx (141, 142, 151) certified to

    • either upgrade it to version C_HANATEC_11

    • or, until the end of this year, pass any of the three E_HANAINSxx certifications (141, 142, 151)




For those interested in the C_HANATEC exam, I wrote a blog about it some time ago (September 14, 2014 for the 141 edition (SPS 07):

Introduction


In the summer of 2014, I wrote a blog about the SAP Certified Technology Specialist - SAP HANA Installation certification. The blog has received over 20.000 views - many thanks to all of my readers! - and judging by the comments and messages I have received it has helped quite a few students to pass the exam.

At the time, the certification matched SAP HANA SPS 06 and 07. Today, the most recent SAP HANA release is SPS 11. So I figured it to be a good time to provide an update for this blog and yesterday I dropped by the certification test center and managed to pass the certification ( :wink: ). In this blog, I will share with you my experiences.

As for my background, I have performed countless installations of SAP HANA as of SPS 02 and upgraded many revisions for the SAP HANA Academy. I also write the What's New series for the SAP HANA Academy, e.g.What's New with SAP HANA SPS 11 - by the SAP HANA Academy.

This blog is part of a series:

About the Certification


Below the editions of the SAP Certified Technology Specialist - SAP HANA Installation certification

  • Edition 2013 (SPS 06) - no longer available, expired in 2015

  • Edition 2014 (SPS 07) - E_HANAINS141 will expire in 2016

  • Edition 2014 (SPS 08) - E_HANAINS142

  • Edition 2015 (SPS 09) - E_HANAINS151

  • Edition 20xx (SPS xx) - E_HANAINSxxx


For the latest information about SAP HANA training, see the blog by haythem.oueslati on SCN: SAP HANA Education - Course & Certification Program 2015.

Number of questions: 40

Cut Score: 68% (141), 65% (142), 60% (151)  => Note that the cut score is going down. This exam is getting easier! :wink:

Duration: 90 minutes

The prerequisite for the Technology Specialist certification is ownership of the Technology Associate certificate: E_HANATEC141, E_HANATEC142, or E_HANATEC151; it sits on top. They are not linked, so any combination is fine, e.g. a combination of TEC141 and INS151 is valid.

Topic Areas


There are 40 questions divided over 6 topic areas with the relative weight. I will discuss each topic area in more detail below.

  • System Landscape Planning (6 -10 questions)

  • Installation and Uninstall Procedures (6 -10 questions)

  • Post-installation (6 -10 questions)

  • Hardware and Operating System Verification (3-5 questions)

  • Scale Out Scenarios (3-5 questions)

  • Administration Tools (3-5 questions)


Resources


As main resource training HA200 - SAP HANA - Installation & Operations is listed. This 5-day training covers not only installation but also architecture, administration tools, backup and recovery, operations, security, user management, etc. The training is also the main resource for the Technology Associate certification, so it probably is a good investment of your time. However, it is not a requirement.

The prerequisite for the HA200 training is the training HA100 SAP HANA – Introduction (2 days).

Both HA200 and HA100 are also available as e-learning.

Additional resources mentioned as preparation for the exam:

Note that the SAP Help Portal on http://help.sap.com/hana_platform only shows the latest documentation, SPS 11 at the time of writing. For earlier editions, you need to go to the SAP Service Marketplace on http://service.sap.com/hana.

SAP HANA Academy


To help you prepare for the exam, I have recorded a number of tutorial videos about SAP HANA installations. The playlist SAP HANA Installations SPS 11 discusses concepts and shows how to install and update the SAP HANA server, studio and client, add components, and perform post-installation configuration.

Sample questions


On the certification page, a link to a PDF with sample questions is included. Unfortunately, the questions are still the same as for the 2013 edition, so I will not repeat them here. If you are not familiar with these questions yet, see the previous of this blog SAP Certified Technology Specialist: SAP HANA Installation - by the SAP HANA Academy.

More Questions?


Unfortunately, but very reasonably, those that have passed the exam are not allowed to share the questions with anyone else, so I can't share any particular question with you here. However, a close study of the mentioned resources should provide you with enough knowledge to successfully pass the exam.

Product Availability Matrix


The Product Availability Matrix (PAM) on the SAP Support Portal provides information about SAP software product versions, including availability and end of maintenance dates, upgrade paths, and technical release information (database platforms, Java version, operating systems, etc.).

For SAP HANA, PAM provides links to the Certified SAP HANA Hardware Directory, the latest SAP Road Map presentation, important documentation (Master Guide, Server Installation Guide), release notes, and the SAP Help Portal for the SAP HANA Platform.

PAM also list supported operating system for the SAP HANA server, for SAP HANA studio, and for the SAP HANA client.

:!: QUESTION ALERT: Make sure, you know on which operating systems the different components are supported.



:!: QUESTION ALERT: Make sure you are familiar with the notion of T-Shirt sizing and the relevant components.

For more information about SAP HANA sizing, see the SCN blog: Sizing SAP HANA - by the SAP HANA Academy

Below a video from the SPS 11 Installation and Update playlist that demonstrates how to navigate the Matrix.


SAP HANA Server Installation Guide


This guide grows with every release. The SPS 11 version counts 197 pages, of which 50 pages are parameter reference.

Chapter 1 - SAP HANA Installation and Update Overview


The first chapter lists the different editions and options, and where to download the software.

:!: QUESTION ALERT: Make sure you know what's in the box. Base edition, platform edition, enterprise edition: what components are included?

For more information about the options, see SAP HANA Options and Additional Capabilities – SAP Help Portal Page

:!: QUESTION ALERT: Make sure you are familiar with the different deployment models: appliance and tailored data center integration (TDI).

For more information about TDI, see SAP HANA Tailored Data Center Integration - SAP HANA Technical Operations Manual - SAP Library and SAP HANA Tailored Datacenter Integration (TDI)

Below a video that shows how you can download SAP HANA software from the SWDC (Software Download Center).



This video shows where to find documentation and some of the key topics from the Master Guide.


Chapter 2 - Concepts and Requirements for an SAP HANA System


The second chapter discusses system concepts and system types, deployment types, hardware and software requirements, and recommended file system layout.

:!: QUESTION ALERT: Make sure you understand what's a host, a system, an instance, and a distributed system. What has to be the same on a distributed system?

:!: QUESTION ALERT: Make sure you know what purpose the SAP HANA Storage Connector API serves; read for example SAP HANA TDI - Storage Requirements.

and SAP HANA TDI - Network Requirements

:!: QUESTION ALERT: Make sure you know what purpose the hardware check tool serves (what it does, how it works, you do not have to known all the parameters); see SAP Note 1943937 - Hardware Configuration Check Tool - Central Note

Below a video that discusses these concepts and shows default file system layout.


Chapter 3 - Using the SAP HANA Platform LCM Tools


The third chapter introduces the different flavours of the lifecycle management (LCM) tools: command line, windows, and web; and how they can be used; interactive, batch, or a combination. This clearly is an important chapter and you can expect a few question on this tool.

:!: QUESTION ALERT: Make sure you understand what tasks can be performed by the different versions of the lifecycle manager installer (installation medium and resident HDBLCM); where are they located?

:!: QUESTION ALERT: Make sure you understand the different program interaction modes and what takes precedence: parameter file or call options?

:!: QUESTION ALERT: Make sure you understand how the web version of HDBLCM works, how to access it (URL, ports), how to troubleshoot (e.g. under what account it runs and required privileges), what lifecycle management tasks it supports, etc.

:!: QUESTION ALERT: Make sure you understand how to perform a centralised execution of platform LCM tasks.

:!: QUESTION ALERT: Make sure you understand what role the SAP Host Agent has for LCM tasks.

:!: QUESTION ALERT: Make sure you understand the difference between platform lifecycle management with HDBLCM and application lifecycle management with HALM.

:!: QUESTION ALERT: Make sure you understand the difference between the platform lifecycle management tool HDBLCM - the wrapper tool - and the different command line tools that are called by HDBLCM, e.g. hdbinst, hdbuinst, hdbupd, etc.

Below a video that shows the different versions of the SAP HANA Platform Lifecycle Management tool (command-line, windows, web).



Below a video that shows the lifecycle management tool in batch mode with a parameter file.


Chapter 4 - Installing an SAP HANA System


The fourth chapter documents the actual SAP HANA installation. This obviously is also an important chapter!

:!: QUESTION ALERT: Make sure you understand how to run HDBLCM with a parameter file, minimum required parameters and which parameters do not have a default value.

:!: QUESTION ALERT: Make sure you understand how you can specify passwords with a batch installations.

Below a video that shows the SAP HANA installation in command line and Windows mode.


Chapter 5 - Updating the SAP HANA System


The fifth chapter documents the update of the SAP HANA system and SAP HANA system components like the SAP HANA client, SAP HANA studio, Application Function Libraries (AFL) ,etc.

:!: QUESTION ALERT: As of SPS 09, updating the SAP HANA system can be performed as the system administrator user <sid>adm.

Below a video that shows an update of the SAP HANA system in command line, Windows, and web mode.


Chapter 6 - Managing SAP HANA System Components


The sixth chapter documents how to install, update or uninstall SAP HANA system components.

:!: QUESTION ALERT: Make sure you understand what tasks can be performed by the different versions of the lifecycle manager installer (installation medium and resident HDBLCM).

Below a video that shows how to add the AFL component using the platform lifecycle management tool in command line, Windows, and web mode.


Chapter 7 - Uninstalling the SAP HANA System


The seventh chapter documents how to uninstall SAP HANA components.

:!: QUESTION ALERT: Make sure you know the prerequisites to uninstall an SAP HANA system.

:!: QUESTION ALERT: How do you uninstall the SAP Host Agent or the SMD agent?

Below a video that shows how to uninstall an SAP HANA system.


Chapter 8 - Managing the SAP HANA System After Installation


The eighth chapter documents some common post-installation tasks like enabling data volume encryption.

:!: QUESTION ALERT: Make sure you understand what you can encrypt with data volume encryption.

Below a video that shows how DVE works.


SAP HANA Studio Installation Guide


This is a small guide compared with the server installation guide and documents what is SAP HANA studio and how to install, update, or uninstall it on the three supported platforms: Linux, Microsoft Windows and Mac OS.

:!: QUESTION ALERT: Make sure you know on which platforms SAP HANA studio is supported.

:!: QUESTION ALERT: Make sure you are familiar with the featured installation option and what purpose it serves.

:!: QUESTION ALERT: Make sure you know how you can perform an installation using an update site.

The video below shows how to install SAP HANA studio on the Windows platform.



The video below shows how to install SAP HANA studio on the Mac OS X platform.



The video below shows how to install SAP HANA studio using an update site.



The video below shows how to install SAP HANA studio as a plugin for Eclipse


SAP HANA Administration Guide


This is very complete and therefore voluminous guide: 1175 pages for the SPS 11 release.

On the topics list for the installation certification it listed, however, as an additional resource only for the topic Scale Out Scenarios, which has a relative weight of 8-12% (± 4 questions). So I would not recommend to spend too much time on this guide.

Chapter 5 - Availability and Scalability


:!: QUESTION ALERT: Understand (high-level) the concepts of system and storage replication and the tool used (hdbnsutil)

:!: QUESTION ALERT: Understand (high-level) the concepts of backup and (disaster) recovery.

:!: QUESTION ALERT: Understand how you can configure the network for multiple hosts.

The video below explains SAP HANA system replication concepts. There is a full playlist on this topic here: SAP HANA System Replication - YouTube



The video below explains SAP HANA system replication concepts. There is a full playlist on this topic here: Database Backup and Recovery - YouTube



Additional Resources



SCN Docs




SCN Blogs




SAP Notes



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