Recently I was involved in migrating lot of adapter modules from a PI 7.0 system to a PI 7.4 environment. Creating a custom adapter module is not too complicated but like anything else, we need to be clear of all the components involved and their implications. There is a very good SDN document about the steps to create one. However, in my experience keeping the following points i makes the development process much smoother.

1. Understanding the descriptor files:

Most of the issues with adapter modules occur as one of the descriptors is wrong. Let's go through them.

a) ejb-j2ee-engine.xml: This file will be in the EJB project. This links the EJB name with the JNDI name. Hence, if you are getting a module not found error, most likely you need to check your jndi-name.

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8" standalone="no"?>

<ejb-j2ee-engine

  xmlns:xsi="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance"

  xsi:noNamespaceSchemaLocation="ejb-j2ee-engine.xsd">

  <enterprise-beans>

  <enterprise-bean>

  <ejb-name>ToUpperCase</ejb-name>

  <jndi-name>ToUpperCase</jndi-name>

  </enterprise-bean>

  </enterprise-beans>

</ejb-j2ee-engine>

b) ejb-jar.xml : This is in the EJB project as well . This has the actual class name, EJB interface names, bean type etc. The key thing here is to check the ejb-name and the class name. The home,local, remote and local-home names always stay the same.( to standard SAP values ). This causes a lot of errors as normally people just accept the default provided names for these interfaces and it causes errors.

c) application-j2ee-engine.xml : This file is in the EAR project and stays the same, unless the project needs additional libraries.

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8" standalone="no"?>

<application-j2ee-engine

  xmlns:xsi="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance"

  xsi:noNamespaceSchemaLocation="application-j2ee-engine.xsd">

  <reference

  reference-type="hard">

  <reference-target

  provider-name="sap.com"

  target-type="service">engine.security.facade</reference-target>

  </reference>

  <reference

  reference-type="hard">

  <reference-target

  provider-name="sap.com"

  target-type="library">engine.j2ee14.facade</reference-target>

  </reference>

  <reference

  reference-type="hard">

  <reference-target

  provider-name="sap.com"

  target-type="service">com.sap.aii.af.svc.facade</reference-target>

  </reference>

  <reference

  reference-type="hard">

  <reference-target

  provider-name="sap.com"

  target-type="interface">com.sap.aii.af.ifc.facade</reference-target>

  </reference>

  <reference

  reference-type="hard">

  <reference-target

  provider-name="sap.com"

  target-type="library">com.sap.aii.af.lib.facade</reference-target>

  </reference>

  <reference

  reference-type="hard">

  <reference-target

  provider-name="sap.com"

  target-type="library">com.sap.base.technology.facade</reference-target>

  </reference>

  <provider-name>sap.com</provider-name>

  <fail-over-enable

  mode="disable"

  xsi:type="fail-over-enableType_disable"/>

</application-j2ee-engine>

This file has references of libraries etc. when the application is running. A good way to check that the references are correct is by going to Java Class Loader on the application server and give the component name.

In the below screen-shot we're able to fins component type "service" with name "engine.security.facade" as updated in application-j2ee-engine.xml .

Addiing additional references:  If we're using additional libraries, we need to update the reference in the below way.

- Add the client libraries to allow compilation. Many of the libraries are already available in NWDS plugins ( e.g. JCO 2/3 libraries ). However, in some cases they will need to be obtained from SAP PI application server.

- Refer Javadoc to understand the DC that contains the class. Taking interface ApplicationPropertiesAccess as an example. Javadoc at

http://help.sap.com/javadocs/NW73/SPS05/CE/en/com.sap.en/com/sap/engine/services/configuration/appconfiguration/ApplicationPropertiesAccess.html

gives the DC as:

[sap.com] tc/je/appconfiguration/api

Hence, the deployment descriptor will need to be updated as:

<reference reference-type="hard">

    <reference-target provider-name="sap.com"

target-type="service">

      tc~je~appconfiguration~api

    </reference-target>

</reference>

2. Renaming adapter module name: We need to update a module name many a times. Some of the reasons could be:

- While testing, we gave a "test" name and want to change the module name without rewriting the whole project.

- Create a new version and test it out in some scenarios before changing configuration everywhere.

The adapter module name that we configure in adapter modules is actually the JNDI name in ejb-j2ee-engine.xml. So initially the ejb and jndi names were the same.

In the below screenshot, I changed the JNDI name to Convert2Up

After making only the JNDI name, I sent a test message after updating the adapter module config parameters and it works fine.

3. Adding software component information: The adapter module can be deployed directly from NWDS by running the EAR project on the application server. However, it is better to organise custom software components like SAP delivered software components in its own namespace so that it's easier to track the inventory and get all the benefits of application lifecycle management.

Without the software component information, we can verify the bean is successfully deployed by checking JNDI browser.

However, if there are multiple beans, we need to know their names.  It's better to organise in their own namespace. We need to go through the below process : EAR --> SDA --> SCA

The steps required are :

- Convert EAR to SDA file ( which is EAR file along with SAP specific manifest info in SAP_MANIFEST.MF file )

- Add SDA file to a SCA file along with the software component information

The easiest approach is to use nwpacktool . Update the batch file with JAVA_HOME and NWPACKTOOLLIB.

Then lanuch the batch ( or .sh ) file. As an example, to create a SDA file from the EAR.

Now, add component information and create a SCA file.

Now, deploy the SCA file .  We can display all custom modules created under the same component.In the below screen-shot, two beans are deployed under SC "AdaptModules" with the first bean having version 3.

,

It's easier to deploy to any system as well since there is only one SCA file to be updated .

Best practice in SOAP calls is to provide at least user and password to authenticate call. Unfortunately sometimes the client systems do not provide the option to send credential in SOAP calls.

This issue have been discussed in previous Blogs like  A closer look at SOAP Sender authentication , but the solutions provided are either not supported by SAP PI single stack or they are too dangerous because disable SOAP authentication at adapter level.

One option we have found quite interesting in a recent project is to use SAP Web Dispatcher to allow anonymous SOAP calls to specific services.

The idea is the following:

1. We define a new endpoint for the anonymous service,  for instance /xi/project1/service1

2. Rewrite the end new endpoint to the SOAPAdapter URL related to the service

3. Add header authentication for the endpoint.

Let have a look in detail.

1. The first thing to find out  what the URL for the service call is.

This URL has the format

http://<server>:<port>

/XISOAPAdapter/MessageServlet?senderParty=<SENDER_PARTY>&senderService=<SENDER_SERVICE>&receiverParty=<RECEIVER_PARTY>&receiverService=<RECEIVER_SERVICE>&interface=<INTERFACE>&interfaceNamespace=<INTERFACE_NAME_SPACE>

for instance

http://myserver.com:50000/XISOAPAdapter/MessageServlet?senderParty=&senderService=BC_MYBC&receiverParty=&receiverService=&interface=BookingUpdate&interfaceNamespace=http://mycompany.com/booking

There are several places where you can find this, one of them is in Display WSDL for the ICO.

2. HTTP Basic Authentication is constructed as follows:

• Username and password are combined into a string "username:password"
• The resulting string is then encoded using the Base64
• The authorization method and a space i.e. "Basic " is then put before the encoded string.

For the values pouser and mypassword the string will be "Basic cG91c2VyOm15cGFzc3dvcmQ="

3. Update modification handler rules for SAP Web Dispatcher.

The documentation is here  Modification of HTTP Requests - SAP Web Dispatcher - SAP Library

In Unix the file is something like /usr/sap/<SID>/SYS/global/security/data/icm_filter_rules.txt

You can add 3 rules similar to these ones:

if %{PATH} stricmp "/xi/project1/service1"

SetHeader Authorization "Basic cG91c2VyOm15cGFzc3dvcmQ="

RegRewriteUrl ^/xi/project1/service1/XISOAPAdapter/MessageServlet?senderParty=&senderService=BC_MYBC&receiverParty=&receiverService=&interface=BookingUpdate&interfaceNamespace=http://mycompany.com/booking" [qsreplace]

4. Logon to Web Dispatcher Administrator

http://<server>:<port>/sap/admin    for instance http://myserver:50000/sap/admin

Select HTTP Handler -> Modification Handler

Press Reload Rule File

5. In the SAP call for this service replace the end point with the new one, for instance /xi/project1/service1

And hopefully it will work without user and password

Hi All,

There are many articles, blogs and posts on dynamic filename in SCN. I was looking for a pseudo code where dynamic filename and dynamic directory has been implemented at the same time. I did'nt find any. Here, I am posting a pseudo code with dynamic file name and condition based dynamic directory. Hope this helps.

Name:setFileName

Title:setFileName

Execution Type:Single Values

Category:User-Defined

Type:Argument

Name:variablePart

Java Type:String

//Dynamic File name and Directory: Author-Partha

String filename = new String("");

String directory = new String("");

DynamicConfiguration conf1 = (DynamicConfiguration) container.getTransformationParameters().get(StreamTransformationConstants.DYNAMIC_CONFIGURATION);

DynamicConfigurationKey key1 = DynamicConfigurationKey.create("http:/"+"/sap.com/xi/XI/System/File","FileName");

DynamicConfigurationKey key2 = DynamicConfigurationKey.create("http:/"+"/sap.com/xi/XI/System/File","Directory");

filename = "Customers_Outbound_" + variablePart + "_.csv";

conf1.put(key1,filename);

//return filename;

if (variablePart.equals("6301"))

{

directory = "/IN-IFL/01-OFFICE";

}

else if (variablePart.equals("6302"))

{

directory = "/IN-IFL/02-OFFICE";

}

else if (variablePart.equals("6303"))

{

directory = "/IN-IFL/03-OFFICE";

}

else if (variablePart.equals("6304"))

{

directory = "/IN-IFL/04-OFFICE";

}

else if (variablePart.equals("6305"))

{

directory= "/IN-IFL/05-OFFICE";

}

else if (variablePart.equals("6306"))

{

directory= "/IN-IFL/06-OFFICE";

}

else if (variablePart.equals("6308"))

{

directory = "/IN-IFL/08-OFFICE";

}

else if (variablePart.equals("6309"))

{

directory = "/IN-IFL/09-OFFICE";

}

else if (variablePart.equals("6310"))

{

directory = "/IN-IFL/10-OFFICE";

}

else if (variablePart.equals("6312"))

{

directory = "/IN-IFL/12-OFFICE";

}

else if (variablePart.equals("6313"))

{

directory = "/IN-IFL/13-OFFICE";

}

else if (variablePart.equals("6314"))

{

directory = "/IN-IFL/14-OFFICE";

}

else

{

directory = "/IN-IFL/20-OFFICE";

}

conf1.put(key2,directory);

return directory;

Introduction:

We all have worked on creating custom adapter module in various projects at some point. And we have mostly written all our custom modules in EJB(Enterprise Java Bean) 2.1 standard. In this blog, let’s look into few main differences between EJB 2.1 and 3.0 standards and how to develop and deploy your custom modules in EJB 3.0 standard. This document will be more helpful if you have basic knowledge on how to create/develop custom adapter modules in EJB 2.1 standard.

Differences:

Few key differences between EJB 2.1 and EJB 3.0 are

There are many other differences between EJB2.1 and 3.0, but we are not using them.

Let's create a simple adapter module in EJB 3.0:

To keep the implementation simple our custom adapter module just prints a statement to the audit log.

Step 1: Create new EJB project in NWDS

1. Project name: FileValidation_EJB
2. EJB module version: 3.0
3. Add EAR membership: FileValidation_EAR
4. Click Next

1. Uncheck option to create EJB client jar
2. Uncheck Generate ejb-jar.xml deployment descriptor
3. Click Finish

Step 2: Configure Build Path

1. Right click on FileValidation_EJB
2. Select Build Path > Configure Build Path

1. Select Libraries tab
2. Click in Add Library

1. Select XPI Library
2. Click Next

1. Select Library Type: XPI Adapter Libraries
2. Click Finish

Step 3: Create a new Session Bean

1. Right click on FileValidation_EJB
2. Select New > Session Bean(EJB 3.x)

1. Java package: com.sap.pi
2. Class name: Validation
3. State type: Stateless
4. Uncheck create remote and local business interface
5. Click Finish
   

Add below annoations to the Validation class

1. @Stateless(name=”ValidationBean”)
2. @Local(value={ModuleLocal.class})
3. @Remote(value={ModuleRemote.class})
4. @LocalHome(value=ModuleLocalHome.class)
5. @RemoteHome(value=ModuleHome.class)

Implement Module interface and add bean lifecycle methods using @PostConstruct and @PreDestroy annotations. Bean life cycle methods are optional and can be ignored.

Step 4: Provide JNDI name for module

1. Expand FileValidation_EJB > ejbModule > META-INF
2. Double click ejb-j2ee-engine.xml
3. Right click on XML node ejb-j2ee-engine
4. Select Add Child > enterprise-beans

1. Right click on XML node enterprise-bean
2. Select Add Child > jndi-name

1. ejb-name: ValidationBean (This should be same as the value specified in @stateless annotation)
2. jndi-name: SetValidation (This name will be used in the communication channel module tab)
3. Save the file

Step 5: Add standard references to EAR

1. Expand FileValidation_EAR > EarContent > META-INF
2. Double click application-j2ee-engine.xml
3. Right click on XML node application-j2ee-engine
4. Select Add Child > reference

1. Right click on reference-target
2. Select Add Attribute > provider-name

1. reference-target: engine.security.facade
2. reference-type: hard
3. target-type: service
4. provider-name: sap.com

Repeat the steps in step5 and add below references

1. Right click on XML node application-j2ee-engine
2. Select Add Child > fail-over-enable

1. Right click on XML node fail-over-enable
2. Select Add Attribute > type

1. Right click on the node fail-over-enable
2. Select Add Attribute > mode

1. xsi:type: fail-over-enableType_disable
2. mode: disable
3. Save the file

Step 6: Deploy EAR into PI Web AS Java

1. Right click on FileValidation_EAR
2. Select Export > SAP EAR file

1. Select a target folder on the local file system
2. Check Export source files and click Finish

Add SAP AS Java instance to NWDS

1. Window > Preferences > SAP AS Java > Click Add button
2. Enter your PI system hostname and instance number and click OK

Open deployment perspective in NWDS

1. Select Window > Open Perspective > Other > Deployment
2. Click OK
   

In Deployment Job view

1. Click on Import button under Deployment List

1. Select File System
2. Click Finish and select the EAR file to deploy from local filesystem.

1. Click on Start button to start the deployment
2. Enter j2ee_admin credentials if prompted

The module should get deployed successfully without any errors

Step 7: Use module in communication channel and test

Use the module in channel

Audit log

Note:

1. EJB3.0 solves the same problems as in EJB2.0 , but EJB3.0 is more developer friendly than EJB2.0
2. I am using SAP NWDS (Net Weaver Developer Studio) 7.31 SP10, The screenshots in this document may vary depending on NWDS version that you are using.
3. The perspective that am using in NWDS is Java EE
   

SAP has recognized the need for customers to leverage and augment their existing on-premise investments with cloud applications for faster business outcomes. To help customers rapidly and flexibly integrate our cloud solutions with other systems, whether they are SAP, non-SAP, or custom applications, SAP provides a cloud integration solution called SAP HANA Cloud Integration (HCI) which is a core service running on top of the SAP HANA Cloud Platform.

In this SAP Insider hosted webinar you can understand the core product capabilities of SAP HANA Cloud Integration. You can also see how partners like Itelligence are building a SalesForce adapter using the adapter SDK of HCI.  The webinar also talks about how customers like Bentley, Owen Illinois etc have been solving their cloud integration challenges using HCI and also understand how the pre-packaged content delivered by SAP can significantly reduce the time spent on integration projects.

For more details click here Event Registration (EVENT: 921502 - SESSION: 1)

While trying on the SAP Hana Cloud Integration trial version for integration with on premise SAP systems and cloud SAP applications – one issue of concern is the connection between SAP HCI and on premise SAP PI or ECC system from network perspective. The reverse proxy approach is not always the best approach and the client network teams are sometimes reluctant to have firewall rules modified with service end points. SAP Cloud Connector based on SAP Hana Cloud Platform can be an easy to use alternative in this case and it also handles propagation of the cloud user identity in a trusted manner to on-premise SAP system.

For testing purpose only, let us try in this blog to reach the ping service on On Premise SAP system from SAP Hana Cloud Integration using SAP Cloud Connector.

SAP Hana Cloud Platform and SAP Hana Cloud Integration trial user has been used to set up the connection.

1. Activate the HTTP service in sicf transaction. Once activated successfully the following link can be checked in local browser or you can use the ‘Test Service’ option shown below.                                                                                                                                                                                        http://<on premise sap hostname>:<port>/sap/public/ping?sap-client=<client>

     In this blog we will try to reach this onPremise ping service from SAP HCI and capture the response i.e ‘Server reached successfully’ in a file.

     2. Setting up SAP Cloud Connector

For setting up the SAP Cloud Connector please refer to the following link :

http://hcp.sap.com/developers/TutorialCatalog/con100_1_setting_up_cloud_connector.html

Refer to the section ‘Install the SCC’ section for installing the cloud connector and ‘Establish connection to your cloud account’ to setup the connection to your SAP HCP trial account.

     3. Setting up the Connectivity application in SAP Hana Cloud Platform from Eclipse

For this example, we will use the connectivity sample from the SAP Hana Cloud Platform SDK available from https://tools.hana.ondemand.com/#cloud

The ‘connectivity’ project is imported into Eclipse and deployed in SAP Hana Cloud platform as described in Rui ‘s opensap course on SAP Hana Cloud Platform. This is basically a servlet which requests data from onPremise system and passes this to the calling system in this case SAP HCI system. The primary steps are outlined below :

1. The Hana Cloud Platform server is setup in Eclipse as below :

    .b. Right click on the imported project and Run On Server to deploy the application in SAP Hana Cloud Platform.

  c. Double click on the server and adjust the URL destination ‘backend-no-auth-destination’ to the subpath - /sap/public/ping?sap-client=<client>.The hostname and port does not need to be the actual onpremise SAP server and we will set the mapping of system names in next step. We are using here the destination ‘backend-no-auth-destination’ which is provided in the sample ‘connectivity’as well.

d. Set the mapping of the external system and internal actual hostname in SAP cloud connector:

4. Setup SAP HCI iFlow to reach onPremise SAP system as below. The iFlow fetches the HTTP response from onPremise and writes it into a file in SFTP server

Note that in the receiver channel the Query should start with ‘&’.

The URL Address to be used in the receiver channel can be taken from Eclipse as below :

5. Set the ‘Timer start event’ in the HCI iFlow to ‘Run Once’ and deploy the project in your HCI Tenant.

6. Monitoring :

   a.  Once it is deployed successfully, the message monitoring in HCI can be checked for failures.

The message processing log is shown below on selecting the message in the ‘Properties’ tab.

b. Logs in the SAP Cloud Connector can be checked in the ‘Logs’ link in the left pane after logging in to SAP Cloud Connector.

7. Checking the result :

The file is checked in the path in SFTP server which is mentioned in the HCI receiver channel. The file has the response from onPremise ping service confirming the connectivity setup.

For a number of cases, for example when cloud applications like Successfactors (for example Employee Replication interface from SF to SAP ECC) is being integrated with on Premise SAP using SAP HCI , SAP Cloud Connector can be a helpful tool and hope SAP will have a recommended approach at some point of time to frequently use the Cloud Connector with SAP HCI Integrations.

In my recent role, I have the opportunity to work on PO 7.4 SP08, nearly the latest and greatest version of PO to date. My previous experience on NWDS was on version 7.11 CE which was mainly used for development of Java mapping and custom adapter module. As there have been strides of improvements on the NWDS end over the last few years like Eclipse Tool for ESR in NW PI and Introducing iFlow in PI 7.31 Configuration, I decided to try it out to see if I am able to fully perform all the development/configuration tasks in NWDS or do I still need to use the traditional Swing clients.

Here is my experience after two months of working on NWDS 7.31.

Installation

To begin with, head over to the link below to download the correct version of NWDS. Note that the download location requires an S-user authentication.

NWDS Download Links - Java Development - SCN Wiki

Once the NWDS Zip file has been downloaded, installation is rather straightforward as it just involves unzipping the file to any destination on the local machine. However, getting NWDS to work nicely (read: least buggy!) in subsequent usage can be a little bit tricky, and some of the issues can be traced back to installation-related issues.

Here are some general tips on getting it right:

Once the installation issues have been sorted out, the experience is so much better and I can actually begin to work on it for my daily tasks.

Likes

Dislikes

The downside to my NWDS experience is mostly due to features from the Swing client that are missing. AFAIK, these are some of it although it is possible that the features are there, but just not that obvious to me!

The features (or lack of it!) around Message Mapping deserves a section of its own!

The one feature I missed most from the Swing client is the "Display Queue" function in Message Mapping. IMHO, a solid understanding of graphical mapping's queues and contexts and the ability to display queue at any point in the mapping logic are key ingredients to developing robust and accurate mapping logic. It is the single feature that causes me to switch back to the ESR swing client most.

Another feature that I miss is the ability to check the consistency of the source input. This can be easily done via the "Test" functionality of the Swing client. By copying the sample in Source Text View and switching back to Tabular Tree View, the little green or red icons help to immediately flag any inconsistencies. This is very useful especially in cases with tricky namespaces or typo errors. Match Mismatch

The feature to copy the logic of an entire mapping flow is also not available in NWDS. This is an often used feature as there are a lot of similarities between the mapping for different target field, and this feature helps to reduce the effort to rebuild the logic for each target field.

Also missing is the ability to ungroup a target field from a grouped mapping flow. Sometimes, after the mapping flow has been developed for a group of target fields, it might be necessary to ungroup one of the fields, and yet retain the logic for that field. The only option in NWDS now is to delete the target field from the grouped mapping but all the associated logic for that target field is also deleted.

Although writing the code for UDF or Function Library is better due to the Eclipse-based editor, there is no wizard to create the input/output parameters for the UDF. Creating UDF for Message Mapping Using NWDS is a manual process (and prone to error) as the input arguments and parameters have to be declared via annotations. The correct import statements need to also be manually included in the code.

Bugs

Although the experience has been relatively stable, there are occasional bugs. One of it is that when trying to make a change, NWDS does not prompt a new Change List, so I can't save my changes. The workaround is to quit and restart NWDS.

Another bug that I've come across is when using the Condition Editor for iFlow. If there are any unintentional white spaces in the Xpath condition, the generate condition on the iFlow is incorrect (has an additional Xpath prefix in front) and does not work. It took me a while to nail down why the condition does not work, only to find out that it's because of a little white space!

Conclusion

iFlow seems like a complete experience, although the same cannot be said about the ESR perspective, especially with regards to Message Mapping. All in all, I do enjoy developing on NWDS. I do know that some of the missing features are scheduled in the roadmap and I'm looking forward to those and more enhancements in the future (maybe someone from SAP Labs might come across this and help to push things .) I've certainly embraced it as my primary IDE for developing in PI and BPM, but I'm still far from dropping off the Swing client completely.

This adapter module allow you to set EOIO QoS and Queue ID in sender channel (even it was configured as EO). Queue Id can be setted as fixed value, or as value from Payload (using XPath).

Module has two parameters: QueueName and XPath.

Parameter QueueName is mandatory. Even you fill XPath parameter, you should set QueueName (with any non-empty value).

XPath example for PI message:

For example, we have this message:

<ns0:MT_1xmlns:ns0='someuri'>

<item>

<ThisIsWillBeUsedForQueueName>1</ThisIsWillBeUsedForQueueName>

</item>

</ns0:MT_1>

Xpath is: //item/ThisIsWillBeUsedForQueueName

In the message Data log you will see (even it is EO sender channel):

    Quality of Service Exactly Once in Order

    Sequence ID : <value from your QueueName or XPath result>

Code of Module in the attachment (this is for PI 7.4, for others may be some differences)

Useful links to create Module:

http://scn.sap.com/community/pi-and-soa-middleware/blog/2014/08/08/pi-74--adapter-module-creation-using-ejb-30

And check comments

Note: even you select XPI Libraries you can't add Audit, cause in those libraries is missing one important file com.sap.aii.af.svc_api.jar

You can get it from PI server. Very very great blog for it: http://scn.sap.com/community/pi-and-soa-middleware/blog/2012/10/19/how-to-locate-java-library-resource-during-java-development-in-pi

Another useful link: http://wiki.scn.sap.com/wiki/display/NWTech/Custom+Adapter+Module+Development+-+SAP+PI+7.1

There I found how to get payload.

Have fun

PS. If you know, how to optimize it or do better - write in comments please. Thx

PPS. Another blog about : http://scn.sap.com/community/pi-and-soa-middleware/blog/2015/01/29/create-sap-pi-adapter-modules-in-ejb-30-standard

This blog will complement other blogs on 'Java Mapping' in SCN.

Sample Java Mapping used in the video: -

package com.map;
import java.io.*;
import com.sap.aii.mapping.api.*;
public class Test_JavaMapping extends AbstractTransformation {      @Override    public void transform(TransformationInput transformationInput, TransformationOutput transformationOutput) throws StreamTransformationException {        try {            InputStream inputstream = transformationInput.getInputPayload().getInputStream();            OutputStream outputstream = transformationOutput.getOutputPayload().getOutputStream();            // Copy Input content to Output content            byte[] b = new byte[inputstream.available()];            inputstream.read(b);                      outputstream.write("Prefixing this line to input. Test_JavaMapping. \r\n".getBytes());            outputstream.write(b);        } catch (Exception exception) {            getTrace().addDebugMessage(exception.getMessage());            throw new StreamTransformationException(exception.toString());        }    }
}

Sample text file used in the video:-

Name,ID,Phone
AAAA,11,123456789
世界,22,987654321
BBBB,33,777777777

Helpful links: -

NWDS Download Links - Java Development - SCN Wiki

SAP Support Portal S user id is required to download NWDS.

Not well-formed XML - & issue

JAVA Mapping - Managing Services in the Enterprise Services Repository - SAP Library

PI Mapping and Lookup API - SAP Javadocs

Trail: Java API for XML Processing (JAXP) (The Java Tutorials)

Dynamic file name for pass-through scenario - Process Integration - SCN Wiki

Multi-Mapping using Java Mapping - Process Integration - SCN Wiki

Reading Binary File Using ICO

Java Mapping in Exchange Infrastructure (download the mwv file).

WebSphere MQ  JMS adapter  configurations for SAP PI

Business requirements need to integrate with  other EAI technologies or some clients may use other EAI tools like(IIB9) in such cases we may get chance to work with inbound or outbound scenario between Queues(MQ) and SAP .

Some cases IBM mainframe systems needs to exchanges data from/to SAP at that time they might use other EAI technologies to place/get the data from host(Mainframe system) to IIB(MQ) where PI need to pick data from queues(MQ) then route it to SAP, In such cases we probably need to configure JMS adapter.

Prerequisites :

1)Before going to start scenario development we need to deploy respective jar files in PI server using NWDS.(com.sap.aii.adapter.lib.sda)SDA file .

for more information for deploying Jar files  please go through  below link :

http://scn.sap.com/community/netweaver-administrator/blog/2014/01/28/nwds-step-by-step-in-the-loving-memory-of-sdm

Below are Receiver JMS adapter Configurations:

`

Processing Tab:

Sender JMS adapter:

Processing Tab:

Common Error & Solutions while working with JMS adapter:

1)Error:A channel error occured.Deailed error(if any):java.lang.NoClassFoundError:com/ibm/mq/jms/MQQueueConnectionFactory:cannot initialize class because prior initialization attempt failed at java.lang.ClassforName0(Native Method)

Solution: SAP NetWeaver Administrator → Java System Properties → Applications, select the com.sap.aii.adapter.jms.app application and modify the property value.

For client library MQ version 7.5, set the "preloadClasses" property as: com.ibm.mq.MQEnvironment,com.ibm.mq.internal.MQCommonServices,com.ibm.mq.jms.MQQueueConnectionFactory,com.ibm.mq.jms.MQTopicConnectionFactory.

2)Error:Error creating JMS connection.The JMS provider gave the error message as JMSWMQ2013:The security authontication was not valid that was supplied for QueueManger 'SAPPIQM'with connection mode 'Client'and host name 'xx.xx.xx.xx(I.P)'.JMSCMQ0001:WebSphere MQ call failed with compcode '2'(MQCC_FAILED)reason '2035'('MQRC_NOT_AUTHORIZED'),and the error code as JMSWMQ2013.

Solution: Need to execute the following commands where ever MQ instance placed

Open cmd prompt (run as administrator) execute cmd:

runmqsc LOGGER_QM_DB(QUEUE Manager name)

ALTER QMGR CHLAUTH(DISABLED)

3)Error:Transmitting the message to endpoint <local> using connection File_http://sap.com/xi/XI/System failed, due to: com.sap.engine.interfaces.messaging.api.exception.MessagingException: com.sap.aii.adapter.jms.core.fsm.DFA$InvalidTransitionException: No transition found from state: ERROR, on event: process_commence for DFA: CC_RCVR_F2J:5e9985d8d2cb3f75a5ba830e6b51b1ac

Solution: AS same above.

This is easy way to configure Sender channel to assign dynamic name to Queue, you can use n elements of XML Payload to assigne Qname

Module EJB  SAP EJB J2EE 1.4 Project, view doc [1], Is a very good document, there is a little mistake, the type of EJB is stateless, the image shows a wrong stateful (take care)

The parameters for Module you need with this solution:

ElementPath1: Xpath of node

ElementPath2: Xpath of node

...

ElementPath(n): Xpath of node

Separator: char for separation of elements, use une like "-"

QName: Starting part of queue, something like (ORD, MAT, PORD)

This is the configuration:

The parameters:

This is a sample of Monitor view (pimon):

Use This code for module:

------------------------------------------------------

GetQueueBean.java.html (Attach file)

-----------------------------------------------------

have a nice day

Reference URL

[1]

How to Create Modules for the JEE Adapter Engine

[2]

How XPath Works (The Java&amp;trade; Tutorials &amp;gt; Java API for XML Processing (JAXP) &amp;gt; E…

I am writing this blog as we faced multiple issues while deploying JDBC driver in our PI system through SUM and finally NWDS made it easy. I hope it will be useful for others as well.

Our requirement was to connect our PI system to SQL 2012 DB used for staging tables. Major steps involved in this are- Downloading JDBC driver from Microsoft site, Bundling SCA file and Deploying through NWDS.

1. Download sqljdbc4.jar from Microsoft.

http://www.microsoft.com/en-in/download/details.aspx?id=11774

2. Download  SAPXI3RDPARTY07_0-10008107.SCA  (SCA file for NW 7.3) from SAP  service market place, depending on your PI system version.

TIP : Use ‘Search for Software’ in Support packages and patches.

3. Rename SAPXI3RDPARTY07_0-10008107.SCA to SAPXI3RDPARTY07_0-10008107.zip.

4. Open with winzip

Double click on DEPLOYARCHIVES folder.

Double click on com.sap.aii.adapter.lib.sda and again open with winzip.

Click on lib and then Add

Add sqljdbc4.jar downloaded from Microsoft site

Click on OK

Now click on server

Right click on  provider.xml and edit

Add the sqljdbc4 jar entry in provider.xml as per screen shot.

Save this file and close Winzip(where you have opened com.sap.a11.adapter.lib.sda), it will ask to save changes made. Click on YES and then OK.

5. Rename SAPXI3RDPARTY07_0-10008107.zip to SAPXI3RDPARTY07_0-10008107.SCA

6. Now open NWDS.

Click on window and click on preference.

Click on SAP java and click on Add

Add SAP PI system by providing below details-

Click OK.

It may take 1 to 5 minutes for adding system in NWDS, it will asks for administrator user and password. Once added close Preferences window.

Now Click on Windows and open Perspective and Other.

Select deployment and click on OK.

Click on import.

Select File System and click on Finish.

Select SCA file which we created and click on Open.

7. Select File and click on Start

Once imported successfully, it will give Import successful message.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

You may face below error or issues while deploying sca file through NWDS.

1. While adding PI system in NWDS, it is asking for operating system user and password

- Refer SAP Note#1834579 and make changes accordingly.

2. Got error as JVM vendor is not supported.

- You can ignore this error or Install JDK 1.6 patch 26 or above. If you install it then restart NWDS and select javaw.exe from proper path.

3. If you are using Windows 7 64bit and get error ‘JVM terminated. Exit code =-1’ on starting NWDS, as below-

- Refer SAP note#1566977 - NWDS on Windows 7 – Solution is to install 32bit JDK.

4. Deployment failed with error : [ERROR CODE DPL.DCAPI.1031] AllItemsAlreadyDeployedValidationException. Reason: ASJ.dpl_dc.003456 All batch items are marked as AlreadyDeployed because of Version check.

- In NWDS before starting deployment of file, click on Settings and change below setting, it is for force deployment which we use while deploying through Telnet/SUM.

Important SAP notes and KBA on this topic-

SAP KBA 1829286 - PI: How to check which drivers are installed for the JMS and JDBC Adapters

SAP KBA 1770206 PI: How to extract the archive for deploying 3rd party drivers

SAP KBA 1770304 PI: How to prepare the com.sap.aii.adapter.lib.sda for deployment

SAP KBA 1770384 Cannot deploy the archive com.sap.aii.adapter.lib.sda to PI

SAP KBA 1816456 PI: Deploying new JMS/JDBC drivers overwrites existing deployed drivers

SAP note 1138877 How to Deploy External Drivers JDBC/JMS Adapters

XML concepts/pre-requisites of XSLT mapping in SAP PI

First let’s take a look at basic concepts:

1. what is XML-
It is Extensible mark-up language. It is platform independent data format as well as manufacturer independent data format.
It has easy to read structured information, and there is separation of information and semantics.
Moreover it has metalanguage for defining description languages.
XML defines set of rules for encoding documents in a format which is both human readable and machine readable.

2. What is XSL-
It is language for expressing style sheets. Extensible stylesheet language.
It is a file that describes how to display an XML document of given type.
This style sheet describes how a document (XML/HTML) should look like on the screen/print.
Without this, there is no meaning to data in XML.

3. What is XSL-FO-
It is another language for formatting XML data, and focuses on styles that work on both screen and print such as PDF.
This formatting allows you to create files that look fantastic on any screen or print neatly.
There is no difference in XSL and XSL-FO.
www consortium (WC3) expanded on XSL theories to create XSL- FO.

4. What is XSLT-
It is XSL transformation. It is part of XSL language for XSLT processes.
XSLT defines order/frequency of processing of XML source document.
It has templates having processing instructions.
It also has various features like variable declaration, repeat instructions, conditional checks etc.

5. X-Path-
It is language for addressing specific parts of an XML document.
It models XML document as tree of nodes.
XPath expression is mechanism for navigating through and selecting nodes from XML documents.

So to conclude the relationship between above components is, we use XML language for transfer of data because of its advantages mentioned above, and XSL document is a reference, using which XSLT does transformation and produces final document.
Ex. Just like we execute mapping in SAP PI, we take input payload (say XML), take data type as reference (say XSL), and we produce output using mapping transformation (say XSLT).

We can separate content and output format using XML.
We can create numerous output documents using single source document by performing transformations.

Following are examples of applications for XML:



Following is basic syntax 1 for XML:


Following is basic syntax 2 showing various elements in XML :

XML can also be viewed as tree structure.

Job of XSLT is to transform data from XML file into another format like html/xhtml. Data is sent as xhtml (format after XSLTransformation), and web browser  modifies it into the required data to display (html).

In case of XSL-FO, we can use various formats which can be printable such as PDF etc.

SAP Business Connector:



XML in SAP PI:

Well-formed XML:
1. Must have XML declaration.
2. Root element should be defined.
3. All elements have start and end tag.
4. All attribute values are in inverted commas.
5. Element groups are correctly nested

Validation of XML:
1. All points mentioned above.
2. It must contain DTD/Schema.
3. Rules of DTD/Schema are compiled.

DTD-

DTD is document type definition. Under DTD, main categories comprising XML document are declared. Ex. elements, their attributes, ordering, nesting of  elements etc.

Schemas-

XML schema have namespace and their own DTD. It is more powerful than DTD. It can have most basic program till expanded complex programs.

CSS-

CSS is designed around styling a document, structured in markup language (XML/HTML).
They are cascading style sheets used to style XML markup.

To conclude, these three are data type definitions. To transfer data, we use these structures, in which XML data is passed.

Advantages of Schema over CSS:
1. It is in XML syntax.
2. Sequence of source data can be changed.
3. Elements can be repeated any number of times in output.
4. Additional information can be included in output document.

DTD vs Schema:

XSLT mapping:

The most common thing heard in SAP PI in this subject regards is XSLT mapping.
Different ways of achieving conversion in XI is:

1. 1. Message Mapping (Graphical Mapping using Mapping Editor in XI).
2. 2. Java Mapping.
3. 3. ABAP Mapping.
4. XSLT Mapping.
   
   

  Steps required for developing XSLT Mapping

• Create a source data type and a target data type
• Create Message types for the source and target data types.
• Create Message Interfaces includes Inbound Message interface and Outbound Message interface.
• XSLT Mapping does not require creation of Message mapping, so don’t create any Message mapping.
• Create an .XSL file which converts source data type into target data type.
• Zip that .xsl file and import it into Integration Repository under Imported Archives.
• In Interface Mapping choose mapping program as XSL and specify this zip program. (Through search help you will get XSL Mapping programs that you imported under Imported Archives, select your corresponding XSL Program)
• Test this mapping program by navigating to Test tab.

Introduction

I had a requirement recently that involved handling of time zone conversion between the sender and the receiver systems. I had hoped that this was achievable by the standard mapping functions in PI, however there were certain limitations. Searching on SCN did not yield any suitable solutions, so I turned to good old Mr Google. I soon found out that Joda-Time was the de facto standard for handling date/time in Java prior to Java SE 8, as the date/time classes before that were considered poor.

After a bit of fiddling with the Joda-Time classes in a mapping UDF, I finally got it to work according to my requirement. In the section below, I will detail the solution I came up with as well as the options available when dealing with time zone conversion in PI.

Option 1 - Converting to local time zone

For conversions from other time zones to the local time zone (on the PI server), it can be achieved by the standard DateTrans function of the Date group. The input/output date formats in DateTrans are based on the Java's SimpleDateFormat which caters for time zone related letters (z, Z, X) in the pattern.

In the following example, the input timestamp in Pacific Standard Time (PST stated in general time zone format z) is converted a timestamp in local server timezone GMT+8 (+0800 stated in RFC 822 time zone format Z.)

Option 2 - Converting from any time zone to any other time zone

Since option 1 does not cater for conversions to time zones other than the local time zone, it had to be handled by a custom mapping UDF. Following is the source code of the UDF.

Prerequisite:

Download the library files for Joda-Time from Joda-Time's repository.

Import JAR file into an Imported Archive object.

Add Imported Archive in Archives Used section of Message Mapping or Function Library.

Import statements for UDF

import org.joda.time.DateTime;
import org.joda.time.DateTimeZone;
import org.joda.time.format.DateTimeFormat;
import org.joda.time.format.DateTimeFormatter;

Public method with Execution Type = 'Single Values', having 1 String input argument and 3 configurable parameters.

@LibraryMethod(title="convertTimeZone", description="Convert input time from one timezone to another",        category="FL_DateTime", type=ExecutionType.SINGLE_VALUE)
public String convertTimeZone (  @Argument(title="Input timestamp")  String timestamp,  @Parameter(title="Timestamp format")  String format,  @Parameter(title="From timezone")  String fromTZ,  @Parameter(title="To timezone")  String toTZ,   Container container)  throws StreamTransformationException{  // ----------------------------------------------------------  // Convert input time from one timezone to another  // - utilizes Joda Time libraries  // ----------------------------------------------------------  // timestamp - input timestamp  // format - pattern format of input and output timestamp similar allowed patterns below  //        - http://docs.oracle.com/javase/7/docs/api/java/text/SimpleDateFormat.html  // fromTZ - from timezone  // toTZ   - to timezone  //        - expected timezone in long format timezone ids listed in following site  //        - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_tz_database_time_zones  // ----------------------------------------------------------  DateTimeFormatter formatter = DateTimeFormat.forPattern(format);  DateTimeZone originalTZ = DateTimeZone.forID(fromTZ);  DateTime fromDateTime = new DateTime(DateTime.parse(timestamp, formatter), originalTZ);  DateTime toDateTime = fromDateTime.withZone(DateTimeZone.forID(toTZ));  return formatter.print(toDateTime);
}

The UDF expects the from/to time zone in long ID format (available in the TZ column of the Wikipedia site listed in the Reference section.)

In the following example, the input timestamp is converted from the Asia/Kuala_Lumpur time zone to the timestamp in UTC.

Reference

Joda-Time

SimpleDateFormat

Wikipedia list of time zones

a)          Configurations in PI side - NWA.

Open the NWA page (http://<host>:<port>/nwa)

1) Click on:     Configuration > Infrastructure > Application Resources

Filter by key name in column Resource Name: ‘inboundRA’:

Here we have to select: Resource Name: “inboundRA” – Resource Type: “Resource Adapter” and click on Properties. Next, configure these parameters:

• GatewayService: set in accordance to PI configuration (see trx code: SMGW).
• GatewayServer: set in accordance to PI configuration (see trx code: SMGW).
• MaxReaderThreadCount: 5
• ProgramID: “XI_IDOC_DEFAULT_PID” where “PID” refers to PI system ID. Set in accordance to local configuration. This Program ID name will be used in ECC system when we create RFC dest. type “T”.
• DestinationName: XI_IDOC_DEFAULT_DESTINATION
• Local: false
• BindingKey: PI_AAE_IDOC

  Remaining values will be kept as they were.

2) Again from NWA, create a destination pointing to ECC using the name XI_IDOC_DEFAULT_DESTINATION

Set the Connection Parameters and Logon Data for ECC system where Idocs will be sent. Do a connection test.

3) We also have to create another Destination equals to the last one (XI_IDOC_DEFAULT_DESTINATION) but in this case we will add the R3 System ID in the end of the name. For example: XI_IDOC_DEFAULT_DESTINATION_ECC

Note: This destination will be used to transport the Idoc metadata.

b)          Configurations in Sender System – R3 side.

1)          Create RFC Destination Type T: (Client Independent. Use Customizing client)

1. Go to trx. code SM59
2. Create a new RFC Dest. Use a name that refers to PI AAE, for example: “PIDCLNT001_AAE”.
3. Select radio button “Registered Server Program”
4. In Program ID enter the same Program ID name already configurated in resource adapter inboundRA from NWA.
5. Enter the “Gateway Host” y “Gateway Service” from PI Server.
6. In “MDP Unicode” tab, actívate the radio button Unicode.
7. Make a connection test to check connectivity.

2)          Create Port: (Client Dependent. Use the client where Idocs will be sent)

1. Go to trx. code WE21.
2. Display “Ports” and click on “Transactional RFC”
3. Click on “Create”
4. Specify a name and a description.
5. InRFCdestinationspecify theRFCdestination namecreatedin the previous step.

3)          Create Logical System (Client Independent. Use Customizing client)

1. Enter trx. code BD54
2. Specify a name like <SID>CLNT<Client.Nr> for example “PIDCLNT001” where PID is the PI System ID and “001” it’s client number.
3. Save.

4)          Create Partner Profile (Client Dependent. Use the client where Idocs will be sent)

1. Enter trx. code: WE20
2. Select Partner Type LS
3. Click on button “Create”
4. Specify Logical System Name created in previous step as “Partner No.”
5. Create an Outbound Parameter.
   1. Select the desired “Message Type”
   2. Select the Receiver Port (Created on Step #2)
   3. Activate the option “Transfer IDoc Immediately”
   4. Configurate credentials in tab “Post Processing Permitted Agent”

c)          Scenario configuration in Integration Directory.

Create and configurate an Integrated Configuration (ICO):

i)          Create a Communication Channel sender type:  IDOC_AAE.

ii)          Create an ICO, choosing Sender System and Service Ifz. name (Idoc name)

iii)          Select the Communication Channel previously created.

iv)          Finish the configuration entering: Receiver System, Receiver Interfaces and destination Communication Channel in their respective tabs. Save & Activate.

Warning: This blog is essential a rant and an opinion piece!

I have repeatedly mentioned my dislike of the RFC functionality especially in terms of PI-related integration. RFC is a technology from the old days of SAP that amazingly (and unfortunately ) still surviving in these days of SOA, cloud and mobile!

Even SAP themselves have publicly come out to discourage the use of RFCs in the following guideline published years ago, but unfortunately the use of RFC is still widespread today.

SAP Guidelines for Best-Built Applications that Integrate with SAP Business Suite

SOA-WS-3. If access is needed to SAP application functionality that has not yet been service-enabled, SAP recommends wrapping remote function calls (RFCs) or BAPI® programming interfaces as web services. Direct access to RFCs or BAPIs is possible, but it is not encouraged.

In my humple opinion, it is possible to design and architect an integration landscape that is free from the usage of RFC in all its form. However, this requires an architectural approach that considers integration holistically (factoring in all the parts - middleware and backend systems) instead of the silo approach of limiting integration to the sole responsibility of the middleware/PI/PO.

Here are my thoughts on the common usage of RFCs in PI-related integration and some possible alternatives.

RFC as a lookup

The introduction of the RFCLookup functionality in PI 7.1 has unfortunately contributed to the proliferation of RFC usage in PI, much to the detriment of the SOA guiding principles. A graphical SOAP Lookup functionality would have been more appropriate but until now there is no indication if we will ever have that.

As I mentioned before in this blog, the RFCLookup functionality is tolerable at best and buggy at worst!

The common use case for RFCLookup is for data enrichment in PI - enriching the contents from the source prior to delivery to the target system. The usage of RFCLookup implies that either the sender or the receiver is an SAP backend system. If we look at integration holistically, especially taking into consideration the debate of Integration Logic Vs Business Logic, it can be argued that data enrichment should be performed at the backend system - prior to sending for sender systems or after receiving for receiver systems. Sometimes, the argument for RFCLookup is to reduce ABAP development on the SAP backend system but this argument becomes invalid if a custom RFC-enabled function module needs to be developed to be used by the RFCLookup in PI. More often than not, this is true as commonly the data enrichment requirement is unlikely to be fulfilled by existing standard SAP RFCs.

Here are some options for performing data enrichment on the backend SAP systems.

BAdI, User Exits

If the interfaces used in the backend systems are standard SAP functionality (RFC, IDoc, Enterprise Services), data enrichment can be handled in the user exits or BAdIs.

Integration Framework

A more robust approach would involve having an integration framework in the backend system. Such frameworks provide capability for data enrichment/translation (fix values or value mapping), validation and logging. Below are some options of standard and custom frameworks:

• Application Integration Framework (AIF) - a licensed framework by SAP for interfaces using IDoc, Proxy, RFCs
• Custom framework for IDoc-based interfaces
• Custom framework for proxy-based interfaces with FEH/ECH/PPO

Even if data enrichment lookups from PI cannot be avoided, it is still possible to perform SOAP based lookup which provides better logging mechanism (although it takes more effort.) Below is a blog utilizing SOAP lookup via ABAP proxy.

Mapping-Lookup to ABAP-Proxy

RFC as an interface

As we can see from this example thread, there is no clue what happens after an RFC call is executed as there are no traces/logs in the called system. Even though the message status in PI is "delivered", it is hard to determine what happened. This makes troubleshooting and supporting such an interface difficult.

Instead of using RFC as an interface (either sender or receiver), there are other alternatives as listed below:

• Exposing the RFC as a web service as mentioned by the guideline above - this uses the Web Service Runtime of the SAP backend system which provides better logging and error handling capabilities
• Proxy interface - the SAP recommended outside-in approach for developing new custom interfaces based on ESR. The RFC function module can be called within the proxy logic
• IDoc interface - If the RFC is a Business Object (BOR) function module, associated IDoc/ALE objects can be generated for it using BDBG. The IDoc basically just wraps around the RFC function module, and also provides better error handling capabilities

Conclusion

As mentioned in the arguments above, with some effort in design and architecture, it is possible to avoid usage of RFC in PI-related integration. The end results are more robust interfaces and increase in supportability. Wherever I go, I try my best to advocate such an approach. However, there are organizations where the usage of RFC is so deeply embedded into the architecture and design that it is hard to avoid it.

If you have other thoughts, whether for or against this, feel free to comment below - I'd love to hear your thoughts

As a seasoned PI consultant, I wanted to create an archiving solution that would make a developer’s work easier. Specifically, I wanted to create an archiving module that would store a lot of metadata on the file, while also adding a useful search function to it. This is howwww.piarchiving.comwas born, it is no longer being maintained because there is other solutions. Some of the newer user-defined message search modules also have different search criteria for text and so does HANA.

I was talking with a friend around searching content and how easy it would be to implement your own search solution.

After taking a look at search APIs, such as Amazon’s, and having long discussions with a friend, I came across this useful page:https://www.searchify.com/documentation/java-client

My friend mentioned that this would be very simple to use in a PI context for full-text searches, in case you wish to view and save certain documents.

After gathering my ideas, I had created a module. In only takes one hour to learn and implement the code in an SAP PI module.

To get started, you need to add the API URL that should be used. The next step is to create and add the Index. After these steps, the content should be put into the text field and uploaded. A step-by-step explanation is shown in my video, with examples on how to find message IDs after the completion of keyword-based searches.

This is an easy application for those who wish to search through all of their content using Searchify in a PI/PO context. It is good for scenarios where you don't have a HANA instance to save and search through messages.

It is also quite inexpensive, at only $59 per month which will not let you run much servers.

If this was to be used in a real scenario there should be a focus creating more stabile code and a async process. There would obvious also be the need for better front end.

For a more in-depth explanation, watch my video at.

I posted the code for my module on my other blog: Searching SAP PI/PO message content with module development - SAP PI course

XML concepts/pre-requisites of XSLT mapping in SAP PI

First let’s take a look at basic concepts:

1. what is XML-
It is Extensible mark-up language. It is platform independent data format as well as manufacturer independent data format.
It has easy to read structured information, and there is separation of information and semantics.
Moreover it has metalanguage for defining description languages.
XML defines set of rules for encoding documents in a format which is both human readable and machine readable.

2. What is XSL-
It is language for expressing style sheets. Extensible stylesheet language.
It is a file that describes how to display an XML document of given type.
This style sheet describes how a document (XML/HTML) should look like on the screen/print.
Without this, there is no meaning to data in XML.

3. What is XSL-FO-
It is another language for formatting XML data, and focuses on styles that work on both screen and print such as PDF.
This formatting allows you to create files that look fantastic on any screen or print neatly.
There is no difference in XSL and XSL-FO.
www consortium (WC3) expanded on XSL theories to create XSL- FO.

4. What is XSLT-
It is XSL transformation. It is part of XSL language for XSLT processes.
XSLT defines order/frequency of processing of XML source document.
It has templates having processing instructions.
It also has various features like variable declaration, repeat instructions, conditional checks etc.

5. X-Path-
It is language for addressing specific parts of an XML document.
It models XML document as tree of nodes.
XPath expression is mechanism for navigating through and selecting nodes from XML documents.

So to conclude the relationship between above components is, we use XML language for transfer of data because of its advantages mentioned above, and XSL document is a reference, using which XSLT does transformation and produces final document.
Ex. Just like we execute mapping in SAP PI, we take input payload (say XML), take data type as reference (say XSL), and we produce output using mapping transformation (say XSLT).

We can separate content and output format using XML.
We can create numerous output documents using single source document by performing transformations.

Following are examples of applications for XML:



Following is basic syntax 1 for XML:


Following is basic syntax 2 showing various elements in XML :

XML can also be viewed as tree structure.

Job of XSLT is to transform data from XML file into another format like html/xhtml. Data is sent as xhtml (format after XSLTransformation), and web browser  modifies it into the required data to display (html).

In case of XSL-FO, we can use various formats which can be printable such as PDF etc.

SAP Business Connector:



XML in SAP PI:

Well-formed XML:
1. Must have XML declaration.
2. Root element should be defined.
3. All elements have start and end tag.
4. All attribute values are in inverted commas.
5. Element groups are correctly nested

Validation of XML:
1. All points mentioned above.
2. It must contain DTD/Schema.
3. Rules of DTD/Schema are compiled.

DTD-

DTD is document type definition. Under DTD, main categories comprising XML document are declared. Ex. elements, their attributes, ordering, nesting of  elements etc.

Schemas-

XML schema have namespace and their own DTD. It is more powerful than DTD. It can have most basic program till expanded complex programs.

CSS-

CSS is designed around styling a document, structured in markup language (XML/HTML).
They are cascading style sheets used to style XML markup.

To conclude, these three are data type definitions. To transfer data, we use these structures, in which XML data is passed.

Advantages of Schema over CSS:
1. It is in XML syntax.
2. Sequence of source data can be changed.
3. Elements can be repeated any number of times in output.
4. Additional information can be included in output document.

DTD vs Schema:

XSLT mapping:

The most common thing heard in SAP PI in this subject regards is XSLT mapping.
Different ways of achieving conversion in XI is:

1. 1. Message Mapping (Graphical Mapping using Mapping Editor in XI).
2. 2. Java Mapping.
3. 3. ABAP Mapping.
4. XSLT Mapping.
   
   

  Steps required for developing XSLT Mapping

• Create a source data type and a target data type
• Create Message types for the source and target data types.
• Create Message Interfaces includes Inbound Message interface and Outbound Message interface.
• XSLT Mapping does not require creation of Message mapping, so don’t create any Message mapping.
• Create an .XSL file which converts source data type into target data type.
• Zip that .xsl file and import it into Integration Repository under Imported Archives.
• In Interface Mapping choose mapping program as XSL and specify this zip program. (Through search help you will get XSL Mapping programs that you imported under Imported Archives, select your corresponding XSL Program)
• Test this mapping program by navigating to Test tab.

Image courtesy: SAP e-learning hub(introduction to XML).

This blog will complement other blogs on 'XSLT Mapping' in SCN.

Direct link: How to create XSLT Mappinng in SAP PI / PO - YouTube   

     I recommend, practicing how to use XSL elements like xsl:template, xsl:if, xsl:choose, xsl:for-each, xsl:output, xsl:sort and xsl:namespace-alias in SAP NWDS or Eclipse or NetBeans. Please search internet for more examples.

Sample XSLT used in the video.

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?><xsl:stylesheet version="1.0" xmlns:xsl="http://www.w3.org/1999/XSL/Transform">  <xsl:output encoding="cp1252" />  <xsl:template match="/">  <xsl:copy-of select="." />  </xsl:template></xsl:stylesheet>

Sample XML used in the video.

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?><hr>   <Resources>      <EmployeesRecords>         <Record>            <Name>AAA € </Name>            <ID>111</ID>            <Phone>1111111111</Phone>         </Record>         <Record>            <Name>BBB</Name>            <ID>222</ID>            <Phone>2222222222</Phone>         </Record>      </EmployeesRecords>      <ContractorsRecords>         <Record>            <Name>ZZZ</Name>            <ID>999</ID>            <Phone>9999999999</Phone>         </Record>      </ContractorsRecords>   </Resources></hr>

Helpful Links: -

XML Path Language (XPath)

XSL Transformations (XSLT)

XSLT Mapping - SAP Library

Parameterized XSLT Mappings - SAP Library

Using the Lookup API in an XSLT Program - SAP Library

How to.. Import and use XSLT 2.0 mappings in SAP PI/PO

XSLT Mapping in Exchange Infrastructure (download the mwv file).

I was talking to my little brother yesterday. He is a medical doctor and he is currently finishing his higher education. In this phase, he is working as a general practitioner - but he has supervision. So every day he has 30 minutes to talk about some of the experiences he is going through in this important period. This is quite a privilege when trying to master a craft. I don’t think that I had that option when I started learning SAP XI, 10 years ago.

I also went through a learning process. There were two standard SAP XI courses and some e-learning. I had to become an expert in my own field. That was a bit challenging. I was supposed to know how everything would work, and how to design and solve issues. I really learned a lot during that phase. One of my advantages was that I had a few colleagues I could call to discuss my strange questions. I had many questions, I did not know anything about design back then. Those conversations really helped me get started.

We all have our different learning paths that help us become who we want to be. There are a lot of things we must do to fully understand the concepts of SAP Integration.

I’m getting quite a lot of requests regarding new SAP PI/PO roles at the moment, from all over the globe. It must mean that there is a requirement for SAP Customers to get new PI developers. I can tell that customers aren’t keen on having novice SAP PI developers working for them. There are some concepts that you must understand before you can become an expert PI developer.

I’m looking into effective methods of improving various people’s skills in the area of PI/PO development, so they can get started faster. I would like to hear about your learning journey. What was important for you? What is the best path to follow in order to become an expert developer? By ensuring that new developers can receive this crucial information, we can make sure they speed up their learning process.

Another part of the survey is focused on how you currently work. Even though you have been working with SAP XI/PI/PO for many years, there are still new use cases and different ways to solve new issues. It is also possible that a new, improved feature has been introduced. Sharing your objectives with your colleagues and receiving feedback on your projects is always a good idea. I have also put some of this into the survey.

So please take the time  to help with the survey, so i can learn how you managed to learn SAP Integration