Shutting Down the Target System
Planning Guide for the Connector for SAP Landscape Management
One example: In an SAP environment, a system copy must be performed for various reasons - until now manually. Such a copy is always required when the QA system of a multi-level SAP architecture has to be brought up to the status of the current production system: Be it for testing new applications or during a release upgrade, for maintenance purposes or for updating the quality assurance and test system. In principle, the task proves to be simple: All files belonging to the clean configuration and implementation of the SAP environment must be transferred from the productive systems to the quality assurance system in the correct order and in the correct directories.
The steps to be taken before shutting down the target SAP system can be summarized as follows: Well before performing the upgrade, inform the target system users - especially project managers, developers, and testers - about the planned maintenance work via e-mail, SAP system messages, and/or a message at the system logon. Using the SAP transport system requires careful preparation so that software development projects can be completed as far as possible. Shortly before the start of the update, inform users again that maintenance work on the system is imminent and that they should log off from the target system. After logging users off and locking them out, download system-specific content from the target system database for customization (including security settings, Remote Function Call (RFC) targets, and operating modes).
This is why companies need professional test data management
To meet ever-changing business requirements, a production system must be continuously developed and adapted after the initial installation. To do this, you need development, consolidation, and quality assurance (QA) systems that can provide the appropriate updates to the production system as SAP transports.
The different types of SAP environments must meet different requirements. Training courses, for example, can only be held expediently if the working conditions largely correspond to those on the production system. Companies can simulate real-life situations for testing purposes on the basis of consistent and realistic data alone. Users should also test their own developments and modifications with consistent data that is close to production. A test environment that is as identical as possible to the production system is suitable for testing patches and release upgrades. In development and training systems in particular, it is fundamentally important to anonymize sensitive data in order to comply with data protection rules.
Tools such as "Shortcut for SAP Systems" supplement missing functions in the area of SAP system copy.
However, the disadvantages of this procedure are the high memory requirements, the lack of anonymization of the data and the long runtime of the copy process.
This can be extremely profitable, for example, for the conversion of existing ERP systems to the new SAP Business Suite S/4HANA.