1. Introduction to ABAP and SAP Structure

2. What is the UOW?
SAP operates around the concept of a Unit of Work (UOW)
Every transaction code you execute completes a unit of work
It’s atomic (cannot be divided). That is, a transaction completes entirely or it does not!
A unit of work (transaction code) corresponds to a program (term used loosely)

3. What’s a Transaction?
There is a 1-1 relationship between transaction code and a UOW program
A transaction
Has a corresponding program
Belongs to a package
Has an initial screen and possibly many others

4. Organization of the SAP System (1)
It’s big
Use the Object Navigator to look at all of the SAP objects (SE80)
All sorts of tools to look up and edit applications
Typical ‘drill-down’ interface
My example will look at transaction code VA01 – create sales order

5. Organization of the SAP System (2)
You have all of the source code and can see / change / enhance how the system works
All code is written in a language called ABAP or more recently some is written in Java

6. Program Attributes (Package)
SAP packages, in the simplest case, allow you group programs, database tables, (and other things) together
SAP itself is organized into thousands of hierarchical packages
A program belongs to a package and has an owner
The package is defined when the program is saved for the first time
Use package $TMP for our “local” packages

7. ABAP Program Attributes (Package)
Use Local Package $TMP for our work

8. The Object Navigator It’s a navigator to all SAP ‘objects’ (SE80)
The ‘Application Hierarchy’ is at the top and contains packages

9. Object Navigator (Lookup Example 1)
Sales and Distribution (SD) / SALES is an Application Component

10. Object Navigator (Lookup Example 2)
Which contains the program SAPMV45A (Sales Order Processing)

11. Object Navigator (Lookup Example 3)
And the transaction code VA01 is bound to this program SAPMV45A
SE93 is used to look up a program based on the transaction code

12. Object Navigator (Lookup Example 4)
Transaction code VA01 belongs to the package SAPMV45A
Having a default screen number of 101

13. Object Navigator (Lookup Example 4)
Screen 101 from the Object Navigator is the first screen to create a sales order

14. Object Navigator (Lookup Example 5)
Which when run gives us a screen simulation

15. Object Navigator (Lookup Example 6)
Which looks is our first screen to create a sales order (VA01)

16. How do we Customize?
We modify SAP programs via ‘enhancement sections’ and other means
We create custom programs
We copy entire transaction codes and ‘make our own

17. Enhancement Sections
They are entry points into SAP programs that allow us to add our own code before or after some SAP task executes

18. Creating a Custom Program
It’s a unified interface for creating, debugging, modifying, deploying, … ABAP programs
Use transaction code SE38

19. Review (A First ABAP Program -1)
Create a program

20. Review (A First ABAP Program -2)
Edit the program statements

21. Review (A First ABAP Program -3)
Activate the application (Program / Activate)

22. Review (A First ABAP Program -4)
Run it (F8) or (Program / Test / Direct Processing
A first report is displayed

23. APAP Program Attributes (Introduction)
Every program that you create has metadata

24. APAP Program Attributes (Program Type)
ABAP has it’s own program types
Executable programs can be run independently of a transaction code
Module Pools are made up of processing steps and are executed from a transaction code
And other types of programs

25. APAP Program Attributes (Program Status / Application)
Program status controls whether the program is a test (local) program deployed to production systems
Application controls where in the SAP hierarchy the program “lives”

26. The ABAP Editor It’s Visual Studio for SAP A code editor
The clipboard works as we would expect
We can run and test programs inside of the ABAP editor

27. ABAP Program Names SAP has naming conventions for programs
Local programs should ALWAYS begin with the letters Y or Z (for customer)

28. ABAP Syntax (Introduction)
Like most programming languages, we have variables, statements (sequence, decision, loops)
The language looks like the old COBOL language