Mastering the SAP Business Information Warehouse: Leveraging the Business Intelligence Capabilities of SAP NetWeaver, 2nd Edition

CHAPTER 2The SAP NetWeaver Integration Platform

This chapter begins with a short explanation of the development path SAP has taken over the years and how it has led to today’s SAP NetWeaver BI capabilities. The focus then turns to the two main components of the solution: The Portal and SAP BW. The Portal and its knowledge management (KM) capabilities, along with the SAP BW software components, create a broad foundation for organizations on which to build analytical applications and collaborative business intelligence solutions. The remainder of this book focuses on the options available to those implementing the SAP BW component. However, we must first place the SAP BW into the SAP NetWeaver BI context and set the stage for subsequent chapters.

The Architectural Roots of SAP NetWeaver

SAP was among the first software development companies to fully adopt a multi-tier client/server model (see Figure 2-1) and move away from traditional host-based solutions for business software. This was the beginning of the SAP R/3 success story back in the early 1990s.

Figure 2-1 SAP multi-tier architecture

To fully utilize the existing mainframe R/2 business applications (to a large extent implemented in the ABAP programming language), SAP had not only to implement a high-performance development and runtime environment but also a lot of tools available on host computers at the time:

1. Transaction-based ...