SAP Planning: Best Practices in Implementation

Introduction to Availability

Before you tackle sizing an SAP solution, you must understand the availability requirements of the system, or the amount of time that the system needs to be available to satisfy the needs of its users. In the world of SAP and other enterprise applications, this is referred to as high availability, or simply HA, to reflect the critical nature of the systems themselves. It’s not enough to be available most of the time—the enterprise solution must be available nearly always, and the degree of availability depends on the requirements of the business.

This high-availability requirement manifests itself in a number of ways. The architecture of the solution, the solution components themselves, practices, processes, and much ...