ABAP Platform 2021 amazingly new features

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SAP ABAP Platform 2021 is generally available to customers since Oct. 13, 2021. In this blog post we will look at the new features of ABAP Platform 2021.

ABAP Platform is a technical platform of products like SAP S/4HANA or SAP BTP. It is comprehensive integrated life cycle management to create and run ABAP-based application programs. ABAP Platform 2021 is foundation for SAP S/4HANA 2021 and applicable for SAP HANA-only Add-Ons.

Any previous versions of S/4HANA including 1511, 1610, 1709, 1809, 1909, and 2020 can be upgraded to S/4HANA 2021.

ABAP Platform 2021 Highlights
ABAP Platform 2021 Highlights

ABAP Platform 2021 Highlights

ABAP Platform 2021 delivers improvement and innovations in following capabilities.

  • ABAP Development
  • Application Server Infrastructure
  • Document and Output Management
  • Business Process Management
  • UI Technologies
    • UI Theme Desginer
    • SAP Fiori Launchpad
  • Security
  • Integration and Connectivity

Lets examine these feature in-details

ABAP Development

  • Excellent Eclipse development experience with expanded ABAP tools and language.
  • Improved ABAP CDS with ABAP SQL for sophisticated data access and modeling on SAP HANA.
  • The ABAP RESTful Application Programming Model feature set has been expanded to include support for unmanaged early and late numbering as well as new protocols.
  • Improved connectivity, integration, security, and extension.
  • Real-time with support for WebSocket RFC, MQTT, and AMQP, as well as ABAP Channels and ABAP Daemons for industrial IoT and M2M communication.
  • Effective custom code migration support for SAP S/4HANA and SAP BTP ABAP Environment.
  • High quality assurance using code analysis tools.

Application Server Infrastructure

Following are new features

  • Additional SAP Web Dispatcher command line arguments are available to reload different configuration items or begin a soft shutdown.
  • SQL Monitor transaction SQMD have new possibilities to filter results. New filter options Joins and Cross Node Joins are introduced and Resolved options supports CDS views, ABAP Managed Database Procedures (AMDP) and CDS table functions.
  • SAP Web Dispatcher now supports logging request which are not routed to any backend system by using the pseudo backend system name NONE.
  • With this release, you can use pre-defined log formats with user defined log format placeholders to enhance log format.
  • Internet Communication Manager (ICM) and SAP Web Dispatcher now supports to call an authorization handler check within a modification handler rule.
  • Additional logging using log handler can be configured to log blocked requests by authorization handler.

Document and Output Management

Maintain Form Templates is a Fiori app to create/update/delete form templates in S/4HANA. It is recommended to use form templates for all document and output management scenarios such as purchase order, invoice. The app is available since the S/4HANA 1511

With this new release you can now download previous versions of your customized form templates and compare two versions at the object level.

Note: Adobe LiveCycle Designer (ADLC) is required to view downloaded custom form templates.

Business Process Management

Flexible Workflow is a new concept in SAP S/4HANA that aims to simplify workflow configuration. To meet evolving innovation needs both on-premises and in the cloud, Flexible Workflow expands SAP Business Workflow.

In S/4HANA 2021 FPS 00, a new app called Flexible Workflow Administration is introduced to monitor all flexible workflow instances. You can use this app to open flexible workflow instances, display instances, and perform administrative actions on selected instances. For tasks that are ready to be processed, you can also forward the tasks of one user to another.

UI Technologies

Across UI Technologies such as Floorplan Manager, Web Dynpro ABAP, UI Theme Designer and SAP Fiori Launchpad, there are many improvements and innovations listed below

UI Theme Designer

The UI theme designer is a browser-based tool for cross-theming scenarios. The following new theming parameters are added:

  • sapTile_OverlayBackground and sapTile_OverlayForegroundColor for overlays used on image, news and slide tiles.
  • sapContent_ContrastTextShadow to support text shadow styling for contrast text.
  • sapContent_Selected_ForegroundColor to color foreground elements.
  • Following border theming parameters are added to support styling of field and input
    • sapField_InvalidBorderWidth
    • sapField_InvalidBorderStyle
    • sapField_WarningBorderWidth
    • sapField_WarningBorderStyle
    • sapField_InformationBorderWidth
    • sapField_InformationBorderStyle
    • sapField_SuccessBorderWidth
    • sapField_SuccessBorderStyle
  • Following text color theming parameters are added to support button
    • sapButton_Emphasized_Active_TextColor
    • sapButton_Attention_Active_TextColor
    • sapButton_Accept_Active_TextColor
    • sapButton_Reject_Active_TextColor
    • sapButton_Negative_Active_TextColor
    • sapButton_Critical_Active_TextColor
    • sapButton_Success_Active_TextColor
    • sapButton_Neutral_Active_TextColor

SAP Fiori Launchpad

The following are new SAP Fiori Launchpad features that will be available in S/4HANA 2021.

  • My Home is a new space available and activated by default.
  • The pages now supports two additional tile sizes: flat and flat wide.
  • Users can now set their preferred date and time formats, the time zone and the decimal format in the user settings.
  • Spaces can be sorted with a new configuration parameter SPACES_SORT_CRITERION.
  • SAP-Delivered Spaces and Pages details are now available in Manage Launchpad Spaces Fiori app.
  • A redesigned About dialog shows more application and system-specific information with new launchpad parameters.
  • Enhanced link handling in Pages.
  • SAP Fiori Launchpad Home page is deprecated.
  • Automatic data loading in SAP Fiori overview pages or list Apps, no longer have to click the Go button.
  • Loading SAPUI5 from a CDN with Target Mapping is removed.
  • You no longer can run an app standalone in the SAP Fiori launchpad.
  • Enhancements to SAP Fiori Launchpad App Manager.
  • Internet Explorer 11 is no longer a supported browser.
  • The function to give feedback in the SAP Fiori launchpad will be deprecated.

Security

Four new Fiori apps are introduced to support logging, system static and security audit.

  1. Read Access Logging Configuration to configure read access to logged data.
  2. React Access Logging Monitor to monitor all log entries and errors.
  3. Display Security Audit Log, to display security relevant events that occur in the SAP S/4HANA system.
  4. Display Status System Audit to display overview of static system information.

Integration and Connectivity

  • SAP Application Interface Framework (AIF) got some new SAP Fiori apps.
    • Message Monitoring for Integration Experts
    • Message Monitoring for Administrators
    • SOAP Error Log
    • OData Error Log
  • Due to various data protection rules, you can track and log read access to sensitive data using Enterprise Event Enablement.

Other References

ABAP Platform for SAP S/4HANA 2021

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