SAP Landscapes on Autopilot

with Workload Automation

Introduction
Managing their SAP landscapes is the major challenge for many organizations. To
keep their service level agreements, the impact of huge workloads resulting from
high data volume and end-user generated batch-requests needs to be managed.
Strategic planning and execution of background processes is the key to optimizing
throughput. This is not only a concern for SAP processing, as SAP workload has to
be synchronized with other SAP NetWeaver Solutions and to be integrated with
non-SAP applications such as legacy systems and IT infrastructure tasks like
backups. Efficient coordination of technologies, enabled by automation software,
will result in higher productivity of your SAP systems in your whole organization.
End-to-end process management automates and integrates SAP with non-SAP
workload, enabling alignment with SOA strategy and increasing throughput for
business processes. Introducing an enterprise-wide automation strategy, which coordinates SAP and non-SAP application workload with the IT administration and
computing demands of the operating system, will lead to significant increases in
productivity. SAP users are well advised to recognize the value enterprise-wide
automation can bring to their IT landscapes, allowing SAP to run on autopilot.

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ENTERPRISE SOLUTION TO
AUTOMATION CHALLENGES

WORKLOAD

UC4 Workload Automation Suite covers the four

most important areas: SAP NetWeaver, non-SAP
applications,
IT
infrastructure,
and
legacy
systems.

what is offered by conventional job schedulers,

which are not robust enough to provide
enterprise-wide
visibility,
management,
and
control. UC4 ensures SAP users that all jobsnot
only jobs inside SAP, but also processing around
SAP are taken care ofguaranteeing availability of
the SAP System.
SMOOTH MIGRATION OF LEGACY SYSTEMS

The breadth and depth of packaged application

and operating platform support sets UC4 apart
from both other automation vendors and the
inbuilt scheduling tools provided by SAP (notably
SAP CCMS and recently introduced SAP Central
Process Scheduler [CPS]). These latter tools are
designed only to schedule reports in SAP Systems,
with a primary focus on running SAP jobs.
Integration to non-SAP-applications is rudimentary
at best, especially considering that 50 to 80% of
necessary tasks are found one layer below SAP in the IT infrastructure layer.
UC4 Workload Automation Suite contains all of the
functionality provided with embedded SAP process
scheduling tools. In addition to ensuring that all
SAP workload is fully automated and centrally
monitored, UC4 Workload Automation Suite
manages all interfaces with SAP and all non-SAP
applications. Just about every SAP customer relies
on home-grown solutions and other non-SAPapplications to support their business processes
things like in-house developed time clocks or a
third party business intelligence tool. There are
always interfaces to other systems which need to
be managed.
At the IT infrastructure management layer, there
are housekeeping and administrative tasks that
need to be executed: Backups, Cleanups, File
Transfer Handling, Starting and Stopping of SAP
online systems. All of these activities are
necessary to ensure that everything around your
SAP Systems are properly managed and
maintained. These requirements go well beyond

Another important area that can benefit from the

attention of automation is legacy modernization.
Migrating your business procedures from existing
legacy systems to SAP normally takes about three,
often up to five years. During this period you not
only need automation in your new SAP system,
you also need to synchronize the processing that
continues to run on legacy systems. During a
migration project, there will be an overlap period
when both systems are supporting production
activities. To ensure consistency these systems
will have to exchange, synchronize, and update
the data they work with. Synchronizing masterdata day by day is one of many areas where
enterprises can apply process automation to
relieve the migration headache. With UC4
Workload Automation Suite, enterprises can make
sure that the business information contained in
their legacy systems and SAP landscape remain in
step.
In many instances, legacy modernization is a
process that never ends. Its not unusual for
organizations to pursue merger and acquisition
strategies, buying up to two or three companies in
a single year and resulting in huge follow up
projects to integrate IT systems. Integrating a
new, external legacy system with the existing
enterprise landscape is just one of the many
challenges, and leads to a host of questions: Does
our merged partner have a modern SAP System in
place? What is the condition of the HP 3000-based
systems? How can we get information out of a
custom application into our corporate SAP BW
data base? Should we consolidate the existing
systems management tools that are used today
and start using single solutions?
SAP enterprises can become more flexible in
responding to change if the activities around
mergers and acquisitions can be supported by
automated migration procedures that enable
migration of legacy systems to SAP Solutions.
Process automation software that is compatible
with the different operating systems, ERP and
other applications that are used by merged
companies eases the transition and removes the
risk of merging technologies. UC4 Workload
Automation Suite can facilitate business change
with solutions that support a wide range of
2

operating and ERP-Systems, allowing customers

to be fully equipped to address the challenges of
today and fully prepared for all challenges in the
future.

SAP SCHEDULING ALONE IS NOT ENOUGH

In the complex IT landscape typically found in
many enterprises, process automation starts with
the creation of a stable and established
automation infrastructure which is able to cover
the diverse mix of applications and operating
systems. This platform establishes a homogenous
environment for the configuration, execution,
monitoring, and administration of business workload. This is a fundamentally different approach to
implementing a process scheduling and automation strategy based on internal SAP tools.
Consider the following example:

The advantages of using a scheduler that

manages workload from outside of SAP are very
clear, and there is also no difference in the quality
of service for external scheduling internal SAP
jobs. UC4 solutions use exactly the same
interfaces as those used by internal tools. The XBP
(eXternal Batch Processing) is the most important
interface for companies wishing to manage SAP
ERP workload and integrate processes with
external applications and IT housekeeping tasks.
This interface allows certified solutions to start,
manage and monitor ABAP Jobs. The Java-XBPinterface (JXBP)due to be launched early in
2008supports organizations that want to run
and synchronize Java jobs running on the SAP
NetWeaver Java stack with other SAP and nonSAP processes. The good news is that SAP users
dont need to wait for this new interface to
become available. They can already start taking
advantage of the 6000+ Java-MBeans that can be
executed on the SAP NetWeaver Java-stack with
JMX integration, currently available from UC4.
Regardless of which parts of the IT landscape are
involved, processing needs to be automated so
that end-user service level agreements are met.
UC4 Workload Automation Suite covers all four
automation areas that SAP users need to consider,
highlighting yet again the need for an enterprisewide solution which provides the visibility much
like a captain likes to have from the cockpit.
Nowadays, regardless of destination and the
landscape over which they fly, most modern
airlines require very little intervention from the
captain. Equally, the SAP landscape can be
successfully navigated on autopilot with UC4
Workload Automation Suite.
ABOUT UC4 SOFTWARE

How should a scheduler, which is running inside

the SAP system, create a backup of this same
system? The backup requires starting and
stopping the system. An internal scheduler is
stopped when the SAP-system is stopped. The
internal scheduler may be able to stop itself, but it
cannot restart. This dilemma leads to many
manual restarts. Automation of SAP applications
from inside and outside handles all the
maintenance of your IT-infrastructure with a
single solution. Significant savings can be
achieved in license and consulting costs if you
forgo implementing an additional SAP only
scheduler and choose a tool like UC4 Workload
Automation Suite.

UC4 Software is a leading provider of workload

automation and IT process optimization solutions that
ensure core business processes and enterprise
information systems run faster, more accurately and
without interruption. More than 1,500 companies
worldwide have successfully enhanced application
processing performance and improved IT efficiency using
UC4s business acceleration solutions. Customers include
American
Suzuki
Motor
Corporation,
Cadbury
Schweppes, eBay, Eastman Kodak, General Electric,
Mattel, McGraw Hill, Panasonic, Robert Bosch, Sun
Microsystems, Symantec, T-Systems and Verizon. For
more information, please visit www.uc4.com.

CONTACT UC4 SOFTWARE

In the US at (877) 464-7300 (toll-free)
In Europe at +43 2233 77880
www.uc4.com
info@uc4.com