1. Pennsylvania State System of Higher Education
SAP BW Overview

2. Agenda Reporting Comparison BW Overview BW Landscape & Architecture
BW Reporting Tools
Business Content
BW Website
Online Resources
Discussions/ Q&A

3. Reporting Comparison R/3 BW Relational & Multidimensional Analysis
Line Item Analysis
Delivered Reports
Basic Reporting or Predefined (requires
ABAP programmers)
Consumes Resources from
Transaction Processing
Real-time Analysis
Function Specific
Relational & Multidimensional Analysis
Delivered Reports (aka Business Content)
Ad hoc or Predefined (can be designed
by users)
Significantly Faster Processing
Current (according to update schedule)
& Historical Analysis
Cross Functional

4. BW Overview
The Business Information Warehouse (BW) is SAP’s architectural solution for data warehousing.
Seamless integration with R/3
Built-in functionality that substantially reduces DW design, development and maintenance
BW is a separate system from the R/3 transaction processing system
BW data structures are optimized for reporting data efficiently and quickly (analytical processing).
R/3 data structures are optimized for recording data efficiently and quickly (transaction processing).

5. State System BW Landscape
BW Dev
DB1
BW QA
QB1
BW PRD
PB1
BW TRN
TB1
BW SB
SB1
Data
Data
Data
Data
Data
SAP R/3
DV1
DR1
DC1
SAP R/3
QA2
QR1
QC1
SAP R/3
PRD
PR1
PC1
SAP R/3
TRN
TR1
TC1
SAP R/3
SF1
SR1

6. Business Explorer Tools
Basic BW Architecture
BEx
SAP R/3
InfoCube
ODS
Non-SAP
Data Sources
(Flat file, XML
or DBConnect)
Data Detail
Business Content
Web
Based
BEx
SAP-BW
Data Sources
Business Explorer Tools

7. BW Reporting Tools Business Explorer (BEx) Query Designer
MS-Excel-Based Analyzer (Web or GUI)
Formatted Reporting
Web Application Designer

8. Business Explorer (BEx) Analyzer
Queries and solution workbooks embedded in MS Excel
Excel functionality can be utilized (calculations, charts, VBA programming, etc.)
Queries are refreshed at each run; workbooks provide pre-calculated queries
Incorporates BW Security and, therefore, eliminates the need for an additional layer of security at the reporting level
Seamless integration with BEx Analyzer for the Web

9. GUI Based or……
SAP Menu Bar Add-in

10. Web-Based

11. What is “Business Content?”
Advantages of using Business Content
Pre-Configured SAP-delivered objects allow rapid development (DataSources, Transfer Structures, ODSs, InfoCubes, Queries, etc.)
Based on Best Practices
A solution to build upon
Provides a good baseline for enhancements of functionality and data models.

13. Online Resources SAP Online Documentation - help.sap.com
Service Marketplace - service.sap.com
OSS Notes
Installation and upgrade info
SAP Developers Network - sdn.sap.com
Online Forums
How Tos
SAP Fans –

14. QUESTIONS

15. Thank You