What'S New With Sap Netweaver 7.02?: Wolfgang Schaper

Business Rule Framework plus
Whats New With SAP NetWeaver 7.02?
Wolfgang Schaper
Product Manager BRFplus
SAP AG
December 2010
Disclaimer
This presentation outlines our general product direction and should not be
relied on in making a purchase decision. This presentation is not subject to
your license agreement or any other agreement with SAP. SAP has no
obligation to pursue any course of business outlined in this presentation or to
develop or release any functionality mentioned in this presentation. This
presentation and SAP's strategy and possible future developments are subject
to change and may be changed by SAP at any time for any reason without
notice. This document is provided without a warranty of any kind, either
express or implied, including but not limited to, the implied warranties of
merchantability, fitness for a particular purpose, or non-infringement. SAP
assumes no responsibility for errors or omissions in this document, except if
such damages were caused by SAP intentionally or grossly negligent.
2010 SAP AG. All rights reserved. / Page 2

Agenda
1. Overview
2. New Features in Detail
Rules, Rulesets, and Variables
Deep Contexts and Direct Access to Structure Elements
Direct Value Assignment in Rules
New and Improved Expression Types: Loop, Table Operation,
Call Procedure, new Formula UI
Configuration
Catalogs
Versioning
Excel Import and Export
Performance and Sizing
UI Improvements and Other Features

Agenda
1. Overview
Configuration
Catalogs
Versioning

BRFplus in SAP NetWeaver 7.02
Release Information
By December 2010 SAP NetWeaver 7.0 Enhancement Pack 2 (aka
NW 7.02) is available
That is the NetWeaver release SAP Business Suite 7 Innovation
2010 (including SAP ERP Enhancement Pack 5) is based on
With SAP NW 7.02 comes a new release of BRFplus with drastically
enhanced capabilities compared to SAP NW 7.01

Capabilities of BRFplus in NW 7.01

Supports a model-driven approach to manage business rules throughout
their lifecycle
Business users can define business rules artifacts such as decision table, decision
trees, and formulas, and change system behavior without the need to code ABAP
Business users can test and simulate changes
Best BRMS choice for any ABAP based application
high Performance: code generation and memory data access
TCO: runs embedded in BW, ECC, CRM, ; no separate server needed, no frontend
installation needed
Nesting of UI into application UIs
Direct access to business semantics and logic of SAP ABAP applications
erfect
integration with SAP NetWeaver Application Server and the ABAP
based applications in SAP Business Suite and SAP Business ByDesign
Local or remote (RFC, Web Service) business rules execution
Successfully used in many business applications shipped by SAP (known
to business and proven by many users)
Capabilities of BRFplus in NW 7.02

Business users can define business rules artifacts in a multi step approach
(ruleset) to implement not only simple derivations or calculations (such as
in the Standard), but aggregate rules into rule sets and thus implement
complex business logic without programming
A ruleset provides a set of additional capabilities
Can significantly reduce implementation effort for custom applications or
even take away the need to implement ABAP code
Instead of specification, design, implementation, test as a process of multiple
teams, it is possible to have business logic implemented in the system without any
coding experience by non-technical users; communication and translation costs
between different teams not requires
Business users implementing business logic changes leads to more flexibility,
higher agility at lower costs
Business users implementing business logic changes leads to better decisions
being implemented in the system and finally better results

Example
BRFplus in NW 7.01 allows to define simple business rules. Customers can
define decision tables, decision trees, formulas and other expressions to
implement derivations, calculations, and decisioning. Limitations to model
chains of expressions
A simple scenario is for example, the determination of a unit price using the
product and quantity. In this scenario only a decision table is used.
Decision Table
Product Quantity Price per unit

Pen 1 .. 9 50 cent
Pen 10 .. 99 40 cent
Pen >= 100 30 cent
Ruler * 70 cent

Example (continued)
On top of BRFplus in NW 7.02 allows to define high complex and large business
rules. Rulesets allow for combining many expressions to reflect chains of
decisioning, calculation and derivation logic, and for processing business rules
in parallel
A complex scenario using RULESETS allows combining several decision tables,
formulas and other expression types for a complex price determination. The
above decision table is just one rule out of a chain of rules to determine prices
of products within a basket allowing to consider additionally the buying history,
marketing campaigns, local taxes i.e. a chain of rules
Ruleset
Rule 1 Get unit price Determine unit price (Decision Table)
Rule 2 Apply customer discount Read historic customer data (DB Lookup expression),
based on customer history apply discount (Formula expression)
Rule 3 Apply discount from Check if campaign applicable (Decision Table), apply
marketing campaigns discount (Formula expression)
Rule 4 Apply taxes Calculate tax (Formula expression), apply tax to net price
(Formula expression)

Agenda
1. Overview
Configuration
Catalogs
Versioning

Agenda
1. Overview
Configuration
Catalogs
Versioning

Rules
Rules
In NW 7.02 rules can
contain several
expressions and actions
that are processed
sequentially
Rules can be nested, i.e.
rules execute other rules

Rulesets
In NW 7.01 one expression
was directly assigned to a
BRFplus function
With NW 7.02 there are
rulesets assigned to a
function
A ruleset contains several
rules that are processed
sequentially
Each rule can have a
condition, determining if
the rule is executed
Several prioritized
rulesets can be assigned
to a function
Each ruleset can have a
precondition and is only
triggered, if that
precondition is fulfilled
Variables
Variables and
initializations to store
intermediate results or
read additionally required
data for the business rules
evaluation
Variables can be defined
directly, or they can be
bound to a BRFplus or
DDIC object
Variables are part of the
context and can be used
within rules, expressions,
and actions

By defining rulesets business rules are simplified, and easier to

understand and maintain
Instead of having complex decision logic nested within one single
expression, all rules are in lists, being processed sequentially,
making multi step derivations possible
Rulesets allow for combining many expressions to reflect chains of
decisioning, calculation, and derivation logic, and for processing
business rules in parallel
By storing intermediate results in variables, it is possible to
combine the outcome of several rules to be used in other rules
Rules may have conditions, allowing for being processed only in
specific cases
Assigning several rulesets to a function allows for defining some
default logic that can be adapted for specific cases by adding
additional rulesets with higher priority

Rulesets provide a set of additional capabilities

Preconditions to dynamically include/exclude sets of business rules
to/from processing and priorities to define sequence of processing of
business rules
Exit conditions to stop rules processing in a ruleset
Restart conditions to restart interrupted rules processing at the place of
interruption
Ability to assign multiple rulesets to one business rules service (function)
allowing different business units to implement their business rules
independently
Ability to combine business rules from various sources (e.g. from
development system and production environment) within one business
rules service
Ability to change data directly in the context and trigger actions in the
same rule/ruleset

Agenda
1. Overview
Configuration
Catalogs
Versioning

Deep Contexts and Direct Access to Structure
Elements
Deep Contexts
In NW 7.01 only simple
elements, no structures,
could be used as context
parameters
With NW 7.02 input and
output parameters of a
function can have deep
structures

Elements
Direct Access to
Structure Elements
In NW 7.01 only some few
features were available to
deal with structures
Direct access of structure
elements was not possible
With NW 7.02 structure
elements can be accessed
directly
either for assigning the
result of some expression
or to be used within some
rule, expression, or action

Elements
Using deep contexts for input and output parameters makes it

easier to hand over data to and from a BRFplus function
This especially holds for structures that are derived from DDIC objects
Structures also can be used as input and output parameters for
expressions and actions
Direct access to structure elements allow to work with these
elements like with any other context parameter
As each line of a table is represented by a structure, working with
tables becomes feasible as well

Agenda
1. Overview
Configuration
Catalogs
Versioning

Direct Value
Assignment in Rules
With NW 7.02 values can
be assigned directly to
variables, which was not
possible with NW 7.01
In NW 7.01 the only way to
do this was using a
formula, which is possible
as well, but more
cumbersome and more
complex
As this feature is needed
quite often, its worth
having it at your fingertips

Agenda
1. Overview
Configuration
Catalogs
Versioning

New and Improved Expression Types
Loop, Table Operation, Call Procedure, new Formula UI
Loop
With NW 7.02 there is a
new expression type Loop
It allows for looping in
different modes
Do something n times
Do something until a
condition is fulfilled
Do something while a
condition is fulfilled
Do something for each entry
in a table
Expression type Loop
allows for repetitive
process steps

Table Operation
new expression type Table
Operation
It allows for sorting,
aggregating,
manipulating, and
searching in tables
With expression type
The follwing modes are available Loop, it is possible to
Has at least First line
access the whole table as
Has exactly Last line
one entity
Has no more than All lines
Count Sort Delete first line
Minimum Delete last line
Maximum Delete all lines
Total
Average

Call Procedure
new expression type Call
Procedure
It allows for accessing
ABAP methods and
function modules
Input, output, and error
message can be handled
Using expression type
Call Procedure allows to
do anything that is
implemented within an
ABAP method or function
module

Formula UI
Major improvements to
formula editor
Editing formula becomes
easier and more user
friendly
Additonal functions
available
Filtering capabilities by
functions category or text
Embedded documentation

Agenda
1. Overview
Configuration
Catalogs
Versioning

Configuration
Configuration
With NW 7.02 it is possible
to configure the BRFplus
Workbench according to
your needs and
preferences
Can be done individually
by user or centrally by
administrator to tailor the
UI to specific user groups

Agenda
1. Overview
Configuration
Catalogs
Versioning

Catalogs
Catalogs
Catalogs, with NW 7.02
embedded into the
BRFplus workbench, offer
a filtered view to that
objects that are important
for a user
Catalogs are not bound to
the repository structure
Catalogs can either be
created by a user, or by
the administrator to offer
user group specific views
It is possible to guide
users directly to role
specific catalogs

Agenda
1. Overview
Configuration
Catalogs
Versioning

Versioning
Versioning
Versioning allows for
archiving previous
versions of objects or
object trees for
documentation, validation,
legal reasons, ...
Compare different
versions of an object
Return to previous
versions
Track changes

Agenda
1. Overview
Configuration
Catalogs
Versioning

Excel Import and

Export
Decision Tables can be
exported to and imported
from Microsoft Excel files
That allows to maintain
decision tables in a user
interface business users
are familiar with
Common spread sheet
tools like sorting,
search/replace, filtering, ...
are available

Agenda
1. Overview
Configuration
Catalogs
Versioning


Performance and sizing capabilities of BRFplus was improved
drastically with NW 7.02
The effects are most visible for mass data processing and for all
mass operations like transport, import, export
A major reason for the better performance is a new data model that
for instance treats decision tables as single objects
Decision tables with 1000 lines became up to 100 times faster with
NW 7.02 compared to NW 7.01
Decision tables with 10000 rows or more are possible with NW 7.02
With NW 7.02 there are no more gaps in code generation, where
some parts needed to be interpreted with NW 7.01
For details see article in SDN

Agenda
1. Overview
Configuration
Catalogs
Versioning

UI Improvements
With NW 7.02 there are
lots of user interface
improvements that makes
using BRFplus workbench
even more a pleasure
Most visible are the icons
in the object tree and
catalog, indicating object
types
Other examples are the
improved formula editor,
display of rulesets, and
many more

Other Features that are new with NW 7.02

Improved texts in function simulation that help to better understand
the decision logic
New modus Quality Match in expression type Search Tree, allowing
to go for the best match available
Defaults, like versioning, can be set on application level and are
inherited by all subsequent objects
Additional features were added to the repository tree, e.g. grouping
of objects of the same type
By switching between technical names and object texts (to be done
by configuration), all users get their preferred view

What'S New With Sap Netweaver 7.02?: Wolfgang Schaper

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Business Rule Framework plus

Whats New With SAP NetWeaver 7.02?

2010 SAP AG. All rights reserved. / Page 2

2010 SAP AG. All rights reserved. / Page 3

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Capabilities of BRFplus in NW 7.01

Capabilities of BRFplus in NW 7.02

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Product Quantity Price per unit

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Rule 1 Get unit price Determine unit price (Decision Table)

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By defining rulesets business rules are simplified, and easier to

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Rulesets provide a set of additional capabilities

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Using deep contexts for input and output parameters makes it

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Excel Import and

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Performance and Sizing

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Other Features that are new with NW 7.02

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