Abap Cloud, what is it?

Hylke Visser - Senior Developer & SAP Invoice Management Consultant


According to the SAP definition, ABAP Cloud is the following:

"ABAP Cloud is the new ABAP development model for building cloud-enabled business applications, services and extensions. It comes with SAP Business Technology Platform and SAP S/4HANA and works equally well with public cloud, private cloud and on-premise systems."

So it is not a new product or tool, nor is it just for Cloud solutions. It is a development model for ABAP developers to build (cloud-ready) apps and extensions on the following SAP products:

  • SAP BTP ABAP Environment,

  • SAP S/4HANA Cloud, public and private edition,

  • SAP S/4HANA on-premise.

On S/4HANA on-premise and private cloud systems, both ABAP Cloud and classic ABAP can be used. On the BTP ABAP environment and S/4HANA public cloud, classic ABAP is not possible.

ABAP Cloud availability depends on the version:

What does it consist of?

The main components of ABAP Cloud are:

  • ABAP RESTful Application Programming Model (RAP), provides a clear separation between the different layers in the development model, such as the UI services for Fiori and integration services;

  • Core Data Services (CDS) for the data model;

  • ABAP programming language optimized for the cloud;

  • Released APIs and extension points (for customization stability, it is important that APIs are released by SAP).

Evolution or revolution?

ABAP Cloud is an evolution from classic ABAP to ABAP Cloud:

  • Needed for development of S/4HANA products and ABAP-based cloud solution

    • A number of components such as CDS, RAP and ADT (ABAP Development Tools) in Eclipse have existed for some time since or even before S/4HANA.

  • SAP BTP ABAP Environment (also called Steampunk) for building ABAP-based cloud apps on SAP BTP

    • This is where the cloud-optimized ABAP programming language was introduced along with the first public APIs.

  • The next step was to introduce this cloud-ready ABAP development model into S/4HANA (2022)

    • SAP S/4HANA Cloud ABAP Environment (Embedded Steampunk)

    • The goal was to let customers build their own ABAP in the public cloud edition of SAP S/4HANA.

  • With SAP S/4HANA 2022 added to the private cloud and on-premise S/4HANA systems

    • Customers can choose whether to use classic ABAP or ABAP Cloud.

With these steps, the new ABAP development model is available in all major environments (SAP BTP and all S/4HANA editions). To differentiate between classic ABAP, the new name ABAP Cloud has been coined.

How do I use ABAP Cloud?

To use ABAP Cloud, you need Eclipse IDE with the ABAP Development Tools (ADT). An installation instruction can be found here.

S/4HANA Cloud & BTP

From Eclipse, navigate to File, New and then choose New ABAP Cloud Project:

For S/4HANA Cloud systems, enter the service instance URL here. For BTP environments, connect via the service key (in JSON format) found in BTP with the instances credentials.

S/4HANA on-premise and private cloud

For S/4HANA on-premises and private cloud systems, ABAP Cloud can be used by customizing the ABAP language version:

 
 

The ABAP language version is in the properties of an object, such as an ABAP class. It can also be set as the default for a development class. In particular, choosing ABAP Cloud leads to a stricter ABAP syntax.

You can no longer access everything like in classic ABAP. There is only access to released APIs, for example, you cannot do a select on table BUT000, this has to be done through the released CDS view I_BUSINESSPARTNER. Also, understandably, SAP GUI transactions and screens cannot be used. Write statements and, for example, a function like popup_to_confirm give a syntax error. Interaction with the user is done through Fiori apps.

Why?

Then the question is, why use ABAP Cloud with on-premise and private cloud systems? Two reasons might be:

  • Cloud ready ... but you must already be on S/4HANA.

  • Future safe (standardized way of working)

However, the most important reason to use ABAP Cloud is: Keep the core clean. Using ABAP Cloud keeps the core clean. The advantage of this is that the S/4 systems are more future proof.

In addition to greenfield implementations, ABAP Cloud is also possible at brownfield. Existing, classic ABAP developments can be converted to, or replaced by ABAP Cloud developments. So it is not that the ABAP Cloud clean core principle only applies to new S/4 systems, for existing S/4 systems ABAP Cloud can actually lead to a clean core. This will not be an easy transition in most cases, but ultimately contributes to a future-proof, clean SAP system.

Sources used

More information

For further questions or information on this topic or any other questions in the area of SAP Workflow, Fiori, SAP Invoice Management (SIM) or SAP Master Data Governance (MDG), please contact Victor van den Hazelkamp.