SAP BW Questions - Some Real Question

1. Differences b/w 3.0 and 3.5

2. Differences b/w 3.5 and BI 7.0
3. Can you explain a life cycle in brief
4. Difference b/w table & structure
5. Steps of LO
6. Steps of LIS
7. Steps of generic
8. What is index and how do you increase performance using them
9. How do you load deltas into ODS and cube
10. Example of errors while loading data and how do u resolve them
11. How do you maintain work history until a ticket is closed
12. What is reconciliation
13. What is the methodology u use before implementation
14. What are the role & responsibilities when you are in implementation and whil
e in support also
Major Differences between Sap Bw 3.5 & sapBI 7.0 version
1. In Infosets now you can include Infocubes as well.
2. The Remodeling transaction helps you add new key figure and characteristics a
nd handles historical data as well without much hassle. This is only for info cu
be.
3. The BI accelerator (for now only for infocubes) helps in reducing query run t
ime by almost a factor of 10 - 100. This BI accl is a separate box and would cos
t more. Vendors for these would be HP or IBM.
4. The monitoring has been imprvoed with a new portal based cockpit. Which means
you would need to have an EP guy in ur project for implementing the portal ! :)
5. Search functionality hass improved!! You can search any object. Not like 3.5
6. Transformations are in and routines are passe! Yess, you can always revert to
the old transactions too.
7. The Data Warehousing Workbench replaces the Administrator Workbench.
8. Functional enhancements have been made for the DataStore object:
New type of DataStore object
Enhanced settings for performance optimization of DataStore objects.
9. The transformation replaces the transfer and update rules.
10. New authorization objects have been added
11. Remodeling of InfoProviders supports you in Information
Lifecycle Management.
12 The Data Source:
There is a new object concept for the Data Source.
Options for direct access to data have been enhanced.
From BI, remote activation of Data Sources is possible in SAP source systems.
13.There are functional changes to the Persistent Staging Area (PSA).
14.BI supports real-time data acquisition.
15 SAP BW is now known formally as BI (part of NetWeaver 2004s). It implements t
he Enterprise Data Warehousing (EDW). The new features/ Major differences includ
e:
a) Renamed ODS as DataStore.
b) Inclusion of Write-optmized DataStore which does not have any change log and
the requests do need any activation
c) Unification of Transfer and Update rules
d) Introduction of "end routine" and "Expert Routine"
e) Push of XML data into BI system (into PSA) without Service API or Delta Queue
f) Intoduction of BI accelerator that significantly improves the performance.
g) Load through PSA has become a must. I am not too sure about this. It looks li
ke we would not have the option to bypass the PSA Yes,
16. Load through PSA has become a mandatory. You can't skip this, and also there
is no IDoc transfer method in BI 7.0. DTP (Data Transfer Process) replaced the
Transfer and Update rules. Also in the Transformation now we can do "Start Rou
tine, Expert Routine and End Routine". during data load.
New features in BI 7 compared to earlier versions:
i. New data flow capabilities such as Data Transfer Process (DTP), Real time dat
a Acquisition (RDA).
ii. Enhanced and Graphical transformation capabilities such as Drag and Relate o
ptions.
iii. One level of Transformation. This replaces the Transfer Rules and Update Ru
les
iv. Performance optimization includes new BI Accelerator feature.
v. User management (includes new concept for analysis authorizations) for more f
lexible BI end user authorizations.
=====================================
2. Complete life-cycle implementation of SAP BW, which includes data modeling,
data extraction, data loading, reporting and support.
==============================
3A. When they refer to the full life cycle its the ASAP methodology which SAP re
commends to follow for all its projects.
1.Project peparation.
2.Business Blueprint.
3.Realization.
4.Fit-Gap Analysis
5.Go-Live Phase.
Normally in the first phase all the management guys will sit with in a discussio
n . In the second phase u will get a functional spec n basing on that u will hav
e a technical spec. In the third phase u will actually inplement the project and
finally u after testing u will deploy it for production i.e. Go-live .
You might fall under and get involved in the realization phase . If its a suppor
ting project u will come into picture only after successful deployment.
===========================
5A. LO extraction is one stop shop for all the logistics extarctions .
 LO dataosuurces come as a part of the business content in BW .
We need to transfer them from the BCT and then activate them from D version to t
he active Verion A .
Go to the tcode -- RSA5 ---- Transfer the desired datasource . and then LBWE to
maintain the extract structure LBWG -- to delete the setup tables ---- why ... ?
OLI*bw -- Statistcal initialization . LBWQ --- To delete the extractor queue SM
13 -- to delete the update queue . LBWf -- to get the log .
Its always recommended to have the Queued delta as an update method , since it u
ses the collective run to schedule all the changed records .
Once the intial run is over set the delta method Queued to periodic for further
delta load
Why ..?
We need to delete the setup tables since we need to delete the data that is alre
ady in them and also because we will change the ES by adding the required fields
from the R/3 communuication structrure .
we can also select and hide the fields here .. all the filds in blue are mandato
ry ..
If the required fields are not avilable we will go for the DS enhancments .
=================================
6A. LIS uses information structures to extract the data .it comes under the app
lication specific customer generated extractions.
The range is 000 to 999.
0-499 is for SAP structures n 500 to 999 are for customer defined .
We need to consider the two cases if its the SAP defined r the customer defined
.
Lets see the SAP defined first :
Tcode -- LBW0
give the information structure and selct the option display settings to know the
status .if u seelct the generate datasource option it will throw an error sayin
g that u cannot create in the SAp name range .
You select the option the setup environment settings it will create the two tabl
es n one structure with the naming convention .. 2LIS_application no _BIW1 ,2LIS
_appl No _BIW2 and 2LIS _appl no_BIWS
These two structures are used to enable the delta records interchangebaly --- we
will come to know this in the table TMCBIW .
Then go to LBW1 to change the version ..
LBW2 to setup the no update update method .. now you do the full load and after
that go LBW1 change the version and then go to LBW2 to setup the delta update n
the periodic job .
Now you can load the delta updates .
If its in the case of the user defined :
You need to create the IS
MC18 --- create the IS
MC19-- change
MC20 -- dispaly
MC21--MC22,,MC23,MC24,MC25,MC26 folwing to craete the update rules .
Then Tcode LBW0 give the IS name and
sel setup lis environment it will craete the the two tables n the structure ..
You can use OMO1 to fill the tables n u do the full upload then u need to setup
the delta by sel the steup delta ..
You can set whether the delta is enabled are not using the option activate /deac
tivate deelta
Both in cases you need while migrating the data you need to lock the setup table
s to prevent users from entreing the transactions SE14 ... and after completion
u need to unlock .
But LO is preffered to LIS in all aspects .. LO provdes the IS upto the level of
detail .
Enhanced performance and also deletion of setup tables after updation which we n
ever do in LIS .

============================
7A. We opt for generic extraction whenever the desired datasource is not availa
ble in business content or if it is already used and we need to regenerate it .
when u want to extract the data from table, view, infoset, function module we us
e generic extraction. In generic we create our own datasource and activate it .
Steps :
1.Tcode is RSO2
2.Give the datasource name and designate it to a particular application componen
t.
3. Give the short medium and long desc mandatory.
4. Give the table / Fm /view /infoset.
5. and continue which leads to a detail screen in which you can always hide, sel
ect ,inversion , field only options are available.
HIDE is used to hide the fields .. it will not transfer the data from r/3 to BW
SELECT -- the fields are available in the selection screen of the info package w
hile u schedule it . INVERSION is for key figs which will operate with '-1' and
nullify the value .
Once the datasource is generated you can extract the data using it .
And now to speak abt the delta ... we have .. 0calday , Numeric pointer , time s
tamp.
0calday -- is to be run only once a day that to at the end of the day and with a
range of 5 min. Numeric Pointer -- is to be used for the tables where it allows
only appending of records ana no change .. eg: CATSDB HRtime managent table .
Timestamp: using this you can always delta as many times as possible with a upep
rlimit .
Whenever there 1:1 relation you use the view and 1:m you use FM.
============================
8A. INDEX: They are used to improve the performance of data retrival while exec
uting the queries or work books the moment when we execute and once we place the
valiues in Selection criteria at that time the indexes will act as retrival poi
nt of data .. and it will fetch the data in a faster mannner ..
Just common example if you can obeserve any book which has indexes .. This index
es will give a exact location of each topic based on this v can easily go to tha
t particulur page and we will continue our thingz. Similar mannner in the data l
evel the indexes are act in BW side...
=============================
9A. Time stamp error.
sol: activate the data source and replicate the data source and load.
2. Data error in PSA.
sol: Modify the in PSA error data and load.
3. RFC connection failed.
sol: raise the ticket to BASIS team to provide the connection.
4. Short dump error.
sol: delete the request and load once again.
a) Loads can be failed due to the invalid characters
b) Can be because of the deadlock in the system
c) Can be becuase of previuos load failure , if the load is dependant on other l
oads
d) Can be because of erreneous records
e) Can be because of RFC connections.....(sol: raise the ticket to BASIS team to
provide the connection)
f) Can be because of missing master data.
g) Can be because of no data found in the source system
h) Invalid characters while loading. When you are loading data then you may get
some special characters like @#$%...e.t.c..then BW will throw an error like Inva
lid characters..then you need to go through this RSKC transaction and enter all
the Invalid chars and execute..it will store this data in RSALLOWEDCHAR table..T
hen reload the data..You won't get any error because now these are eligible char
s..done by RSKC.
i) ALEREMOTE user is locked Normally, ALEREMOTE gets locked due to a sm59 RFC de
stination entry having the incorrect password. You should be about to get a list
of all sm59 RFC destinations using ALEREMOTE by using transaction se16 to searc
h field RFCOPTIONS for a value of "*U=ALEREMOTE". You will need to look for thi
s information in any external R/3 instances that call the instance in which ALER
EMOTE is getting locked as well.
j) Lower case letters not allowed. look at your infoobject description: Lowercas
e Letters allowed k)extraction job aborted in r3 It might have got cancelled due
to running for more than the expected time, or may be cancelled by R/3 users if
it is hampering the performance. l)datasource not replicated If the new DataSou
rce is created in the source system, you should replicate this DataSource in 'di
alog' mode. During the replication, you can decide whether this DataSource shoul
d be replicated as the 3.x DataSource or as the new DataSource. If you do not ru
n the replication in 'dialog' mode, the DataSource is not replicated. m)ODS Acti
vation Error ODS activation errors can occur mainly due to following reasons
1. Invalid characters (# like characters)
2. Invalid data values for units/currencies etc
3. Invalid values for data types of char & key figures.
4. Error in generating SID values for some data
===================================
10A Ticket is nothing but an issue or a process error which need to be address
ed.
There are two types of tickets.
* ito tickets - which are usually generated by the system automatically when a p
rocess fails.for example, when a process chain fails toi run it wil generate an
ito ticket which we need to address and find the fault.
* non-ito tickets - which are the issues which the client face and which are for
warded for correction or alternative action.
If you're using Remedy for tickets, Unfortunately it's not possible. But this de
pends on the software you are using, ask your admin.
===========================
11A Reconciliation is nothing but the comaprision of the values between BW targ
et data with the Source system data like R/3, JD edwards,Oracle,ECC or SCM or SR
M.
In general this process is taken @ 3 places one is comparing the info provider d
ata with R/3 data,Compare the Query display data with R/3 or ODS data and
Checking the data available in info provider kefigure with PSA key figure values
====================
12A ASAP Methodology
1. Project Preparation, in which the project team is identified and mobilized, t
he project standards are defined, and the project work environment is set up;
2. Blueprint, in which the business processes are defined and the business bluep
rint document is designed;
3. Realization, in which the system is configured, knowledge transfer occurs, ex
tensive unit testing is completed, and data mappings and data requirements for m
igration are defined;
4. Final Preparation, in which final integration testing, stress testing, and co
nversion testing are conducted, and all end users are trained; and
5. Go-Live and Support, in which the data is migrated from the legacy systems, t
he new system is activated, and post-implementation support is provided
========================
13A Responsibilities of an implementation project... For ex, Lets say If its a
fresh implementation of BI or for that matter you are implementing SAP...
First and foremost will be your requirements gathering from the client. Dependin
g upon the requirements you will creat a business blueprint of the project which
is the entire process from the start to the end of an implementation...
After the blue print phase sign off we start off with the realization phase wher
e the actual development happens... In our example after installing the necessar
y softwares, patches for BI we need to discuss with the end users who are going
to use the system for inputs like how they want a report to look like and what a
re the Key Performance Indicators(KPI) for the reports etc., basically its a que
stion and answer session with the business users... After collecting those infor
mations the development happens in the development servers...
After the development comes to an end the same objects are tested in quality ser
vers for any bugs, errors etc., When all the tests are done we move all the obje
cts to the production environment and test it again whether everything works fin
e...
The Go-Live of the project happens where the actually postings happen from the u
sers and reports are generated based on those inputs which will be available as
an analytical report for the management to take decisions...
The responsibilites vary depending on the requirement... Initially the business
analyst will interact with the end users/managers etc., then on the requirements
the software consultants do the development, testers do the testing and finally
the go-live happens...
What are the objects that we peform in a production Support project?
In production Suport Generally most of the project they will work on monitoring
area for their loads(R3/ NON SAP to Data Taggets (BW)) and depending up the proj
ect to project it varies because some of them using the PC's and Some of them us
ing Event Chains. So its Depends up on the Project to project varies.
What are the different transactions that we use frequently in Production support
project? Plz explain them in detial.. Generally In Production Support Project ,
we will use the check the loads by using RSMO for Monitoring the loads and we w
ill rectify the errors in that by using step by step analysis.
The consultant is required to have access to the following transactions in R3.
1. ST22
2. SM37
3. SM58
4. SM51
5. RSA7
6. SM13
Authorizations for the following transactions are required in BW
1. RSA1
2. SM37
3. ST22
4. ST04
5. SE38
6. SE37
7. SM12
8. RSKC
9. SM51
10. RSRV
The Process Chain Maintenance (transaction RSPC) is used to define, change and v
iew process chains.
Upload Monitor (transaction RSMO or RSRQ (if the request is known)
The Workload Monitor (transaction ST03) shows important overall key performance
indicators (KPIs) for the system performance
The OS Monitor (transaction ST06) gives you an overview on the current CPU, memo
ry, I/O and network load on an application server instance.
The database monitor (transaction ST04) checks important performance indicators
in the database, such as database size, database buffer quality and database ind
ices.
The SQL trace (transaction ST05) records all activities on the database and enab
les you to check long runtimes on a DB table or several similar accesses to the
same data.
The ABAP runtime analysis (transaction SE30)
The Cache Monitor (accessible with transaction RSRCACHE or from RSRT) shows amon
g other things the cache size and the currently cached queries. The Export/Impor
t Shared buffer determines the cache size; it should be at least 40MB.
*-- Anu radha
BW Questions
SAP BW Interview Questions
SAP BW Books:
SAP Business Warehouse, Interview Questions , Certification and Configuration Bo
oks
Back to:
SAP BW (Business Warehouse) Hints and Tips
Return to :-
SAP ABAP/4 Programming, Basis Administration, Configuration Hints and Tips
(c) www.sap-basis-abap.com All material on this site is Copyright.
Every effort is made to ensure the content integrity. Information used on this
site is at your own risk.
All product names are trademarks of their respective companies. The site www.sa
p-basis-abap.com is in no way affiliated with SAP AG.
Any unauthorised copying or mirroring is prohibited.