Re: SAP/Oracle

|And get used to the following :

|* SAP will try its darndest to keep you out of the database except through
|their tools (such as sapdba) which introduce interesting new bugs

Well, I started with a VMS version and their tools (like sapdba, brbackup, etc) didn't work or were too buggy on that platform so I never adapted. We use brbackup now but we don't use their restore/recovery tools.

|* In our instance : 21303 tables; foreign key constraints : 0 (yep, zero)
|* SAP keeps track of its objects in its own data dictionary. Of course,
|the mapping between what SAP says is a table and what Oracle says is a
|table is NOT 1-to-1.

Of course they don't call it a "data dictionary" anymore. It's a "respository". Anyway, my theory about the tables not being "1-to-1" is that it is a legacy of their IBM mainframe days. These may have been VSAM "tables" subdivided by keys. What SAP calls a "cluster" table is not an Oracle cluster table and SAP has it's own compression/decompression routines for storing/retrieving data from these "cluster" tables (big problem area in early releases...seems to be OK now). Varchar? That's minor. What about the use of "long raw"? This is data uninterpretable without SAP...

|* Things you think are numbers, dates, ... are almost always stored in
|varchar columns

|etc.etc.etc...

|mvg/regards

|Jo

Some other respondents mention outsourcing/offshoring...these forces are at work regardless of whether SAP is involved. I just had a call from an outfit (U.S. based) that said they could manage our systems and DR solution and reduce our costs by 20% (little realizing what this probably meant for me and the people I work with...).

KB

|"Nuno Souto" <nsouto_at_bizmail.com.au>
|Sent by: oracle-l-bounce_at_freelists.org
|12/10/2004 10:54
|Please respond to nsouto
 

| To: <oracle-l_at_freelists.org>
| cc:
| Subject: Re: SAP/Oracle

|----- Original Message -----
|From: "Michael Wu" <xwu_at_sempratrading.com>

|> I am an Oracle DBA and have no SAP experience. We plan to implement SAP
|on
|> =
|> Oracle soon.=20
|> Where should I start to learn SAP? Any good books or training classes
|out
|> t=
|> here?
|> Your recommendation is highly appreciated.

|No problemo, dirt easy: just use your normal sizing rules
|for any aspect of the Oracle database using any other
|product, multiply by at least 1000 and you may start getting
|into the ballpark of the enormous waste of space that
|product is. From there, it's all up-hill.

|Be warned: due to the ginormous cost of the blessed thing,
|your company may look into outsourcing your job to reduce
|the TCO. A term that when dealing with SAP always makes
|me laugh.

|Merry Christmas.
|Nuno Souto
|nsouto_at_bizmail.com.au

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