Connect Alfresco Content Services with SAP in a certified way!

STARTER PACKAGE

Best way to start over!
With our starter package we offer a great option to implement our product(s) in your company environment. We prefer to start with an initialization workshop to understand your requirements, talking on the same level at the same language. We install the product(s) on your system and do the basic configuration on SAP and Alfresco. You will see the simplicity of the installation and even the configuration. Our comprehensive manuals will help you to implement future scenarios by your own.

A note to the Starter Package: Based on my experience with our valued customers, this package offers the best way to start with our products on customer side.

Volker Blaesig - CEO

The Starter Package includes:

ADDITIONAL META-DATA REPLICATION

One step beyond SAP default meta-data!
Is connexas content or connexas process already successfully up and running? Now you are struggling with the fact, that you have to introduce or to adapt new business-processes which requires additional meta-data from SAP? Or maybe business-cases has changed over time?
We can help you to manage this requirement on a project base and extend your current integration to replicate any additional meta-data that will match the new requirements.

This packages includes (dependent on use-case):

MIGRATION TOOL

Still a question: What about … the legacy data?
Are you planning to migrate documents from existing content repositories in SAP to Alfresco Content Services? We do have the tool (our Migration Tool) and the experience available to migrate documents of any archive that is connected as content repository behind SAP to Alfresco. We did already successful migrations from the following legacy systems:

• IBM FileNet to Alfresco
• OpenText to Alfresco
• Documentum to Alfresco
• SAP Content Server to Alfresco
• Various other legacy systems (e.g. Keyfile, InvesDoc, …) to Alfresco

Because we’re using SAP tools to read the documents from the existing content repository and write it to the new content repository (Alfresco), we strongly stick on SAP standard functionality (ArchiveLink). This allows a consistent and reliable migration.

Volker Blaesig - CEO

Offer Details & Price

• Migration program
  The tool will be delivered as SAP ABAP program running on SAP.

• Support
  We provide support with our experience and knowledge.

• Documentation
  There will be a detailed documentation available.

• 1 Million Documents
  The price below includes the migration for up to 1 million documents in the content repository.

• 2 days of Professional Services included to cover:

• Installation & Configuration
  We help you set up the Migration Tool in your Development system.

• Testrun
  We will process a testrun with you in your Development system.

SOFFCONT1 Migration & Cleanup

Challenge

Many enterprises use document management options available in SAP standard – documents are stored via “Services for Object” (GOS menu), “Create” and “Create Attachment”:

With SAP standard, these documents are stored to SAP tables (in the database), typically in table SOFFCONT1 or even in *ASRCONT* (like ASRCONT03, T5ASRCONT01, …) while they are growing significantly over the years of usage which will result in:

• Big tables

• Bad performance

• Long backup times

• Problems during SAP upgrades

• Show stoppers for the migration to SAP HANA (big table for migration and operation)

• High costs for storage (SAP DB is an expensive place to store documents!)

Solution Overview

Our smart solution “SAP SOFFCONT1 Migration and Cleanup” offers an easy to implement and robust operation approach for the reduction of these tables, especially SOFFCONT1!

How it works: Currently the documents are stored via the SAP standard “Services for Object”, “Create Attachment” in SAP table SOFFCONT1. These attachments will be moved out of the SAP table and stored in external storage system, e. g. Alfresco or SAP Content Server and are still accessible in SAP. Beside, we also offer our Migration Tool and related services to move attachments from SAP database to Alfresco.

Two migration scenarios are available:

1. Migrate SOFFCONT1 attachments to ArchiveLink
2. Migrate SOFFCONT1 attachments to other category

Both migration scenarios are executed in the following steps:

1. Copy attachment to Alfresco
2. Delete links e. g. to business object
3. Delete entry in SOFFCONT1

The selection of the migration option will be discussed based on the customers SAP set up and future needs.

Please see our Migration Tool details for more Information on the migration process.

Display documents after migration

The display of the migrated documents is in both options nearly the same: Only the “type of document” has changed, the document/information looks the same.

More Information

• 2 days of Professional Services included to cover:

• Installation & Configuration
  We help you set up the Migration Tool in your Development system.

• Testrun
  We will process a testrun with you in your Development system.

To get more information about our service to cleanup the table, please get in touch with us.

URL-Jumper: Enable Alfresco Document Management for SAP

URL-Jumper: About the AddOn

The AddOn URL-Jumper is intended to enable all Alfresco document management capabilities for a SAP business object. If you’re using SAP Archivelink (by using connexas) to store and access documents from Alfresco, the SAP user will see a link in the attachment list of the business object that opens the document directly within the SAP viewer. However, there is no way to do any further actions – it’s just a view of the document (that’s what the ArchiveLink protocol was made for). With our AddOn URL-Jumper, we provide the capability to jump from the SAP business object’s attachment list directly to the document in Alfresco Content Services and therefore, all Alfresco document management features (like versioning, add/change meta-data) are available.

The AddOn provides a huge range of possibilities available already by default. Anyway, it is easy adoptable for customer needs.

Mario Fliegner - Consulting

Alfresco document management for the SAP business object is now just one click away.

Volker Blaesig - CEO

URL-Jumper: Quick Video Demo

This short 5 minutes video will give a quick introduction about the AddOn and how it works. BTW: Check our Youtube channel to find more related videos of our products.

URL-Jumper: Benefits

The URL-Jumper comes along with a couple of benefits that will extend connexas content to be even more powerful and productive.

• Real Document Management is one click away from the SAP business object.
  

• Create links manually or by Alfresco rules, meaning from Alfresco side.
  

• Create links manually or by any SAP logic on SAP side for the business object.
  

• Take advantage of access rights and permissions.
  

• Enable/disable feature for each SAP content repository.
  

• Allow/deny access from SAP for each SAP content repository.

• Choose Alfresco entry point for each SAP content repository (Document Detail, Search Result,…).

URL-Jumper: Requirements / Pre-requisites

• connexas content – the certified SAP-Alfresco integration must be installed
• A valid license is required
• AddOn is shiped with a custom function module (BAPI) that has to be installed on SAP side
• User must have credentials to login to Alfresco

URL-Jumper: Details & Screenshots

Below you’ll find some details and insights about the AddOn.

Access It...

The AddOn offers currently four smart ways to jump from SAP into different views of Alfresco Content Services. They are all related to the current SAP business object where the user starts from. This entry point can be set up for each SAP content repository separately.

Link It...

There are a few ways to add the required Alfresco folder as link in SAP as an attachment URL. You either can use the related menu item from the GOS menu in SAP at the business object which is called “Create external document (URL)”. This means you have to enter the URL manually and you have to know exactly what to type in! This is not common, but would be possible. Maybe some additional functionality in SAP will pre-fill or create the link. The better way – and even what is shipped with our AddOn- is to create the link from Alfresco side. The URL-Jumper will enhance the folder actions in Alfresco with a new menu item. On click at that item, the URL will be created and attached to the SAP business object immediately. Furthermore, the action can be fully automated, too. The URL-Jumper offers a way to trigger the creation by JavaScript. Having this, an Alfresco rule can be easily used to link the folder to the SAP business object and any additional (custom) business logic can be used before or after the creation.

Secure It...

The URL-Jumper AddOn is shipped with a special permission and a pre-defined role to match security standards. Having this, the folder-action item is only visible and executable for Alfresco users with the required permission. Without this permission the user is neither able to see nor to execute the action. With the pre-defined role it is easy to extend the Alfresco standard roles (Collaborator, Contributor, Consumer).
Besides this permission model there is an easy way for the Administrator to prevent access from SAP to Alfresco based on content repository level. Meaning, even there is a document URL at the SAP business object available that links to an existing Alfresco folder, the administrator is able to deny the access to all documents via the SAP document URL link.
Note: The implemented security model does not affect the security model in SAP, it just covers the Alfresco side! The menu item “Create external document (URL)” within the GOS menu in SAP might be always visible and even executable.

Role based:
With the new available permission and the pre-defined role “SAP Publisher” that are available after the installation, there is an easy way to adapt the existing security concept to your needs to allow users to use the feature or not. Only users with role “SAP Publisher” are able to see the folder-action and therefore are able to create the document URL at the corresponding SAP business object.

 

Content Repository based:
Based on the content repository level there are some more powerful possibilities to allow/deny access to the feature: There is a setting to disable the feature for all users – regardless of their roles. Even they do have the “SAP Publisher” role assigned they would not be able to see the related folder action. With this it would not be possible to create any document URL in SAP for the current content repository and it would not be possible to access the folder from the SAP document URL. This means the URLJumper is completely disabled for the content repository. Further, it’s also possible to prevent access from SAP to the current folder. For example, if a User in SAP clicks on the document URL to open the folder in Alfresco, this access can be denied by just enabling the related setting of the content repository.
For some use-cases these possibilities can be powerful features that can be enabled easily be the administrator and that are available on-the-fly (without restarting the application server).