How to use IBM App Connect with SAP (via OData)
SAP is an Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) system. Using OData services you can create a connection and import data from the datasources.
- App Connect Enterprise as a Service connector
- Local connector in containers (Continuous Delivery release) 11.0.0.10-r1 or later
- Local connector in containers (Long Term Support release)
- Local connector in containers (Long Term Support Cycle-2 release)
In IBM® App Connect Designer, as a business user (or anyone else wanting a simple integration experience) you can create integration flows that retrieve or create SAP OData resources and use data retrieved from SAP for other activities in the flow. The flows can be triggered by events in apps such as Salesforce, or by calling an API such as from mobile and web applications.
Supported product and API versions
To find out which product and API versions this connector supports, see Detailed System Requirements on the IBM Support page.
Connecting to SAP (via OData)
If your SAP Gateway has been configured to use OData for SAP products, App Connect can access SAP OData resources in real time, to share SAP data with SaaS apps like Salesforce.com and with other apps and systems that App Connect can connect to. For two-way communication with SAP, App Connect uses an SAP OData 2.0 connector and a private network connection to connect to an SAP Gateway OData service in the private network that hosts the SAP system.
- Before you can use IBM App Connect Designer to connect to SAP, you need the following prerequisites:
- A well-defined SAP Gateway OData service that conforms to several requirements; your SAP objects
should be defined without relationships, and your SAP service should be enabled with the
sap:creatable:false
flag. For more information about the requirement for an SAP service, see Creating a well-defined SAP Gateway OData service for use with IBM App Connect. - A private network connection in App Connect to access an SAP Gateway system in a private network. For more information, see Connecting to a private network.
- A well-defined SAP Gateway OData service that conforms to several requirements; your SAP objects
should be defined without relationships, and your SAP service should be enabled with the
- To connect App Connect to an SAP account that you want App
Connect to use, you need the following connection details:
- SAP Gateway service URL
- Specifies the URL to the SAP Gateway OData service. Use the URL value without an ending '/'; for
example:
http://9.111.222.34:8000/opu/odata/ZGW_ORDER_STATUS_SRV
- Username
- Specifies the user name to use when connecting to the SAP Gateway OData service.
- Password
- Specifies the password to the user name when connecting to the SAP Gateway OData service.
- Private network connection
-
Select the name of a private network agent that App Connect uses to connect to your private network. This list is populated with the names of private network agents that are created from the
Private network connections
tab of the Settings page. For more information, see Connecting to a private network.
To connect to a SAP (via OData) endpoint from the App Connect Designer Catalog page for the first time, expand SAP (via OData), then click Connect. For more information, see Managing accounts.
Before you use the account that is created in App Connect in a flow, rename the account to something meaningful that helps you to identify it. To rename the account on the Catalog page, select the account, open its options menu (⋮), then click Rename Account.
What should I consider first?
Before you use App Connect Designer with SAP (via OData), take note of the following considerations:
- (General consideration) You can see lists of the trigger events and
actions that are available on the Catalog page of the App Connect Designer.
For some applications, the events and actions in the catalog depend on the environment and whether the connector supports configurable events and dynamic discovery of actions. If the application supports configurable events, you see a Show more configurable events link under the events list. If the application supports dynamic discovery of actions, you see a Show more link under the actions list.
- (General consideration) If you are using multiple accounts for an application, the set of fields that is displayed when you select an action for that application can vary for different accounts. In the flow editor, some applications always provide a curated set of static fields for an action. Other applications use dynamic discovery to retrieve the set of fields that are configured on the instance that you are connected to. For example, if you have two accounts for two instances of an application, the first account might use settings that are ready for immediate use. However, the second account might be configured with extra custom fields.
- After App Connect is connected to SAP through a private network connection, the Applications tab in the App Connect Designer catalog lists the SAP objects and their actions that you can use.
- When App Connect makes a request to retrieve OData resources from SAP, the response is returned
as an OData collection of structured entries. The entries are enriched with a
__metadata
name/value pair whose value is a JSON object of name/value pairs. To learn more about ways to handle such OData__metadata
information in App Connect flows, see Ways of accessing SAP OData __metadata information in App Connect
Events and actions
SAP (via OData) events
These events are for changes in this application that trigger a flow to start completing the actions in the flow.
SAP (via OData) actions
Your flow completes these actions on this application.
Available items are listed when you have connected App Connect to SAP (via OData).
Examples
Creating an API flow to create SAP OData resources
Learn how easy it is to create an API flow in App Connect Designer to create OData resources in SAP and act on Salesforce.