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1 800 East 96th Street, Indianapolis, Indiana 46240 USAin24 HoursGeorge AndersonDanielle LaroccaSAPSECOND 10/13/05 2:34 PM Page iSams Teach Yourself SAP in 24 Hours,Second EditionCopyright 2006 by Sams PublishingAll rights reserved. No part of this book shall be reproduced, stored in aretrieval system, or transmitted by any means, electronic, mechanical,photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without written permission fromthe publisher. No patent liability is assumed with respect to the use ofthe information contained herein. Although every precaution has beentaken in the preparation of this book, the publisher and author assumeno responsibility for errors or omissions.

2 Nor is any liability assumed fordamages resulting from the use of the information contained Standard Book Number: 0-672-32822-4 Library of Congress Catalog Card Number: 2005930224 Printed in the United States of AmericaFirst Printing: November 2005080706054321 TrademarksAll terms mentioned in this book that are known to be trademarks orservice marks have been appropriately capitalized. Sams Publishingcannot attest to the accuracy of this information. Use of a term in thisbook should not be regarded as affecting the validity of any trademarkor service and DisclaimerEvery effort has been made to make this book as complete and as accu-rate as possible, but no warranty or fitness is implied.

3 The informationprovided is on an as is basis. The authors and the publisher shallhave neither liability nor responsibility to any person or entity withrespect to any loss or damages arising from the information containedin this book or from the use of the CD or programs accompanying SalesSams Publishing offers excellent discounts on this book when ordered inquantity for bulk purchases or special sales. For more information,please Corporate and Government sales outside of the , please contactInternational BogerAcquisitions EditorLoretta YatesDevelopment EditorSonglin QiuManaging EditorCharlotte ClappSenior Project EditorMatthew PurcellCopy EditorKezia EndsleyIndexerChris BarrickProofreaderJessica McCartyTechnical EditorAJ WhalenPublishing CoordinatorCindy TeetersDesignerGary AdairPage LayoutKelly 10/13/05 2:34 PM Page iiHOUR 22 Integration with MicrosoftOfficeIntegration between SAP and Microsoft s products is nothing new.

4 Using object linking andembedding (OLE), a concept introduced in Hour 14, Technology Overview, it has longbeen possible to drop your SAP data into a Microsoft application. In this way, additionalanalysis of your ECC, R/3, APO, and other list- and simple report-based SAP data sourcescan be easily accomplished through Microsoft Excel, Access, and so on. And with the latestjoint announcements between SAP and Microsoft code-named Mendocino this integra-tion continues to grow deeper and more valuable, adding Microsoft Exchange, Outlook,other database sources, and more to the list of Microsoft products that afford better inte-gration with SAP.

5 Highlights of this hour SAP s %pcfunctionality to save SAP SAP data into Microsoft Excel, Word, and of Mendocino impacts end-user productivitySAP and MS Office IntegrationArchitectureIntegration between SAP and Microsoft products hinges upon the use of OLE, a commonand standard technology for transferring and sharing information among OLE, you can take data out of your SAP system and place it into another system, allthe while maintaining the format and integrity of the data. For example, you can viewdata residing in any number of SAP database tables as a series of columns and rows inMicrosoft Excel an easy way to view and manipulate data otherwise trapped in the SAPdatabase.

6 10/13/05 2:31 PM Page 315316 HOUR 22:Integration with Microsoft OfficeThe SAP Assistant is the OLE interface used for calling SAP functions and transac-tions from other non-SAP applications. The SAP Assistant exposes both ActiveX controls and OLE object classes, for logging in to SAP, managing data and tables,calling functions and transactions, and more. SAP systems are therefore designedtoday so that you can share data with any OLE-compatible application. SampleOLE-compatible applications Office, including Visio and other Office, including Smart Web Server development environments, such as Microsoft FrontPage Additionally, nearly all modern application development languages in use todaysupport OLE.

7 This includes the old-school C++ programming language as well as thelatest and greatest Microsoft .NET Visual Basic offerings, to IBM s WebSphereInformation Integrator and PowerBuilder by Sybase. In this way, the developer of anon-SAP application can create objects that can access information in %pcto Download DataThere are many ways to share data between SAP and Microsoft. As I briefly men-tioned in previous hours, executing %pcin the transaction dialog box is an excellentand expedient way of moving data from SAP lists into other formats. Transactionsthat display their data via OCX controls in various panels, each with its own datasources, constructs, and so on are generally not good candidates for %pc.

8 That is,OCX-based output typically does not lend itself to being downloaded into a PC for-mat such as XLS, RTF, and so on. But transactions that are displayed in list format most of them, to some degree are excellent candidates for this method of down-loading SAP data into Microsoft Office based save SAP list-based output to a file on your desktop or the network, enter thecharacters %pcin the transaction dialog box and then press Enter. A print windowpops up (see Figure ), defaulting to saving the screen s contents in an unconvert-ed file format. Choose the format most appropriate for your immediate needs, press Enter, browse to the desired directory path, type the name of the output fileyou want to create, and then press Save to save the list data to the filename 10/13/05 2:31 PM Page 316 SAP and MS Office Integration Architecture317 Exporting SAP Data to Microsoft ExcelMicrosoft Excel provides a user-friendly format and helpful tools to assist you in theprocess of analyzing and presenting data.

9 To get your SAP data into Microsoft Excel,you can employ several methods. The most basic method involves the System Listfunction, which enables you to save lists displayed on your SAP you want to save your downloaded SAP list in Microsoft Excel, be sure to selectFile, Save As and then select the Microsoft Excel Workbook (*.xls) option in theSave As type box or your spreadsheet; otherwise, by default, it is saved in a textformat. You can also use the SAP Query tool to export data to Microsoft Excel, as an SAP Query, as discussed in Hour 20, Reporting Tools in SAP (SAPQ uery, InfoSet Query, Ad Hoc Query, and QuickViewer).

10 Options listed on the selection screen enable you to designate the type ofoutput you want for your report. For a basic transfer to a Microsoft Excelspreadsheet, select the Display As Table radio here, select the List, Save, Local File to download this table into MicrosoftExcel. A Save As box appears, enabling you to select the download file sure to select the spreadsheet the download is complete, start Microsoft Excel and open the data youhave just saved (see Figure ). to your SAP Query output screen displaying your can use the same method detailed previously to download InfoSet or other ad hoc queries, as covered in Hour SAP datain a number offormats is easi-ly and quicklyaccomplishedby using % theWayBy 10/13/05 2:31 PM Page 317318 HOUR 22:Integration with Microsoft OfficeCreating SAP Form Letters in Microsoft WordSAP has a great interface for creating form letters using Microsoft Word.