Posts

Figaf IRT 2.13 released

/0 Comments/in , /by

This week we are releasing the new version of Figaf IRT. It contains quite a bit of improvement to make it easier to get started the tool and make it easier to run your SAP Integration.

You can See a video of it here

General

Make it easier to get started with tool. Both login with the default user, guides to get started with adding license and agents. Updated tours to see the tool in action.

Improved EDIFACT comparison and ignoring of specific segments/fields. This function will also be on X12, in one of the patches. You can ignore if rounding of values. So 5.2 is the same as 5.20.

Improved documentation of changes, so you can see what has been changed as a part of a ticket.

Bug fixes and improvements in the database performance.

CPI

Tracking and transports of Packages, Value mappings. So you can see what is changed between versions. They are also added to your Git repository.

Monitor to show persisted messages. So you can let business monitor the persisted messages.

For people working with the Git workflow, we have also added an option on an agent to prevent commits of iflow changes during synchronization in IRT to avoid duplication of changes committed by user and IRT. This will only create the scaffolding for your Git repository including templates for all plugins. So you can still download/upload your CPI iflows from your IDE with the Gradle plugins. You can then follow your own workflows for working with the Git Repository. This is one of the areas where we need more input on how we can help make the flow better.

In the next releases, we will also be improving the Transport system giving you options to approve and test the changes better and hopefully find a good way to handle a Git flow in the same area.

SAP PI/PO

We had a client using the Figaf IRT tool to test their Seeburger Migration, which was done with our SMT tool. It did lead to a number of improvements to be able to support this case. Existing data was saved in the separate archive so we have created a custom solution to build the test data. If you have migration and want our help to create the test data let us know and let’s create an estimation of the effort

Improvement in the way testing is possible with the SAP Logging module. So it becomes much easier to use it for testing.

SAP PI/PO support for Decentral adapter engine in conjunction with Logging module.

Testing of BE/sync scenarios with mock data on PRO systems really useful when testing secured interfaces. This will enable to test with confidential data.

Consolidation with SAP Logging module. This is useful if you send multiply messages and consolidate them into one message. Or have a BPM process between test cases. It is something that is something that requires custom configuration on your scenarios.

Throttle the number of messages sent to a test case to limit the impact on the system. So the test will not overload the system.

Get started

You can download Figaf IRT here or if you want you can use the trial cloud verion at IRTCloud

Figaf IRT 2.12 release, Secure SAP PI Testing, Dual stack and more

/0 Comments/in , /by

In this release, we have added two quite interesting approaches for testing SAP PI/PO. 

Dual stack

If you have SAP PI dual-stack with Classical Scearnios and want to test your migration. Now we can fetch messages from the dual-stack, and want to create test cases. This is perfect for migration projects, where you want to test if everything works as expected. We have developed on our 7.4 dual-stack system, and successfully fetched data from clients 7.1 system. There will be some issues with older systems, but you can create test cases.  You can read more about the dual stack option here.

Secure messages

This is the big challenge with Record Replay scenarios. Where you take production data and rerun it on your development system. 

We created Figaf based on the assumption that real production data is what needs to be used for testing because it contains the difference in the data. Unforntaly most of it is sensitive and it could have implications of SOX and GDPR. 

That means everybody with access to Figaf can get access to the messages, so it creates a loophole in the SAP security. This means that ie externals may be able to get access to sensitive data. 

We already have an approach for handling the anonymization of data. It does require the developer to understand what is sensitive and it can be multiple values, and it will not work to test migration.
For potential clients with many confidential data that wanted to perform a migration, but it would be difficult to anonymize all interfaces. They wanted a solution to ensure end to end anonymization without external developers would have access to the payload. 

If you create test data on your productive system, Figaf IRT will ensure that all developers will only see the data scrambled data. This way they are able to see if there is something wrong with a specific field. They can see what field is affected and may be able to drive some information. They will not be able to see the specific data. If there is something they don’t understand they can ask an admin to view the difference. 
We are adding some functions over the next few weeks to 

  • Handle synchronize testing so data is not sent to the real system. 
  • Enable the user to access other SAP PI message payloads in the monitor. 
  • Enable same testing option on SAP CPI

I think this security will make it a lot easier to outsource regression testing because you don’t have the challenge if they get access to some secret data.
Improved Synchronization process

For customers with a lof of SAP standard components, our synchronization did not work. The simple query API we used timed out when listing datatypes etc. We are now only syncronizing the SAP objects that are referenced from any other objects. That way you only synchronize the real used objects. 

You can read more and see the demo here.

Improved comparison of SAP CPI iflows

We have improved the algorithm to show what objects were used in an SAP CPI iflow. You can now see which artifacts have been modified between two versions. 

Java 11 /OpenJDK

If you don’t want to use the Oracle Java license, we now also support Open JDK 11. You, therefore, don’t have to use a Java License. We will support Oracle Java for some time, it is really useful for PoC to test the Figaf tool because all SAP PI developers have it. 

Try it now

You can signup to try the Figaf IRT here.


SAP PI/PO Governance made easy

/0 Comments/in , /by

One of the biggest challenges with SAP PI/PO has been the lack of governance models for users. Documentation part has really been lacking making it and it has required a lot of manual work to get it done.

The process for handling governance for SAP PI/PO is just the same as with SAP XI for 15 years ago. The tooling has not changed much. There have just been a few changes that could say to improve the area. Ever since I started with XI/PI i have been working on different ways to improve the process of documentation but we have not made the dream solution yet.

Last year we added the option to use the ticket and thereby log changes to any object in SAP PI and PO, so all versions between them would be remembered. This was the first step in making documentation easier with Figaf IRT.

Now we are ready with the next big thing liking the full development together. So all documentation of your development is linked to CTS transports. That way you will know why something was changed and can see what is being transported much more transparent.

We have also added a central configuration of your channels. So there is just one place where you need to configure the information. IRT will then apply the configuration once the transport has been imported.

You can then make exports of your Integration scenarios documentation, and then show a changelog of this. And also show what was performed as a result of a ticket that you can add to your Jira, Solman to prove what you have done.

Ticket InformationDownload
Scenario DocumentationDownload

Here you can find the recording of the webniar that I did on 1 May 2019, where we showed this information to the public.

We are soon adding this to the release, so signup to check out the current version, and be the first to know once we have released the new iteration. If you have ideas on how to improve the tool and be a part of the beta program reach out to support@figaf.com.

Download IRT

PIArchiving now in the AWS Solution Providers Directory

/0 Comments/in , /by

Figaf has teamed up with Amazon WebServices (AWS) to be able to archive messages for a longer time period. AWS provides affordable long term storage of files.

For the PIArchiving solution it is of key importance to have a cheap easy way to store messages for a long time. AWS S3 provides this making it easy for users to store their data in the systems. Data is stored securely in S3, by being encrypted when it is uploaded.

PIArchiving also uses SimpleDB to store metadata about messages. It makes it possible to find the invoice with the number 123 or the message sent from partner ABC. There is parsers for EDIFACT, X12 and XML.

See the website http://aws.amazon.com/solutions/solution-providers/piarchiving/ for more information on the SAP PI Archiving solution.