Introduction and Content - ERP Applications
Tony de Thomasis - SAP mentor, lecturer and tutor for ERP Applications BCO6181
The semester began with a brief introduction from our lecturer: Tony de Thomasis, SAP NetWeaver Practice Lead at Acclimation and SAP mentor.
This included a summary of his extensive technical experience working with SAP. Surprisingly, Tony further engaged the class by treating the group to a glimpse of his personal interests outside his occupation. These included his musical talents and interests.
The tables soon turned and each of the students was given the chance to introduce themselves including their background and expectations for the semester ahead. This assisted in breaking the ice and initiated a sense of collaboration within the class. Participants included fresher students through to business and technical professionals. A common motivation amongst the class was a need or desire to enhance our understanding of NetWeaver.
The Semester ahead
Class time was to be divided equally between practical workshops and informative lectures. As expected by most participants, the workshop activities focused on periodic administration tasks. Some key areas of focus for workshops involved:
- Stopping and starting a system;
- Analysis of system logs, database logs and short dumps;
- Database administration;
- User administration;
- Work process types and their allocation;
- Updates;
- Batch Jobs;
- Printing;
- Setting of system variants;
- Monitoring of CPU and memory use.
These workshops were performed within a free working Web Application Server - NetWeaver ABAP 7.02 run via a separate VMware operating system on a portable drive.
However, the lectures and workshops for the semester ahead were not to be focused entirely on NetWeaver and systems administration. Unexpectedly for most students, they were to also focus on the encouragement of and assistance to participants in developing a degree of social identity within the rapidly evolving ERP environment. The goal of this was to:
- Ensure participants receive and share up to date knowledge;
- Develop an awareness of the contemporary communication mediums;
- Assist with job readiness and career development.
In the coming weeks we were soon to become familiar with various media and collaborative tools such as: SDN, LinkedIn, Twitter and SAP streaming.
Guest speakers in BCO6181 - ERP Applications - focus on NetWeaver Enterprise Technology
To preview future lecture content, a brief overview of the enterprise technology of NetWeaver was provided. Elements included: Portal, Mobile technology, BW and Information management components. Adding to the mix of already varied and engaging activities, Tony also planned to keep the lectures dynamic by introducing us each week to a special guest speaker, who would focus on particular enterprise technology aspects within NetWeaver.
Assessment
Prior to wrapping up our first week, we were advised that the assessment was to be a combination of the following:
- Practical presentation;
- Theoretical test covering SAP history, lectures and guest presentations;
- Practical administration test.
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