* last update: 22.4.3012

I’m very well aware that there are already initiatives to get all information about HANA into single place. Therefore consider this blog as yet another HANA blog.

As I started similarly with SAP BW 7.3I try to collect all relevant information sources about in this case SAP HANA here. BTW: What’s HANA? In short it is in-memory solution from SAP. It stands for High-Performance Analytic Appliance and basically it is appliance (plus its software components) that can absorb large volumes of data (e.g. tera bytes) into its “operational” memory. The reason why it is so high performant is that all the data is in memory not stored in hard drives. It can be set up on top of SAP ERP or BW system (plus non SAP databases) without necessity to materialize data via transformations as in contrary to current DWH solutions. HANA bundles several components: in-memory computing engine, real-time replication service, data modeling and data services. As it is delivered as appliance it is depended currently on few vendors are supported: Fujitsu, HP, and IBM.

Basically we can say that HANA successor of SAP NetWeaver BW Accelerator as moving forward into in-memory computing. Here HANA acts as persistence mechanism for SAP NetWeaver BW.

HANA components:

1. The core of HANA is called SAP In-Memory Computing Engine (IMCE or ICE, also called as NewDB orBAE). It is an engine kind of in memory database which uses row/column/object based database technology to store data. It is for parallel data processing using state-of-the art CPU possibilities.

2. HANA Studio (client app, or Studio Repository, Eclipse based editor connected to a HANA
Server backend) consists of:
    2.1 Administration console – administer and monitor database
    2.2 Information modeler – data modeling
    2.3 Lifecycle mngt – provides an HANA stack update using SAP Software Update Manager (SUM)

3. HANA Load Controller-resides in SAP HANA, coordinates the entire replication process: It starts the initial load of source system data to the IMDB in SAP HANA, and communicates with the Sybase Replication Server to coordinate the start of the delta replication

4. Host Agent -handles login authentication between source system and target system

5. Sybase Replication Server -accepts data from Replication Agent, distributes and applies this data to the target database using ECDA/ODBC for connectivity.

Current versions:

SAP HANA 1.0 SP03
SAP HANA 1.0 SP02 – as of 12th June 2011 in general availability

Operating system: //only following one:
64-bit SuSE Linux Enterprise Server (SLES) 11 SP1 operating system

Upcoming versions:

April 2012 – General Availability of SAP BW component powered by SAP HANA
Nov 2011 – SAP starts rump up program for their customers to run BW-on-HANA as its database

Here’s list of relevant HANA information:

• SDN In-memory homepage
• SAP In-memory Computing webpage
• quicksizer for HANA – note1637145
• HANA commercial homepage   
• Documentation on hep.sap.com
• Documentation on CW
• 1514967 – SAP HANA 1.0: Central Note
• SAP HANA: Operational Concept (Note 1599888)
• Search for Notes in following application components:
  • SAP In-Memory Database:
          • BC-DB-HDB HDB
          • BC-DB-HDB-DBA Database Administration for HDB
          • BC-DB-HDB-ENG SAP In-Memory Computing Engine
          • BC-DB-HDB-INS Installation HDB
          • BC-DB-HDB-MDX MDX Engine/Excel Client
          • BC-DB-HDB-PER Database Persistence for HDB
          • BC-DB-HDB-SYS Database Interface/DBMS for HDB
          • BC-DB-HDB-UPG Upgrade HDB
  • SAP HANA:
          • BC-HAN SAP High-Performance Analytic Appliance
          • BC-HAN-LOA Load Controler
          • BC-HAN-MOD SAP High-Performance Analytic Appliance Modeler
          • BC-HAN-REP Replication Server
          • BC-HAN-UPD HANA update tool
          • BC-HAN-UPD-UI User interface for HANA update tool
  • SAP BW related:
          • BW-SYS-DB-HDB BW HDB (HANA DB)

                     • BC-DB-HDB SAP In-Memory Database • BC-DB-HDB-ENG SAP in-memory computing engine

• phrase: “If you use       BW on a SAP HANA database”
• keyword:       “orange” //seems a lot of HANA related notes has this keyword//       Project Orange is suppose to allow       customers to run SAP NW BW on SAP HANA as database
• keyword: NewDB

• OSS      quick link, OSS infopage, another one
• HANA solution discovery
• HANA solution deployment
• Books:
  • SAP HANA “Essentials” http://www.saphanabook.com/ – Publication Date: May 2012
  • In-Memory data management – a book by Hasso Plattner and Dr. Alexander Zeier
  • SAP HANA: An Introduction by Bjarne Berg and Penny Silvia (scheduled release September 2012)
• SDN forum: In-Memory Business Data Management and SAP HANA
• SDN HANA developer center
• experiencesaphana.com HANA evangelize page
• sapinmemorycomputing.com marketing site
• sapinmemorycomputing.de marketing site, German version
• youtube video

Applications powered by HANA:

SAP Smart Meter Analytics 1.0, powered by SAP HANA

HANA Accelerators:

CO-PA Accelerator

Blogs:

• What should I do about HANA? A Summary of the ASUG Roadmap to HANA Webinar
• Some Practical Information About SAP In-Memory Solutions: BWA, BO Explorer Accelerated Version, HANA
• The BW – HANA Relationship
• The specified item was not found.
• What is the future of Infocubes?
• SAP HANA Blogseries Part 1: What is SAP HANA and what is the “value” of SAP HANA ?
• Infocubes and Data Store Objects … and HANA
• SAP In-memory – what is in the bag?
• POV: HANA’s impact on ABAP Programming
• Podcast: Straight Talk about HANA with SAP
• HANA and BW 7.30 – Part 1
• HANA and BW 7.30 – Part 2
• Finding SAP HANA Documentation 
• SAP HANA – from Analytics Appliance to Vendor Consolidation
• You said you wanted to experience SAP HANA?
• Living in the Layers – Sikha’s dispute on      layers within enterprises
• When does HANA become mainstream?
• How BW-on-HANA Combines With Native HANA
• Security Concept and Data Architecture: SAP HANA – Security Concept and Data Architecture (part 1), SAP HANA – Security Concept and Data Architecture (part 2)
• Modeling Content  Migration: SAP HANA – Modeling Content Migration – part 1: Preparations, Security Requirements, Export;      SAP HANA – Modeling Content Migration – part 2: Import, Post-migration Activities
• SAP SLT (Trigger Based) Replication Made Easy: SAP SLT (Trigger Based) Replication Made Easy – part 1: Planning, Preparation, Installation 
• SCN runs SAP!
• HANA backup script  hint… a little bit more security, please!
• Using Excel on HANA
• SAP HANA Developer Access Beta program – get the best out of your test-drive!
• Moving from BW-IP to SAP HANA optimized planning with the new Planning Applications Kit
• Data Provisioning in SAP HANA
• Optimized in-memory planning leveraging SAP HANA 
• SAP HANA Over Traditional Databases and Data Storage Capabilities
• How to convert Classic Infocube/DSO to HANA optimized cubes/ DSO
• My Experiments With SAP HANA

BW-on-HANA:

• Red Bull’s Migration of a BW to a BW-on-HANA System
• How does analytics look like on BW powered by HANA
• BW on HANA: Working of In-Memory Info Cube
• BW on HANA: Working of In-Memory DSO
• First Impressions on SAP NetWeaver BW 7.3, powered by SAP HANA – amazing

Backtrace:

• HANA backtrace 05/2012
• HANA backtrace 45/2011
• HANA backtrace 44/2011

Trainings:

• SAP      In-Memory Appliance (SAP HANA 1.0) Elearning RHANA
• SAP In-Memory Appliance (SAP HANA 1.0) classroom TZHANA
• HANA      bundled training
• SAP HANA Training Options (via SAP Education North America)
• Overview of the SAP HANA platform HANAKB v095
• SAP BW on SAP HANA 1.0 TZBWHA v097
• OKP SAP High-Performance Analytic Appliance 1.0 (SAP HANA 1.0) OHA10 v095
• More on HANA training – blog

Certifications:

• SAP Certified Application Associate – SAP HANA 1.0
  

Webinars:

• Overview of HANA and In-Memory road-map
• Updates on the SAP HANA Roadmap and Overall In-Memory Strategy

Videos:

• Steve Lucas: Understanding the SAP HANA Next Generation Database

Success (customer) stories:

• SAP HANA in action (logon to sap.com/community needed)
• Corporate scale SAP Business Warehouse powered by SAP HANA
• BASF
• Adobe
• Medidata 
• Procter & Gamble
• Bosch and Siemens
• Nomura Research
• Centrica
• Colgate-Palmolive
• Hilti
• Surgutneftegas

Where to practice HANA?

• SAP Developer Center @ SDN: access to hosted HANA sandbox systems – currently beta version.
• Get the project:  be lucky enough to get into customer who is running HANA project. Unfortunately there are still only few of them.
• SAP Mentors: If you are a SAP Mentor then you have an access to SAP HANA Developer Access Beta program. It is an access to cloudshare.com where are virtual machines/images with HANA software (HANA Editor).
• As announced on 10.04.2012 within SAP HANA Adoption Program: SAP is founding investments to support customer’s adoption of SAP HANA. This is supposed to help customers make the jump from traditional relational databases to use SAP’s real-time data platform.