CheatSheets – tool for direct access to SAP PI pages

Ask any SAP PI consultant how to access, say… a Communication Channel Monitoring Tool and the answer might be something like this: “Go to Runtime Workbench, choose Component Monitoring, then click on Adapter Engine and there is a button. There is also a direct link available, but I can’t quite remember it…”. This answer is 100% correct and you would be able to access the page… albeit after 4-5 clicks and a good 30-50 seconds of waiting. Alternatively you could select the direct link … if only you could remember it… oh yes, that’s right, it’s: http://host:port/mdt/channelmonitorservlet. It goes without saying that it’s almost impossible to remember all of the SAP PI direct links to browser based tools and it’s tedious to play the ‘click-wait-click-wait-click’ game just to open one page in your browser.

What’s why we created CheatSheets – it’s a small Mozilla FireFox extension that generates bookmarks to provide direct links to your favourite SAP XI/PI browser based tools, such as CC monitoring, CPA Cash delta/full refresh and many more. In this blog we show how to use CheatSheets and save your valuable time in everyday work with PI

Installation

To install CheatSheets you need to download it from Integrace Ltd company website. Save cheatsheets.xpi file somewhere and then drag it to your FireFox window. Confirm you want to install this extension.

Restart Firexox and you will see CheatSheets folder on Bookmarks toolbar

Import from saplogon.ini

Best option to start working with CheatSheets is to import server data from saplogon.ini file what most probably have all information regarding your SAP servers.
To do this please right-click on CheatSheets folder and in pop-up menu select “CheatSheets” / “Import from saplogon.ini”

You will see list of servers from your saplogin.ini files. CheatSheets will try to “guess” you SAP XI/PI servers and will put servers with SID starting with XI or PI at the beginning of the list. Anyway you could choose server to import, server type and generator options, i.e. you want to generate all links, major links only, or if you would prefer not to generate links at this stage (you can do it later).

After you press “OK” extension will generate subfolders in CheatSheets folder for each selected server and direct links for SAP PI tools.

Add server data manually

Using bulk generator is fast and convenient but what if your server is not in saplogon.ini file? In this case you can add server manually. For this you need to create new subfolder in CheatSheets folder. Then right click on the new subfolder and select “CheatSheets/Set Server Data” in pop-up menu.

Do a right click on the folder again and you will find options to generate links in pop-up menu.

Conclusion

Using CheatSheets in multi-server environment not only allows you to have a fast access to basic SAP PI pages but also it gives you an option to use not well known (have you ever tried “Message Display Tool alternative”? You could have an access to message payloads what are not serialized yet!) or rarely used tools. Having in mind CheatSheets is absolutely free we are happy you to use it in your everyday job and looking forward for your feedback and suggestions at our website.