How to install SAP NetWeaver Application Server ABAP 7.03 SP03 Trial – Ready for ABAP in Eclipse (AiE)

Let’s talk briefly about my motivation to write this blog. I feel ongoing frustration of ABAP developers (e.g. great blog series of Martin English: part 1, part 2, part 3 and part 4) when it comes to questions on how to either access or to download test/demo SAP systems. This continues with installation and deployment of such a systems as there are many issues which one developer may face (e.g. here) till the systems gets installed and up and running. Also when it comes to questions if there are still some ON PREMISE (again on premise not cloud version) installations of test/demo NetWeaver system available for Linux OS (e.g. here) left. Just to be clear I have nothing against cloud versions of SAP but on other hand I hear people for whom cloud is not an option for whatever reason.

I understand that this blog can’t cover all the issues that person not very familiar with SAP technologies may face during installation of SAP NetWeaver Application Server ABAP 7.03 SP04 Trial. But somehow I feel there are not enough resources available not only for beginner to cover this topic. Therefore I gave it a shot to describe my experience while I was doing it.

Needless to say that other part of motivation was to give a guide also to the people who are interested to ABAP development in Eclipse.

Content:

1. Download of NetWeaver ABAP 7.03 SP04

2. Installation of the same

3. Eclipse installation & usage

Hardware & software platform I used:

• Intel i7 based laptop with 16GB RAM
• Win 7 Utimate 64 bit virtually deployed via VMware Player
• 8GB of RAM granted to the virtual OS however minimum is 2GB but more memory is needed to run it monthly
• hard drive space for virtual OS had 60GB

1. Download of NetWeaver ABAP 7.03 SP04

First download of installation media is needed. It can be obtained from store.sap.com. Search for: SAP NetWeaver Application Server ABAP 7.03 64-bit Trial. Click on Trial Version. Alternatively you can use pages like developers.sap.com -> Application Platform -> ABAP Platform which point to the SAP Store.

While being there I filled up registration form for trial version:

Soon after that I got an email with link to download installation media. Notice the link is valid for 48 hours. File is called ABAP_7_03_SP04_64_bit_Trial_3_9_2_GB.rar and it has about 3.9GB in its volume. After un-zipping it following is structure of installation folders:

Before starting with real NetWeaver installation there are few software prerequisites that must be met on the system where NetWeaver will be installed.

JAVA: I used jre-7u67-windows-x64.exe, download it from java.com and install before starting with NetWeaver installation.

2. Installation

I made sure that  my user had administration rights granted. I ran the installation by kicking off file sapinst.exe from folder:

\ABAP_Trial_7_03_SP04_Win_64_bit_Version\SAP_NetWeaver_703_Installation_Master\DATA_UNITS\BS2011_IM_WINDOWS_X86_64\sapinst.exe

Here’s first screen of installation wizard:

After little preparation operations installation logged off my user:

After I did re-logon following installation batch was running:

I needed to accept the license (scroll to very down of the window) in order to continue.

On next screen passwords are being set for all SAP’s technical users:

This screen sums up installation checks. My system didn’t meet some of them but I let them as they were and it turned that they were just minor issues. If you get similar result of the checks just choose Cancel to continue with installation without repeating the checks:

On next screen I could mark parameters that I wanted to change. After that I went through list of all the parameters and revised them. Mostly it is about password setting, choosing SID (SAP ID) abbreviation etc.

Once all parameters were revised, real installation started with execution of first few phases:

First error I came across was while installing DB client (phase no. 4):

An error occurred while processing option SAP NetWeaver 7.0 including Enhancement Package 3 > SAP Application Server ABAP > MaxDB > Central System > Central System( Last error reported by the step: The database installer reported an error. DIAGNOSIS: Some database applications might still be running. SOLUTION: Check the log file sdbinst.log and C:\sapdb\data\wrk\MaxDBRuntimeForSAPAS_install__.log.). You can now:

• Choose Retry to repeat the current step.
• Choose Log Files to get more information about the error.
• Stop the option and continue with it later.

Log files are written to C:\Program Files/sapinst_instdir/NW703/AS-ABAP/ADA/CENTRAL/.

In my case copying of “c:\windows\system32\drivers\etc” folder to “c:\windows\SysWOW64\drivers” helped to solve this issue. Remember to restart your OS before continuing the installation. Other solution can be: Standalone installation of DB client.

So now import ABAP import phase was running:

Installation of NetWeaver 7.03 SP04 ABAP done:

As next step I installed SAP GUI. There is a version of SAP GUI within installation media folder:

Frontend&tools\SAP_GUI_for_Windows_7.20_Patchlevel_7_SDN_version_20110701_1428.exe

Later it turned out that this version of GUI is not that much useful while working with Ecplise…

How did it look like after first logon via SAP GUI with DDIC user:

Once I was able to get into SAP via SAP GUI with preinstalled user DDIC (use password as specified in documentation file: NWABAPTRIAL70304_64/README/welcome.html) I entered transaction SU01 to enable BCUSER (special user with all the authorization for ABAP development). In here I just set password for user BCUSER:

3. Eclipse installation & usage

Here I continued with Eclipse installation: I followed instruction available on tools.hana.ondemand.com/#abap. Basically I downloaded Ecplise itself – Kepler version from eclipse.org/kepler. Once I had it  downloaded I just ran eclipse.exe. In its Help menu I choose Install New Software. I Added https://tools.hana.ondemand.com/kepler into Work with field and I hit enter. By this features of were displayed. I Choose ABAP Development Tools for SAP NetWeaver and hit Next button. On next screen just confirm with Finish button.

Just to add more information in here: ABAP Development Tools (ADT) is plugin into the Eclipse which provides functions to connect ABAP repository (DDIC objects) to Ecplise.

Once this was done Eclipse asked me for restart:

After that I faced issue with ABAP communication layer as per following description:

ABAP communication layer is not configured properly. This might be caused by missing Microsoft Runtime DLLs VS2010. Consult the installation guide or download page for further details on how to install this component.

Native library sapjco3 is too old. Found library C:\work\mule\jco\sapjco3.dll has version “720.612”, but required is at least version “721.215”.

Although it says about obsolete version of SAP JCo (file sapjco3.dll) it is not the case. Actually there may be different reasons:

1. Microsoft VC runtime is missing: as per information on tools.hana.ondemand.com/#abap you have to download and install it from: x86 or x64

2. Not proper JAVA is installed: JAVA JRE 1.6 or higher is needed, download it from http://java.com/en/download/manual.jsp. I choose to install JAVA Platform SE 7 U67 version 7.0.670.1.

3. As per Note “2041195 – Eclipse does not identify operating system correctly” I set settings in Eclipse’s eclipse.ini file. Add following line:

-Dorg.osgi.framework.os.name=win32

Into -vmargs section of file.

After I went through these issues I was able to run my Eclipse with possibilities to create/modify ABAP objects.

This is how I created my first ABAP report in Eclipse. I opened File -> New -> ABAP project from Eclipse menu. By doing this I got following pop up window:

Here I by hitting Browse button I specified connection to my newly installed SAP NetWeaver ABAP 7.03 system:

On the next window I provided logon credentials to my SAP system:

By this I got new system in my Project Explorer view in Eclipse:

And here I choose to create new ABAP report:

Oooops I forgot to assign developer key to my user BCUSER:

In order to do that I went to SAP GUI and under my newly created development package ZPACKAGE I created new ABAP report via ABAP Workbench:

While proceeding with this activity systems asked me for developer key. I entered the key which is referred in documentation file: NWABAPTRIAL70304_64/README/welcome.html

Here’s how I finished my first ABAP report in AiE:

After activating it (via right click) I got an output:

While I wanted to see some other objects of ABAP Data Dictionary (DDIC) I came across following error:

Contact your system administrator. A new version of SAP GUI for Windows needs to be installed.

               Actual Version    SAP GUI for Windows: 720 LSAPI protocol version 5

               Required Version              SAP GUI for Windows: 720 Patch Level 9

I realized that I was using “mini” or core version of GUI which is delivered with installation (in folder Frontend&tools). So I de-installed that version and installed full version 730 together with currently most up2date patch 09. After that seems I have a full access to all features of AiE.

When it comes to SAP GUI version here’s another issue. For independent developers not having access to SAP’s downloads area (on so called SAP Market Place – SMP) it can be an issue to get full version of SAP GUI.

Finally this is the end. My NetWeaver installation is working and I’m able to code ABAP in Ecplise. Party in your code!

PS: This blog is cross published on my personal blog site.

Where to go next:

ABAP in Ecplise space

FAQs – ABAP Development Tools for Eclipse

Which SAP NetWeaver releases are compatible with ADT?