SP4 Released: B2B Add-On and Secure Connectivity Add-On

You will be glad to hear the announcement of B2B Add-On inclusion in PO license. Please have a look here for more details

Working on a continuous enhancement mode, SAP has released SP4 for B2B Add-On & SFTP-PGP Add-On and lot of new features are delivered.

Summary of previous SPs:

• SP3 Released: B2B Add-On and Secure Connectivity Add-On
• SP2 Released: B2B Add-On and Secure Connectivity Add-On
• SP1 Released: B2B Add-On and Secure Connectivity Add-On

Major SP4 enhancements include:

• Trading Partner Management: Mass Configuration and Export/Import
• New UI for defining PLAIN/CUSTOM messages and XSD generation
• Usage of complete Trading partner Management configurations on de-central adapter engine. (earlier Functional Profiles were not supported)
• New EDI monitor embedded in PI monitoring screens with B2B/EDI specific advanced view for EDI monitoring staff  (available with PI 7.31 SP14 onwards)

Important Documentation

• Configuration guides (Application Help)
• SMP: Installation Guide/Master Guide/Supported EDI Formats/Security Guide
• SAP Note 1695520 : SMP Download location of Business to Business Add-On
• SAP Note 1695522 : Compatibility matrix : Supported Process Integration releases

Let us have a look on the below information to find out “What is new”.

Trading Partner Management(TPM)

Partner Type

Partner Type list is extensible now. Earlier, only a fixed values provided by SAP could be selected. Users can extend this list with the custom values.

APIs & CSV based Import/Export of TPM data including functional Profiles

• Web Services APIs are provided for TPM to support mass export/import
• CSV based Import/Export is provided for partner profiles and functional profiles

Mass Configurations

Mass Configuration options provide the facility to select specific partner functional profiles and mass update configuration values across different profiles

EDI Separator

Routing of Dynamic headers

All the present dynamic headers (except set by SAP EDI and TPM modules) will be routed to next ICOs after message processing by EDI Seperator Receiver channel. Example: If you have filename as dynamic header set by AS2 or SFTP adapter in first ICO’s XI message, these dynamic headers will be passed to next ICO (XI Message) along with splitted/routed messages.

Support for EANCOM subversion

EDI Separator sender and receiver channel is enhanced to support the routing of EANCOM messages based on sub version as well.

Duplicate Interchange no. check

Optional Duplicate interchange no. check has been introduced for X12, EANCOM and EDIFACT messages. Alerts can also be configured

EDI Content Manager

PLAIN/Custom Messages    

• New User Interface provides you an easy way to defined custom messages.
• XSD for Custom/Plain messages can be generated (just like other EDI formats).

Odette
New content (message formats) has been shipped for Odette. For more details, please refer to content guide available at Service Market Place.

Support for EDIFACT/EANCOM security specifications

Support for secure EDIFACT and EANCOM using signatures and AUTACK (authentication and acknowledgment message). This enables security features like content integrity, message authentication, and non-repudiation. A new adapter module is provided for generating and processing EDIFACT/EANCOM signatures and AUTACK messages. Partner specific settings for AUTACK and signatures can also be configured via TPM.

Monitoring/Alerts

Alerts

Alerts (using standard PI Alerting framework) are introduced for

•      SFTP adapter,
•      Certificate expiry &rollover (These alerts can be enabled only from TPM Administration screen)
•      Duplicate interchange Check   
  

New EDI Dashboard (provided with PI 7.31 SP14)

• One central screen for EDI/B2B monitoring
• Separate URL to open B2B/EDI Monitoring
• One click shift from A2A to B2B monitoring and vice versa.
• Search based on all TPM parameters (Partner Type, Name, region etc.) , EDI parameters (message type, version etc), Idoc no and Document no. (can be order no, invoice no etc.), acknowledgment status, SLA status etc
• Default B2B view has all the EDI related parameters together in central screen. All A2A and new B2B columns can be configured to create custom views
• Contact details based on TPM definitions appears on monitoring page.
• Single click to open incoming/outgoing EDI messages and Human Readable Report for EDI acknowledgements
• Special functions along with B2B Mapping Kit to enable Idoc no and document no. fields in monitoring
• TPM and EDI parameters are automatically pushed for monitoring by existing TPM and EDI Search Parameters module
  All existing functionality (Resend message, Related Messages etc.) is available as-is
• For custom messages, users can use predefined functions in ESR for pushing data to monitoring components
  

B2B Acknowledgment Status Archiving

With standard archiving of XI messages,B2B acknowledgment status archiving is also possible. Acknowledgment status data is available along with Archive Message search.

Log Viewer

AS2 and OFTP log viewers are combined as “B2B Log viewer” under B2B Integration Cockpit

NRO

New (authorization) roles have been added to display/edit NRO Objects

Technical protocols

AS2 Adapter

File Name and Archive File Name fields in Receiver AS2 channel can be dynamically created. You can use predefined standard parameters (same as archiving option) or/and can use any dynamic header value(s)

SFTP Adapter

• File Name in Receiver SFTP channel can be dynamically created. You can use predefined standard parameters (same as archiving option) or/and can use any dynamic header value(s)
• Dual Authentication : For connecting to the servers which implement dual authentication via private key and password.
• Permanent Mode Connection:  For avoiding creating new connection for every incoming file to the receiver connection is kept alive.
• %FILENAME in archiving properties: %FILENAME will be replaced with the filename of the incoming file if the user  wishes to keep the archived filename same as the incoming one.
  

OFTP Adapter

• OFTP Additional Destination Support: OFTP supports additional destinations / routers. Multiple controller numbers can be specified as a comma separated values in case of an ISDN channel. OFTP receiver channel can now be configured to connect to additional destination incase the primary destination is not available. ISDN Sender channel can now listen to multiple routers with different ISDN numbers.
• Receiver Side Proxy Support: SOCKs proxy is supported for OFTP receiver side.
• Single SSID & Several SFID: OFTP receiver channel can now send messages to the same partner with several SFIDs using dynamic header information in the XI message.
• OFTP sender channel publishes Odette ids, virtual dataset filename in dynamic headers