Data Exchange in S/4HANA Cloud Using Communication Scenarios

It is a lot more easy to exchange data between two systems in Cloud. In an on-premise system, you have the freedom to maintain all the infrastructure level settings that are logical ports, RFC destinations, distribution models, partner profiles, replication model, outbound implementation, and so on. But in Cloud, is user restricted to make two systems communicate? So how the end user is going to set the systems up for data exchange? How will any kind of integration for data exchange be performed in Cloud?

In S/4HANA Cloud system, Communication Scenarios are the basis for all inbound and outbound communication. You can transfer data between S/4HANA Cloud system and any external system such as SAP ERP. So what exactly does it take to setup the communication between two systems? The new Fiori UIs – Fiori Catalog Communication Management.

Communication Users

A communication user is a special type of technical user corresponds to a remote system or part, thereof that connects to the own system. Communication users are created within the app, “Maintain Communication Users”, assigned to Communication Systems, and used within Communication Arrangements to process inbound communication services.

Communication Systems

A communication system is a specification of a system that represents a communication partner and all the necessary technical information needed for the communication, like hostname/IP-Address, identity, user information, certificates, etc. In S/4HANA Cloud systems, customers do not have access to the admin transactions for defining logical systems or business systems. However, these entities are required for external communication. The “Communication System” app enables you to define these settings in Cloud.

Communication Arrangements

A Communication Arrangement (CA) describes a communication scenario with a remote system during configuration. It provides necessary metadata for the service configurations like credentials, outbound ports, destinations, and URLs. It consists of several service specifications, which contains the technical data to enable inbound and outbound communication. Activation of a CA populates the required configuration tables of the web service and/or IDOC runtimes, such as logical ports and RFC destinations, for the communication users.

Let’s See How the Data Exchange Happens

Take a scenario where you want to transfer the Business Partner/Customer/Supplier master data from an S/4HANA Cloud system to another S/4HANA Cloud system. The communication scenario for Business Partner/Customer/Supplier is SAP_COM_0008. (Master data integration for Business Partner, Customer, and Supplier is available in S/4HANA Cloud Enterprise Edition, S/4HANA Professional Services Edition, and S/4HANA Finance Cloud Edition).

1. Create a communication user using the “Maintain Communication Users” app.
2. Create the communication system using the “Communication Systems” app and define the settings for the partner system like Logical system ID, and Business System ID. Also the communication user has to be assigned for the inbound and outbound communication.
3. Now, create the communication arrangement using the “Communication Arrangements” Fiori app. Choose SAP_COM_0008 as the communication Scenario. Choose other mandatory parameters like communication system, and communication user. Then select the outbound services to be activated and additional properties that are defined in the communication scenario. Save the data.

Based on your selection of outbound services and additional properties (output mode, replication model etc) you are ready to exchange the data.

There you are!