Process Observer

Process Observer (POB) is a component in the reuse layer of the SAP Business Suite and SAP S/4HANA supporting business process monitoring and analytics of core (“built-in”) processes. It closes a major gap from process management lifecycle perspective.

This blog article collects important documents and articles around Process Observer posted in the SAP Community.

Important Documents:

• An introduction to Process Observer is given in the following presentation: Monitoring and Analyzing Business Suite Processes using Process Observer.
• Detailed usage and configuration information about Process Observer is given in:Process Observer In-Depth Workshop
• Find a Comparison of Business Process Monitoring / Business Process Analytics (BPMon/BPA) and Process Observer (POB) and how you can commonly use them.
• Find anOverview of Enhancement Options for Process Observer for Built-In Processes
• Read our Success Story: Paul Vahle GmbH Reduces Delivery Times with Process Observer

Recordings & Demos:

• View the recording of PMC212 “Big Picture Process Orchestration from an Application Point of View” from TechED Las Vegas.
• A short live demo of Process Observer is available at Process Observer Demo SAP Foundation Day 2012.
• The following demo of the SAP Demo Store shows the integration of Process Observer into SAP Master Data Governance to monitor the master data creation and distribution process cross-systems. To run the demo you need to be logged on to the SAP Demo Store

Process Observer in S/4HANA: 

• Order-to-Cash Performance Monitoring is available as best-practices package in S/4HANA.
• Architecture of Process Performance Monitoring in S/4HANA.

Questions & Discussion:

• For Q&A feel free to post in our Process Observer Discussion. And of course you’re free to start a new discussion or add comments to any of our articles, too.

Further Blog Postings on how to user Process Observer:

Introduction & Setup:

• Introducing New Component: Process Observer for Built-In Processes (POB)
• Business value being addressed by Process Monitoring & Analytics for the SAP Business Suite
• Architecture of Process Observer for Built-In Processes (POB)
• Setup of Component Process Observer for Built-In Processes

Monitor Processes:

• Create Process Definition for Business Process Monitoring & Analytics for Business Suite Processes (POB)
• Create KPI Definitions for Business Process Monitoring & Analytics for Business Suite Processes (POB)
• Monitor Sales Order Processing with Process Observer for Built-In Processes (POB)
• Instrumentation for Procure-to-pay process on item level in Process Observer
• Visualization of Process Flows in Process Observer
• Process Observer: More to See
• Monitoring of cross system workflows with SAP Process Observer

Advanced Topics:

• Process Observer (POB) – working with BOR events made easy
• Process Observer: Working with Tasks Made Easy
• Using Thresholds, SLAs and Alerting in Process Observer (POB)
• Process Observer (POB) Direct Event API for Logging Processes from SAP and Non-SAP Systems
• Tracking Field Changes Using the Process Observer (POB) Direct Event API
• Using BAdIs to Anonymize User Information in Process Observer (POB)
• Applying Process Mining Techniques to Process Observer Data using the ProM Toolkit
• Process Mining with Process Observer and Fluxicon Disco
• A Word on Federation 

Consumption and Enhancement Options:

• SAP Operational Process Intelligence powered by SAP HANA utilizes Process Observer and also other data sources to provide process intelligence and transparency into business operations. It is an application that provides real-time, actionable intelligence about your company’s business processes, spanning SAP Business Suite leveraging Process Observer, SAP Business Workflow, and SAP NetWeaver Process Orchestration. You can further combine it with SAP Process Mining by Celonis.
• The SAP RDS called SAP MDG Content Accelerator integrates Process Observer into Master Data Governance (MDG) to monitor the master data distribution process end-to-end across systems.
• Process Observer log data can be used on SAP HANA using SLT replication from the underlying backend system. A set of HANA views (virtual data models [VDMs]) to ease the consumption of Process Observer data on SAP HANA is released with SAP HANA Live for EHP4 for SAP ERP Release 1.0 SP03. The documentation of the views can be found here.
• Former Member from CubeServ writes about first experiences working with Process Observer:Process Observer – a new SAP approach to analyze Business Suite processes! Cubeserv is offering comprehensive BPM consulting services, BI-Content „Process Analytics“ and process dashboards to visualize KPIs.
• Process Observer log information can be accessed for mobile consumption via ODATA. For details see: Business Process Content powered by SAP Netweaver Gateway

Online Documentation about Process Observer:

• Documentation of the Process Observer core application.
• Documentation of BI Content for Process Observer.
• Order-to-Cash Performance Monitor (S/4HANA)