What SAP Community means to me

This is a quick blog about all the things the community means to me.  I blog on and off about different things, but I don’t think I’ve covered this.  (Or I haven’t written this in a long while)

When I first found SDN:

I went there to find answers.  We were just implementing SAP.  It was 1997, and there was very little information to find.  So I lurked, read, and answered questions (after a while) when I could.  My successful debate with my boss at the time was that I saved so much time with the community that I could afford the time to answer a couple of questions.  Finally after quite a while that moved to blogs.

Friends:

So fast forward…  We started to use SAP in different ways.  So now our functional consultants actually started (to think) that they knew the tables to let us know what to pull from when coding.  At that point, I was told I was just a developer.  And developer’s were a dime a dozen.

I went on a rant in a blog on SDN.  The response was overwhelming.  I ended up with some good friends from that very first blog.  Now I find myself “taking” chatting with many different people.  I stayed just to keep in touch with them and find out what they were up to.

Pure joy over my first blog:

There were people out there that disagreed and agreed with me.  What fun the comments made me so overjoyed.   I shared it with my Mom, my Dad, my Sister, my Husband, my in laws…..  You get the picture, I shared it with NON SAP people.  They even humored me and read it.  They all said they liked it.  I’m laughing to myself.  They basically didn’t understand it.

People with great personalities:

I think it was Susan Keohan that first pointed out, she could talk with her dogs, but they really couldn’t answer her.   I feel the same way.  Who else can I talk “SAP” with?  Yes, my co-workers but not like a blog, blog comments, Q&A, or even coffee corner.   I NOW had a place where people “understood” my joy over “SAP” or my challenges with SAP.  So I stayed.  Friends were here!

Fast forward again – disillusionment:

I found that all the cool “new toys” – new technology was not embraced at my company.  Why?  We were all in technology.  We should be ready and happy for change.

To my surprise: OOP was not something that was used, Webdynpro – NEVER.  I was just lucky my boss let me code in them.

So who could I turn to?  Who would I share my excitement with?  You’ve got it SCN.  (Yes it was now SCN)  I also asked questions, read blogs, and commented.

Fast forward again:

Moved away from the Mentors program.

Different companies.  Different roles. Consulting, in-house, independent consultant…  You name it.  I also had several hats.  Functional consultant, technical work, and project management.   I moved away from SCN.

I came back with a bit of a bang:

Whale sinking – does that remind anyone?  Anyway skip over that.  I needed to learn some new tools quick.  I love this community and wanted success for it.  It had my friends – some of them still here. I could meet new friends, and talk “SAP”ish language.

So I started back and began slowly.  Gradually, I seemed to love the SAP Community.  Yes, another name.

Now:

I helped implement on-premise HANA.  Yes, I’m on a new system.  I can use help.  So back to the Q&A.  I also love reading all the blogs.

My specialties:

My specialties – if you can call them that – OTC and PTP.  My strong points Material master, sales and distribution, purchasing, warehouse, and manufacturing.  I “know” all of them in the functional sense. I usually can dig for the answer – usually.   In the technical areas: Webdynpro, MII, OOP, and Javascript.  I am learning CDS, AMDP, and database procedures. That’s yet another journey I’m taking with the SAP Community.

As you can see that’s a large list.  I know each area up to a point.  But as a highly technical person once pointed out to me, I can’t know anything deep down.  So I know all I need to work on my projects.  If I don’t know it Google does.  Google almost always brings me here.

Conclusion:

If you’ve made it this far – big smiling face for me.

• I enjoy blogs.  Even in areas that are not mine.
• I love the comments.  So much information in them.
• I LOVE Q&A.  I get great answers just by searching.
• I enjoy new people.  I like to see our community growing.  (All of the above reasons)
• Just started using tutorials – awesome.
• Most important to me is the people!!!!

Please do comment.  I’m sure I’ll see you around the community.  Also always know I’m open to PMs.  I love to get those too.