SAP Support Backbone Update

Hi,

My name is Henry Fang who is providing Enterprise Support offerings to our customers. I’d like to share some useful information which are relevant to Enterprise Support delivery and SAP Note implementation.

SAP is connected by customers via the SAP Support Backbone (primarily known as OSS), the central infrastructure to provide technical support.  This infrastructure has been updated to manage the increasing workload and address demands from technology & infrastructure changes. This post highlights the affected systems/components and the actions should be taken to make sure smooth connection between SAP Support Backbone and customers’ systems after 2019.

As a result of this  update, the following customer systems are affected as of January 1^st, 2020:

• SAP Note Assistant (transaction SNOTE) usage in SAP systems
• Technical Communication Users in system landscape
• SAP Solution Manager systems and Focused Run
• ABAP systems with direct connectivity to the support backbone

Before taking any action about this update, it is recommended to make yourself familiar with the topic:

• Please read following article: https://news.sap.com/2019/07/continuous-sap-support-stay-connected-january-2020/
• Check out SAP Portal: https://support.sap.com/en/release-upgrade-maintenance/maintenance-information/connectivity-to-sap.html
• ES Academy offers a MTE session: Recording

• SAP Community Call: SAP Notes Download and Upload Process Changes

And I would strongly recommend to take following actions based on your current IT landscape：

• SAP Note Assistant (transaction SNOTE) usage in SAP systems
  Referring to Note Assistant guide to enable SAP Note Assistant (SNOTE) on all ABAP systems for download of digitally signed SAP Notes
• Technical Communication Users in system landscape
  Ensure that all connections use a Technical Communication User in all systems which have connectivity to SAP. SAP Note 2174416
• SAP Solution Manager systems and Focused Run
  1. Update SAP Solution Manager 7.2 to SPS 07 or above
  2. Focused Run needs to be updated to version 2.0
  How the SAP Support Backbone update affects SAP Solution Manager and Focused Run
• ABAP systems with direct connectivity to the support backbone
  Upgrade the versions of the ST-PI and ST-A/PI add-ons in your systems.
  For detailed information, see Upgrade ST-PI 2008_1_7xx/ Upgrade ST-PI 740 and Upgrade ST-A/PI

More details can be found at

• SAP’s Support Backbone Update central page
• SAP’s Support Backbone Update help
• SAP’s Support Backbone Update guideline
• Note Assistant
• How the SAP Support Backbone update affects SAP Solution Manager and Focused Run
• Update of SAP’s Support Backbone: Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ)

It will be better to be prepared for the update by the end of December 31,2019 by referring to above information.

Regards,

Henry Fang