Technical Articles
Building Extensions for SAP SuccessFactors using APIs and Events | Hands-on Video Tutorials
Philip Mugglestone just released an update to the video tutorial series about building extensions for SAP SuccessFactors using APIs and events. In this blog post you will find the videos embedded with references and additional information. For the related blog posts, visit
For the video tutorials about extending SAP solutions in the Kyma environment, see
Questions? Please post as comment. Useful? Give us a like and share on social media. Thanks! November 3, 2022 – Update, all videos were re-recorded due to changes in the workflow April 16, 2021 – First publication |
Hands-On Video Tutorials
What You Will Learn
Philip Mugglestone from the SAP HANA Academy just released for an update to the video tutorial series about building extensions for SAP SuccessFactors using APIs and events.
You can watch the 10-part video tutorial series in a little over one hour. What you learn is
- where to find reference material for services and technologies used in the scenario
- how to connect an SAP SuccessFactors system with a global account in SAP Business Technology Platform
- how to create a service instance to consume the SAP SuccessFactors OData API, configures entitlements for the SAP SuccessFactors Extensibility service, and create a service instance using the api-access service plan
- how to subscribe to the BTP services that form part of the scenario including SAP Event Mesh, SAP Launchpad, SAP HANA Cloud, and SAP Business Application Studio
- how to use a jumpstart generator to create an extension application based on SAP Cloud Application Programming Model (CAP) including configuration to create and access services used in the scenario
- how the extension application works and how to perform some simple local testing
- how to build and deploy the extension application to SAP Business Technology Platform
- how to configure an event in SAP SuccessFactors that triggers Event Mesh in SAP BTP whenever details have been updated for a recruitment candidate
- how to test the application
- how to de-configure events in SAP SuccessFactors, undeploy the extension application and remove service instances, subscriptions and registrations that were created as part of this extension scenario.
Architecture
The components used are
- SAP SuccessFactors – Human Capital Management (HCM) | Cloud HR Solutions
- SAP Business Technology Platform Cloud Foundry environment – to host the extension app
- SAP Extension Suite – for Management Plane, connectivity, and messaging with SAP Event Mesh
- SAP Business Application Studio – for web-based development
- SAP Cloud Application Programming model (CAP)
SAP HANA Academy YouTube Playlist
To bookmark the playlist on YouTube, go to
Getting Started
Video Tutorial
In this hands-on video tutorial, Philip Mugglestone demonstrates a simple scenario that shows how to extend SAP SuccessFactors using APIs and events. Architecture is discussed as well as where to find reference material for services and technologies used in the scenario.
Chapters
0:00 – Introduction with demonstration of the scenario
1:45 – Architecture
3:38 – SAP Discovery Center
4:35 – SAP API Business Hub
5:30 – Reference Guides
8:00 – Permissions in SAP SuccessFactors
References
For the references, see
- SAP Discovery Center | Free Tier Services
- SAP SuccessFactors Recruiting | SAP API Business Hub
- Extending SAP SuccessFactors in the Cloud Foundry and Kyma Environment | SAP Help Portal (Documentation)
SAP BTP services
SAP SuccessFactors Admin Center | Permission settings
Register Systems
Video Tutorial
In this hands-on video tutorial, Philip Mugglestone shows how to connect an SAP SuccessFactors system with a global account in SAP Business Technology Platform.
Chapters
0:00 – Introduction
0:33 – Review Permission Roles
1:02 – Register System in SAP BTP
2:10 – Add Integration with SAP BTP in SAP SuccessFactors
SAP SuccessFactors Extension Center | Add Integration with SAP BTP
SAP BTP Cockpit | System Landscape
Consume OData API
Video Tutorial
In this hands-on video tutorial, Philip Mugglestone shows how to create a service instance to consume the SAP SuccessFactors OData API. Philip creates a BTP subaccount and configures entitlements for the SAP SuccessFactors Extensibility service. Philip then creates a service instance using the api-access service plan and reviews options for authentication.
Chapters
0:00 – Introduction
0:55 – Create subaccount in SAP BTP
1:27 – Enable Cloud Foundry
2:10 – Configure entitlements
3:15 – Create api-access service instance
5:00 – Review destination
6:25 – Configure principle propagation
6:42 – Configure Application-Interface-Key
Subscriptions
Video Tutorial
In this hands-on video tutorial, Philip Mugglestone subscribes to additional BTP services that form part of the scenario including SAP Event Mesh, SAP Launchpad, SAP HANA Cloud, and SAP Business Application Studio.
Chapters
0:00 – Introduction
0:30 – Configure entitlements
2:05 – Subscribe to services
3:02 – Configure access to subscribed services
3:45 – Create SAP HANA Cloud service instance
5:55 – Review SAP Event Mesh & SAP Launchpad
Create Extension App
Video Tutorial
In this hands-on video tutorial, Philip Mugglestone uses a jumpstart generator to create an extension application based on SAP Cloud Application Programming Model (CAP) including configuration to create and access services used in the scenario.
Chapters
0:00 – Introduction
0:25 – Launch SAP Business Application Studio
1:45 – Install jumpstart generator
2:18 – Scaffold extension application
4:50 – Local testing
Review Extension App
Video Tutorial
In this hands-on video tutorial, Philip Mugglestone reviews the extension application generated in the previous tutorial and performs some simple local testing.
Chapters
0:00 – Introduction
0:30 – package.json
2:50 – srv/external
3:28 – srv/catalog-service.cds/.js
5:20 – xs-security.json
5:45 – db/data-model.cds
6:02 – app
6:40 – mta.yaml
8:37 – .env
Deploy Extension App
Video Tutorial
In this hands-on video tutorial, Philip Mugglestone builds and deploys the extension application to SAP Business Technology Platform.
Chapters
0:00 – Introduction
0:45 – Build application
0:58 – Deploy application to Cloud Foundry
3:15 – Authorize business users
3:35 – Test application
4:30 – Configure SAP Launchpad
6:20 – Review SAP Event Mesh
Consume Events
Video Tutorial
In this hands-on video tutorial, Philip Mugglestone configures an event in SAP SuccessFactors that triggers Event Mesh in SAP BTP whenever details have been updated for a recruitment candidate.
Chapters
0:00 – Introduction
0:45 – Create service key for SAP Event Mesh
1:50 – Configure OAuth in SAP SuccessFactors Security Center
2:45 – Create integration in SAP SuccessFactors Integration Center
6:15 – Add integration to SAP SuccessFactors Intelligent Services Center
Test Extension App
Video Tutorial
In this hands-on video tutorial, Philip Mugglestone tests the extension application.
Chapters
0:00 – Introduction
0:40 – Edit candidate profile in SAP SuccessFactors
1:05 – View in Fiori application
1:52 – Troubleshooting
2:39 – Further extension opportunities
Teardown
Video Tutorial
In this hands-on video tutorial, Philip Mugglestone shows how to de-configure events in SAP SuccessFactors, undeploy the extension application and remove service instances, subscriptions and registrations that were created as part of this extension scenario.
Chapters
0:00 – Introduction
0:40 – Remove integration from SAP SuccessFactors Integration Center
1:00 – Remove OAuth configuration from SAP SuccessFactors Security Center
1:15 – Remove integration from SAP SuccessFactors Intelligent Services Center
1:35 – Remove SAP Launchpad site
2:17 – Undeploy extension application
3:40 – Delete SAP HANA Cloud service instance
3:50 – Remove subscriptions
4:02 – Delete dev space in SAP Business Application Studio
4:02 – Remove SAP Business Application Studio
4:34 – Remove SAP HANA Cloud tools
4:40 – Delete api-access service instance
5:20 – Remove entitlements
6:00 – Disable Cloud Foundry
6:25 – Delete BTP subaccount
6:35 – Deregister and remove system
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Thanks!
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Over the years, for the SAP HANA Academy, SAP’s Partner Innovation Lab, and à titre personnel, I have written a little over 300 posts here for the SAP Community. Some articles only reached a few readers. Others attracted quite a few more.For your reading pleasure and convenience, here is a curated list of posts which somehow managed to pass the 10k-view mile stone and, as sign of current interest, still tickle the counters each month. |
Hi Denys,
Blog was very Useful and Informative. It helps for Beginners to understand easily.
It helped me lot I followed the same but when I try to deploy the App getting following error as shown:
And in SAP BTP-> Subscriptions and Instances--> Under Instances "SAP SuccessFactors Extensibility" failed to create the instance for the Application.
In view Details shown below error which is same when try to deploy the App using MTA File. Service Broker Error
Could you please help me. It was very useful to me to achieve this process to consume SF API's.
Thanks in Advance
Best Regards,
Mamatha
Hi Mamatha,
Internal errors are typically not the easiest to solve. Looks like something is wrong with the connectivity between SSFF and BTP.
Would you mind posting the question to the forum (https://answers.sap.com)? Copy / paste is fine.
It maybe helpful to go through the tutorial series Philip created about the extension generator, start with the most basic configuration and gradually add functionality to find out where the issue resides.
Denys van Kempen Hi, Thanks for the great blog.
Any idea how we can get SF demo instance for checking above blogs step by step
Hi Mohit,
Added a section about provisioning SAP SuccessFactors instances
Hi Mohit,
To get a SuccessFactors test instance, you need to be a SAP partner.
In which case you have access to the link below where you can order a test tenant (Subscription is price is 75EUR/month)
https://partneredge.sap.com/en/partnership/licenses/tdd.html?item=accordion-widewidgets-accordionitem
You will also have access to the provisioning tool mentioned in this post.
Best,
Denys van Kempen
Great updated blog on building the extensions.
I have a question related to the permission section, where the user is added to role collection manually. ( 07. Deploy Extension App)
Is there a way to leverage RBP roles directly as dynamic groups so we can map them to role collections? As opposed to syncing users and roles to IAS using IPS, in which case the role collection mapping can be based on the group attribute.
Thanks,
Frank.
Hi Frank,
As you mention, RBP (role-based permissions) is an SSFF feature, which, currently, cannot be leveraged directly as dynamic groups for mapping to role collections.
Denys van Kempen, I just found the section of "Configure Trust" is a bit out dated now, as the URL to acquire the saml metadata of SF has changed since first half 2021 release it seems.
new URL is
http://<sap_successfactors_system>/idp/samlmetadata?company=<company_id>&cert=sha2
https://help.sap.com/docs/BTP/65de2977205c403bbc107264b8eccf4b/ebc8341367a64fe3a5b187a4e2440608.html?locale=en-US
Hi Kevin,
Thank you for your comment.
Added a box with the update.
Hi Denys,
Blog is very useful and informative. It helps for beginners to understand easily.
Much appreciated.
Cheers,
Rinku
Welcome! Thanks, RInku