Technical Articles
SAP BTP ABAP Environment – Manage System Hibernation
Update on August 28th, 2023:
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System hibernation for SAP BTP ABAP Environment (aka Steampunk) is available since August 28th, 2023. This blog post explains how this feature works and what are the required prerequisites. To benefit from the intended cost savings, we recommend to plan a potential usage and to fulfill the prerequisites.
What is the purpose of system hibernation?
Before the introduction of system hibernation, there was no option to suspend or to stop a Steampunk system if it is not used. The deletion of the system is only an option, if the stored data in the SAP HANA Cloud instance is not needed anymore. As a consequence, there was no option to reduce the costs for temporarily unused systems. The new feature will allow to stop and (re-)start the system without the deletion of the corresponding SAP HANA Cloud instance. This might be helpful, for example:
- To stop development systems outside of working hours and during the weekend
- To stop correction systems (for the productive codeline) outside of correction activities
- To stop test systems outside of test activities
- To stop custom code analysis system when analysis is done
- To stop production systems before go-live
What is the impact on costs?
The costs of a Steampunk system are calculated based on two infrastructure metrics:
- ACU (ABAP Compute Unit) – Runtime Memory in 16 GB Blocks
- HCU (HANA Compute Unit) – Persistent Memory in 16 GB Blocks
The minimal setup for a Steampunk system is 1 ACU + 2 HCUs.
A stopped system requires only SAP HANA Cloud backup storage and disc space, but no ABAP Compute Units. The remaining infrastructure costs are:
| Metric | Costs for a stopped system |
| ACUs | 0% |
| HCUs | 12,5% |
In case of CPEA (Cloud Platform Enterprise Agreement, a consumption-based commercial model) total costs for a stopped minimum system are reduced to less than 5%.
Refer to the relevant metrics and current unit price per hour in the SAP Discovery Center.
The mentioned cost reduction is only achievable in case of consumption-based contracts.
Be aware, that SAP operations will (re-)start and stop a system automatically to perform lifecycle management events like upgrades and patches (refer to this blog post) if the system was stopped before. SAP operations ensures that the Steampunk release of the systems remains up-to-date even for stopped systems. The required uptime for the lifecycle management events is considered as a started system.
What are the prerequisites?
There is one technical prerequisite to use the planned feature: The systems based on the deprecated service plan 16_abap_64_db need to be migrated to service plan standard. Refer to this blog post for more information.
A consumption-based contract, like CPEA or Pay-As-You-Go, is not a technical prerequisite. But in case of a subscription based contract you will not benefit from any cost savings.
How can I stop and start a system?
You need to use the Landscape Portal. Please notice, that you need to subscribe the Landscape Portal in a subaccount for region cf-eu10, independent of region of the Steampunk system. You can manage all systems for all regions within the same BTP global account using the same Landscape Portal instance. The Landscape Portal is part of the Steampunk product. There is no additional license required and there are no additional costs to use the Landscape Portal.
Open the new app Manage System Hibernation, select the respective system, and choose Stop, Start, or Schedule Stop/Start:
Landscape Portal app: Manage System Hibernation
The app will provide also a calendar of the scheduled activities. For more information, refer to the documentation of the app.
How does it work for free tier systems?
A free tier customer can stop and start the Steampunk system manually. The feature Schedule Stop/Start is not supported.
All free tier systems will be stopped automatically each night (time zone of the respective data center). To use the free tier system again, start the system as explained in the previous section.
Accessing a stopped system
If you try to access the SAP Fiori Launchpad of a stopped system, you will get the error message “The system is currently stopped“. To start the system again, you need open the Landscape Portal, open the Manage System Hibernation app, select the respective system in the list, and press Start. An http request to the system will not start the system automatically.
Summary
The feature to stop and (re-)start Steampunk systems is an option to save costs significantly in case of consumption-based contracts.
Hello Frank,
a great feature for the ABAP Env.! It is one important aspect of cloud services to start and stop using them on demand and not running it 24/7 like a onpremise system when there is no workload and they are in a idle mode.
Br,
Christian
Hi Frank,
thanks for the very helpful post!
Is the Landscape Portal already available?
Will there also be an option to handle start/stop via scripting to automate this "from outside the Landscape Portal".
BR,
Illya
Hi Illya,
the Landscape Portal is a BTP SaaS Application and is live since 3 years.
You cannot start /stop Steampunk Systems via scripting.
By using the Landscape Portal, you can Start / Stop but also create any kind of recurrences as well..
Regards, Tahar
I really hate this Mario Jump&Run game with the Service Availability.
I set-up a Subaccount with the free-tier ABAP Environment on cf-eu20, because it was the only chance to have also the Cloud Foundry Runtime.
And now this:
No Service Message
[censored]
Hi Riccardo,
The entitlement for the Landscape Portal can only be added from subaccounts located in region cf-eu10. Please use a subaccount located in this region to add the entitlement and to subscribe to and access the Landscape Portal.
Cloud Foundry runtime is not needed for the Landscape Portal subscription; you only need CF runtime in the subaccount in which you plan to deploy your SaaS solution. To subscribe to the Landscape Portal, only the "Landscape Portal" entitlement is needed.
Best regards,
Rebecca
Hello Rebecca,
The Problem is that the Instance on EU20 is now stopped... and cause of this change you cant get it back up? What is this? So i have to delete my free tier Account with all work and move my ABAP Cloud Free Tier to EU10 becauce otherwise i cant start it again after first shutdown?
Kind Regards,
Alex
Hi Alexander,
I think the Landscape Portal with subscription in eu10 region subaccount will show you all the ABAP systems across all regions in the same global account, so that you should be able to restart/stop as needed.
So the Landscape Portal subscription is independent of region of the Steampunk system.
Regards,
Peter
Hi Alexander,
don't worry, you don't have to delete or move any of your work. You can use the Landscape Portal to (re)start systems located in all regions within the same global account. Only the subaccount used to access the Landscape Portal must be located in cf-eu10.
Best regards,
Rebecca
Hello
Im suffering the same issue, but for our contract "EU limited access" is not possible to create subaccounts in cf-eu10 so what is the next step? If you cannot create subaccount in cf-eu10. Im stuck here.
thanks
Hi Frank,
thanks for the very helpful post!
Does the planned maintenance by sap also take place when the system is stopped?
Regards,
Christoph
Yes. Please refer to the description above:
"Be aware, that SAP operations will (re-)start and stop a system automatically to perform lifecycle management events like upgrades and patches (refer to this blog post) if the system was stopped before. SAP operations ensures that the Steampunk release of the systems remains up-to-date even for stopped systems. The required uptime for the lifecycle management events is considered as a started system."
Hi Frank,
Where service assignment is made,"Standard-Plan-Beta" appears as Plan only
The Landscape Portal service does not appear on the https://discovery-center.cloud.sap/ site.
What is the pricing for this service?
Best regards,
Yasin
The Landscape Portal does not appear in the SAP Discovery Center as an own service, because the service is part of the SAP BTP ABAP Environment product. As mentioned above, there are no additional costs to subscribe and use the Landscape Portal.
In order to subscribe to the Landscape Portal, you need to use a subaccount located in region cf-eu10. Only one subscription is sufficient for all systems in all subaccounts of the same BTP Global Account. Please navigate to the section Instances and Subscriptions and press Create. There is only one service plan "standard" offered:
You can find more information in the documentation of the Landscape Portal.
Hi Frank,
so great that the hibernation feature is there now.
Are they any plans to support scheduling a stop only? It would be great as a security mechanism for systems that need to be started only occasionally. In an upcoming workshop I use the Free Tier System for development but have a standard instance for Tests and Packaging. I start the second system only when needed. But that system should be automatically shut down.
Best Regards
Gregor
Hi Gregor,
It wasn't in my mind first, but I agree with you in such cases it might be more than useful to have a kind of a stop only scheduling.
I'll align it first internally and make this into consideration in the Backlog as well.
Many thanks for the constructive input, Tahar