interface

[Former Member]

hi to all abap gurus

my querry is as follows

what are interface / conversion programs in sap . pls tell both are same ? if not so

what is the difference between interface and conversion program ?

what are the BDC techniques they are interfaces or conversion program s.

pls tell in detail . points will be given defintely

[sreeramkumar_madisetty]

Hi

Conversions - This type of transfer refers to a one-time transfer from a legacy system to the SAP system. In this case, the “legacy” system is the old system that is being replaced by the SAP system.

For example, the old system being replaced has data for 2,000 vendors that must be transferred to the SAP system.

Interfaces - This type of transfer refers to an ongoing transfer from a complimentary system to the SAP system. In this case, the “complimentary” system is a system that will run along side the SAP system.

For example, customer orders may be taken in another system. For the SAP system to reflect accurate information, these orders must be transferred to the SAP system every night.

BDC can be both interfaces or conversions depending upon the functionality above.

Interfaces are needed when we need data from other than SAP envoronment and vise versa.

Suppose aclient may send his business data through Excel sheet which are to be loaded in his SAP Tables.Then we need to use interfaces.

There are two Categogies.

1.From Presentation Layer to your ABAP Program(and then into Database table)

Presentation layer means from your sytem (from C, drives)

2.From application Server to your ABAP Program(and then into Database table)

Application Server means the server for your Sap System.

For the first case you need to use:From Presentation Layer to your ABAP Program and vise versa)

GUI_UPLOAD to upload data,

GUI_DOWNLOAD to download data

For the Second case(From application Server to your ABAP Program and vise versa)

A.OPEN DATA SET FILE NAME ON APPL.SERVER FOR INPUT ENCODING BY DEFAULT. use tranfer command to send data to application server

B. CLOSE DATA SET.

Now I Hope you got idead for what is the need for interfaces,Types,uses,when to use,ets.

Reward points if it helps you.

Regards,

Sree

Let me know any queries on this.

Message was edited by:

sree ram

Message was edited by:

sree ram

[Former Member]

Hi,

Interface and Conversion program with BDC are same.

Only the difference in the mode of execution.

The words were chosen for what they mean. A conversion means data that is converted from one format to another format and from one system to another. So when you first implement SAP, you are actually replacing some of your legacy systems, but you are not completely trashing the data. You still need some of that data from the systems that are being replaced. So you pull the data out of your legacy systems and put them on some files. You then want to load that data into your new SAP system. That is when you write some programs which will read that data and load it into SAP. Imagine you had a home grown purchasing system. You are now replacing all that with SAP. But until SAP goes live, you want to keep using your home grown purchasing system. So during go live, you want to transfer the POs from your legacy system to SAP. Now a PO in your legacy system may not have the same fields as a PO in SAP. So you convert the data.

Interfacing is connecting two or more different entities. In our case, it is connecting one or more systems with SAP. Now extending our previous example, you are replacing some legacy applications but there are some applications that you don't want to replace yet. You need to somehow pass data back and forth between SAP and these remaining systems. Data may be going one way or the other way or both ways. You will still need to do some data transformations/translations etc to make the data understandable to the receiving system. This will continue as long as you want to keep the systems running alongside SAP.

In short, conversions are written to load data into SAP onetime. These are typically file based.

Interfaces are written to exchange/update/send/receive data between SAP and other systems on an ongoing basis. These can be in many forms, file based, idoc based, real time(business connector, XI etc are useful in this), xml, and the list goes on.

<b>*Reward points</b>

Regards