SAP ABAP Development Services

Digital transformation

ABAP (Advanced Business Application Programming) programming is said to be an essential part of digitalthe transformation process as it makes it possible to adjust solutions and applications to clients’ individual needs, their strategy, and business goals. This is why ABAP programmers at Hicron are not only software engineers, but they also need the business curiosity that business consultants have. This combination of skills and competencies: software knowledge and understanding of business processes helps us work faster, deliver best-suited solutions and improve the cooperation process with our clients.

If you need a solution that performs specific functions or addresses a specific problem, you can have it programmed by our experienced ABAP teams. Applications written by Hicron experts are efficient and prepared for future scaling as your business grows.

This approach helps us perfectly adapt our clients’ SAP systems to their need. Apart from developing applications, we also optimize and migrate them to newer technologies. If you are wondering if the system in your company could be better adapted to your current needs or if you feel you need to replace the existing platform – we will discuss possible options, perform a technology audit and help you choose the best solution.

How we work

We create customer-centric teams of ABAP developers.

A team consists of an Architect, a Development Lead and ABAP developers. If the scope of the project is significant, there will also be Steam Leads. The architect designs a solution using the newest technologies. Development Lead and Stream Leads take care of task distribution, cohesion, and code quality. Finally, developers deliver software, always following the best practices, your guidelines, and Agile methodology.

Are you concerned about the time difference? It does not matter if you work from Europe, Australia, Asia or the USA – we will make sure you will not notice the distance. With flexible working hours and dedicated teams of developers, Hicron adapts to your needs and means.

What does ABAP stand for?

Since the 90s all SAP modules (including S/4HANA, the successor software to SAP R/3 ) have been based on ABAP. ABAP (Advanced Business Application Programming) is a high-level, primary programming language on which SAP server platform and applications are based since the SAP R/3 announcement. There are many programming languages with different purposes and various specialties. ABAP as Fourth Generation Language, used by SAP to enable constant improvement. Developers can customize SAP ERP into different environments: ABAP Workbench tools and ABAP Development tools.

ABAB is highly integrated with other features of the SAP application server, one of them is open SQL, ABAP runtime environment converts it to native SQL that is appropriate for the database. It can also be used to gain access to database tables that are declared in the ABAP Dictionary. SQLScript is a new programming language for S/HANA. Open SQL code allows ABAP developer to change databases without changing ABAP programs and buffer data in the Application Server. First and foremost, it allows you to access collections of objects in Internal Tables. This function module is similar to java or C++ and can save the programmer the task of dynamic memory management, by using data as dynamic data objects (the source code has been moved from the program to the database layer and allows completed tasks in real-time).

Data Dictionary is another element of the larger ABAP infrastructure available to all ABAP programs. This is one of the most important tools of the ABAP workbench tools and is a universal dictionary of data structure definitions.

ABAP Workbench

One form of writing the ABAP code is to view and edit the source code by edited through ABAP Workbench tools. This SAP graphical user interface (SAP GUI) can be used to develop, test, run ABAP programs and create dictionary objects. ABAP Workbench includes the following components, among others:

• ABAP Editor – maintains programs
• ABAP Dictionary – maintains Dictionary objects, and allows developers to create and manage metadata. All references to data are taken from the ABAP Dictionary.
• Menu Painter – used by developers to create the user interface and its functions
• Screen Painter – used to design a screen and flow logic
• Function Builder – allows you to manage function modules and function groups

ABAP Development tools

SAP provided two tools to support ABAP programming:

• SAP HANA Studio for ABAP is an integrated development environment for SAP HANA on the SAP GUI tool. It gives you the ability to access the SAP database and allows you to create or modify data models.
• SAP NetWeaver Developer Studio, formerly known as ABAP in Eclipse, allows you to develop Java-based applications. It combines Java persistence and SAP-specific technology. Eclipse is an open-source platform, so it can be extended with plug-ins by developers. Advantages of this solution:
  • test on a local server before deploying to SAP NetWeaver
  • increases efficiency and saves time thanks to graphical editing tools
  • ensures consistency because covers the entire life cycle in Java

SAP ABAP – object-oriented approach

ABAP is a procedural language but with a feature known as “ABAP Objects” which can support object-oriented programming. POO (object-oriented programming) organizes software design around data, or objects (represent abstract or concrete things of the real world). This approach reduces the risk of misunderstandings and facilitates communication with non-programmers because it is close to the way people understand reality.

By organizing programs into object classes and an inheritance system, adding new functions is easier and can be done when needed.