Working with the Development Environment Process Integration XI

The features of Exchange Infrastructure can be divided into several task areas. These task areas correspond to the user roles that users require to perform tasks in their respective areas. This section gives an overview of the task areas and then explains how to access the tools for both ABAP and Java.

Task Areas

· Administration

Setting up of the various tools for Process Integration, system monitoring, user management. An administrator must be involved in the installation process. For more information, see the Installation Guide on SAP Service Marketplace at service.sap.com/instguidesNW2004s.

· Technical Configuration

Contains the configuration of the runtime components. This includes the settings for the Integration Engine and the adapters. This configuration depends on the components implemented in the existing system landscape; the components can be configured independently of the design and configuration of the collaborative process by consultants, administrators, or both. For more information about technical configuration, see Configuration of Usage Type Process Integration (PI).

· Design

This area covers the design of collaborative processes by a development or consultant team. This involves the maintenance of all information required for the integration of the applications (integration scenario, interfaces, mapping, routing, business systems). This information is referred to as Process Integration Content, abbreviated to XI Content.

· Configuration

This area covers the configuration of collaborative processes by a development or consultant team. Inbound and outbound processing, logical routing, technical routing, and mapping are all configured for a particular configuration scenario and a specific system landscape. This task area also includes the maintenance of configuration data for the IDoc adapter.

· Monitoring

Includes the monitoring of distributed processes at runtime. This includes monitoring of the message flow (with respect to throughput, for example), and analysis and further processing of messages that have not been processed (status tracking). The monitoring of processed IDocs and RFCs in the corresponding adapters also belongs to the monitoring task area.

It is a seamless transition from the technical configuration (an administrative task) to the configuration of the collaborative process. For example, the IDoc adapter must access metadata that describes the structure of an IDoc. Which IDocs are to be processed depends on the collaborative process (configuration). In order to access the metadata of an IDoc, there must be an RFC connection to the system that will send or receive the IDocs (technical configuration). The latter task is likely to fall to an administrator, the former to a consultant.

User Roles

To access the functions of SAP Exchange Infrastructure, you require the authorizations that are connected to the user roles. They roughly correspond to the task areas described above.

Roles for ABAP and Java Tools

Role	Task Area
SAP_XI_DISPLAY_USER	Grouping together of the display authorizations for all Exchange Infrastructure tools
SAP_XI_DEVELOPER	Design
SAP_XI_CONFIGURATOR	Configuration
SAP_XI_CONTENT_ORGANIZER	Organizing and structuring the contents of the Integration Repository, Integration Directory, and the SAP System Landscape Directory; such tasks are normally not carried out by a developer, for example, the maintenance of software components
SAP_XI_MONITOR	Monitoring
SAP_XI_ADMINISTRATOR	Administration and technical configuration

On the ABAP side, the transactions assigned to these roles can be accessed from the user-specific menus.

Technically speaking, the roles specified here are composite roles that each reference a single role for accessing Java applications and a single role for accessing the respective ABAP transactions. Users must only be assigned the composite roles. You then have automatic access to the ABAP and the Java tools.

Since user management is located on the ABAP side, users must log on to the ABAP side once to change their initial password.

Accessing Tools

The tools for Process Integration are implemented both as ABAP transactions and Java applications.

· SAP systems based on SAP Web AS 6.40 or higher provide ABAP transactions for the configuration of the Integration Engine and the IDoc adapter, for the generation of ABAP proxies, and for monitoring. When users who have been assigned one of the roles specified above log on to an SAP system of this type, they can use their personal user menu to access the transactions they require.

· The Java part is accessed from a start page. You can access this start page from the respective user menu, from the area menu, and from certain ABAP transactions (Start Integration Builder). Alternatively, you can access it directly by calling transaction SXMB_IFR.

If you know the HTTP address of the start page, you can also call this link directly in the Web browser.

Integration Builder: Start Page

In addition to the Integration Builder, you can also call the Runtime Workbench and the System Landscape Directory (see also System Landscape Directory in SAP Exchange Infrastructure) from the start page.

Functions of the Integration Builder

Phase	Functions	Link to Start Page
Design	Designing integration scenarios, integration processes, interfaces, and mappings, as well as Java proxy generation.	Design (Integration Repository)
Configuration	Defining configuration scenarios, collaboration profiles, collaboration agreements, receiver determinations, and interface determinations.	Configuration (Integration Directory)

Single Sign-On

You can configure Exchange Infrastructure in such a way that you can call the Integration Builder, the System Landscape Directory, and the Runtime Workbench using Single Sign-On.

If you use Single Sign-On, you only need to enter your user and password once. You can then open all other Process Integration tools without having to authenticate yourself.

Note that you cannot initially change the logon language when you call another tool because Single Sign-On means that no new logon dialog is displayed. If you need to change the logon language, you can do so in the Integration Builder (Design or Configuration) by making the appropriate settings under Personal Settings.

For more information about configuring Single Sign-On, see Configuration of Usage Type Process Integration (PI).