SAP BW Architecture

Theoretically, SAP BW Architecture can be divided into 3 layers: Sources System, SAP BW Server and SAP BW OLAP.

SAP BW Architecture

Source system:

Source system is a reference system that functions as data provider for SAP BW.
There four type source system than can be SAP BW provider:

• mySAP.com components: SAP BW is fully integrated into mySAP.com component. Currently, predefined extraction structures and program from mySAP.com component are delivered by SAP. Therefore, we can upload data source from mySAP.com component directly into SAP BW.

• Non-SAP systems: SAP BW is an open architecture that can interface vis-à-vis tp external OLTP or legacy system. Based on information or data collected from heterogeneous system, SAP BW has possibility to be a consolidated data basis reporting to support management in decision making.

• Data Providers: Market research result from, for example, AC Nielsen USDun & Bradstreet can be loaded into SAP BW. The uploaded information can be used as benchmarking and measurement again our operative data.

• External databases: Data from external relational database can be loaded to SAP BW too.

SAP BW Server

SAP BW Server has several features:

• Administration Service: The administration service is responsible for organization within SAP BW. Administration service is available through the Administrator Workbench (AWB), a single point of entry for data warehouse development, administration and maintenance tasks in SAP BW.

• Metadata Service: SAP BW metadata services component provide both an integrated metadata repository where all metadata is stored and a Metadata Manager that handles all requests for retrieving, adding, changing, or deleting meta data.

• Extraction, Transformation, and Loading (ETL) Services: Depending on the source systems and type of data basis, the process of loading data into the SAP BW is technically supported in different ways.

• Storage Services: the storage service (known as SAP BW Data Manager) manages and provides access to different data target available in SAP BW, as well as aggregates stored in relational or multidimensional database management system.

SAP BW OLAP

The Online Analytical Processing (OLAP) layer allows us to carry out multi-dimensional analysis of SAP BW data sets. In principle, the OLAP layer can be divided into three components:

• BEx Analyzer (Microsoft Excel Based)

• BEx Web Application

• BEx Mobile Intelligence.

What I wrote above (Sources System, SAP BW Server and SAP BW OLAP) are the architecture of SAP BW (Business Information Warehouse) in global explanation.