SCC4 Client administration
SAP Basis service on the safe side
An important area of SAP Security is the analysis of the customer's own SAP programs, which are classically written in the proprietary SAP language ABAP. Here, too, as in all programming languages, security vulnerabilities can be programmed - whether consciously or unconsciously. However, the patterns of security vulnerabilities in ABAP code differ from those in Java stacks or Windows programs. The goal of these conventional programs is usually to either crash the program (buffer overflow) or to artificially execute the program's own code (code injection). Both is not possible in ABAP, since a crash of a process causes nothing else than the creation of an entry in the log database (Dump ST22) and a subsequent termination of the report with return to the menu starting point. So a direct manipulation as in other high level languages or servers is not possible. However, there are other manipulation possibilities.
Since jobs and backups should run at set times for organizational or technical reasons, automating them is a good idea. In simple, clear system environments, many SAP Basis administrators help themselves with SAP CPS (Central Process Scheduling) and simple ABAP batch jobs that start operations or other jobs. Since the desires and the system environments usually grow continuously, this approach becomes complex and confusing over time and troubleshooting often becomes difficult. As a result, maintainability often falls by the wayside and error-proneness can increase. If different jobs are strung together to form chains, further problems arise.
INNOVATION MANAGEMENT
The digitization of businesses and the emergence of new technologies mean that admins have to adapt to constantly changing conditions. Currently, the following trends (which are becoming more and more evident in the market) can be mentioned:
"Shortcut for SAP Systems" simplifies tasks in the area of the SAP basis and complements missing functions of the standard.
The website "www.sap-corner.de" offers many useful information about SAP basis.
After all, each SAP Basis expert sees different transactions as important.