In this blog series, I will try to cover use cases of OData
in SAP Fiori. Lets start with introduction to OData in this blog.
If you plan to expose your SAP Data (Table or Query Data) to
external environment like UI5/Fiori or HANA, then you need to push your data in
a form of API. By API we mean, using OData we will generate a service link
that can be accessed via internet and can be used to perform CRUD operations.
SAP OData in SAP ABAP environment is just like another ABAP Class. We can
access the methods of this class using SEGW transaction. We can write our
required code here for the data manipulation and once we activate the class,
the service link that we generate will act accordingly.
Definition
SAP OData is a standard
Web protocol used for querying and updating data present in SAP using ABAP,
applying and building on Web technologies such as HTTP to provide access to
information from a variety of external applications, platforms and devices.
In SAP, we use SEGW transaction
code to create an OData Service. SEGW stands for Service Gateway.
Architecture of SAP OData
Here, we will discuss
about the High level architecture of SAP OData.
SAP OData High Level Architecture
Why we need ODATA
SAP OData comes with
multiple advantages. It not only helps us to expose data but also helps a
customer to access data from anywhere and any device. If there will be no OData
services, then the data will remain on premise and in case a user needs to access
their data, they might have to visit the data location, which is uncomfortable
for the digital world.
Advantages of an ODATA
Using SAP OData provides
us following advantages:
- It helps to
obtain human readable results i.e. you can use your browser to see the
output data
- It is very
easy and relatively fast to access data
- It uses all
the standards of web protocols i.e. GET, PUT, POST, DELETE, and QUERY
- It uses
Stateless Applications: It means Server does not save any data of Client
(e.g. UI5 Application) and treats every OData call as a new call
- It receives
data in form of related pieces of information, one leading to another: It
is an interaction pattern known as “alert-analyse-act”,
“view-inspect-act”, or “explore & act”. According to this pattern not
all data are loaded together, and a user analyses a data and reaches its
required information after navigation. In this way the data loads quickly
and correctly.
SAP OData V2 (Version 2)
OData v2 is a set of new
standards which are add-ons to SAP OData V1, and these are as follows:
- Client-side
sorting and filtering
- All requests
can be batched
- All data is
cached in the model
- Automatic
Message handling
You can read more about
SAP OData v2 vs OData v1 here.
SAP OData V4 (Version 4)
OData v4 is the latest
upgradation to the SAP OData services which comes with some addition and some
reduction of features, such as:
- The new
version brings simplification in terms of data binding. The new OData V4
model simplifies the data binding parameter structure.
- OData v4
requires only asynchronous data retrieval.
- The Batch groups
are solely defined via binding parameters in the new OData v4 calls with
the corresponding parameters on the model as default.
- It supports
use of an operation binding. And now it is much easier to bind operation
execution results to controls.
- Create,
Read, Update and Delete (Remove) operations are available
implicitly via the bindings
- In OData v4,
the Metadata is only accessed via ODataMetaModel
In my next blog, I will
try to cover SAP Netweaver Gateway.
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