The Function of The SAP Extractor and How To Extract SAP Data

To understand the functioning of the SAP Extractor and how to extract SAP data, it is necessary to step back and explore SAP Data Services in a nutshell.

SAP Data Services is a software application that is used widely for data integration and transformation, helping to optimize and execute workflows for the extraction of SAP data from several sources. It might be from various applications, data stores, web services, and databases. After data extraction is completed, the mined data may be processed, integrated, and transformed to cater to the specific requirements of businesses.

Among the critical uses of this data is real-time analytics, based on which crucial decisions may be taken to keep ahead of the competition.

Apart from initiating processes to extract SAP data, there are many other aspects of SAP Data Services. This software application is extensively used for geocoding, auditing, data profiling, addressing standardization, and text analysis. These functions are apart from the routine data transformations like filters, calculations, joins, and aggregations that the Service is capable of.

An exclusive facet of SAP data is its support for the Change Data Capture (CDC) feature that allows input of data for stream-processing systems and data warehouses.

The SAP Extractor Explained

We have seen that one of the important functions of the SAP Data Service is to integrate and transform data. It allows users to develop and execute workflows to extract SAP data from various source systems, such as data stores, databases, applications, and web services.

Once this data is extracted, it can be optimized by the business for real-time analytics and report generation after transforming and processing it to bring it in sync with their needs. The extracted data can also be used for querying Data Services. This leads to quick responses as per a pre-settled workflow, as well as batch processing. Both these actions are a part of the older version of data transformation.

The SAP Extractor is more popularly known as the BW Extractor. It is a highly optimized data management tool of SAP used to extract SAP data from the source systems to be stored in downstream data warehouses or business intelligence systems.

Summing up, the key goal of the SAP Extractor is to extract SAP data for entering into SAP BW applications. It is also used for integrating data, even for SAP clients that do not use the SAP BW.

The Purpose of the SAP Extractor

Let us now explore how the SAP Extractor works to extract SAP data, a highly simplified process as it is automated and fully managed by SAP. The SAP Extractor can be either a customized one with the capability to provide details of full-load delta processes of different types or a routine Data Source. The activity of data transfer of the program is controlled remotely by SAP BW.

Even though the process to extract SAP data is a seamless one, it cannot be started straightaway and transferred to the input layer of the SAP Business Warehouse. It is necessary to first use an InfoPackage in the scheduler to define the load process. This is initiated by a request IDoc to the source system after the InfoPackage is applied with process chains used in executions.

Types of SAP Data Extractors

Three types of SAP Data Extractors are available to extract SAP data.

1. Application-Specific Content Extractors that are optimized to extract SAP data with BW content, FI, HR, CO, SAP CRM, and LO cockpit.
2. Application-Specific Customer-Generated Extractors that are useful for the extraction of data related to LIS, FI-SL, and CO-PA.
3. Cross Application Generic Extractors that work exclusively with the DB View, Infoset, and Function Modules.

The SAP Extractor used by a business depends on its exclusive need to extract SAP data and the infrastructure and applications supporting it.

How To Extract SAP Data with The SAP Extractor

How you extract SAP data with an SAP Extractor depends on the specific application. The SAP Business Warehouse gets access to the BI content after the Extractors are hard-coded for the Data Source. However, before this process, it must be ensured that the structure of the Extractors matches the architecture of the Data Source.

To extract SAP data and move it to the Business Warehouse, you can select an Extractor from various options. After an Extractor recognizes a Data Source, it can identify the data that needs to be extracted and the tables that contain the said data in a read-only form.

Complex as it may seem, this whole process to extract SAP data with SAP Extractors is fully automated and does not need human intervention at any level.

The USP of an SAP Extractor when extracting SAP data is that it can be used regardless of the application. However, for this to be made possible, it is essential that the SAP extractor has related database views, master data attributes or texts, SAP query functional areas, or transaction data from all transparent tables. For all these types of data, the Data Source can read and transfer data to the BW.

The SAP Extractor has, over the years, always stayed ahead of the competition in the domain of Enterprise Resource Planning products. It has stood its ground very well before the other majors in this niche, such as Oracle, Microsoft, Salesforce, and other competitors.

Summing Up

A post that focuses on how and why to extract SAP data will not be complete without mentioning the highly effective SAP ETL (Extract, Transform, and Load) tool. It allows extracting SAP data from various sources, transforms the extracted data to match the data structure supported by the target system, and finally, loads the processed data into a data warehouse or a centralized storage repository.                

The SAP Extractor from SAP Data Services meets the exclusive needs of the SAP Business Warehouse.