Construct a SAP Utility for Monitoring, Logging & Alerting Basis

Introduction

 

Whereas migrating SAP programs to Azure, Microsoft fine-tuned it’s capability administration processes, minimizing downtime, danger, and prices and enhancing worker efficiencies. Optimizing on Azure permits us to design an SAP setting that’s agile, environment friendly, and versatile to develop and alter with our enterprise wants.

 

So you have got determined emigrate SAP your programs to Azure. It’s a giant transfer, and taking the precise steps could make the transition clean and manageable. IoTCoast2Coast took a measured strategy to maneuver probably the most delicate information and confidential workloads with SAP programs.

 

The precise strategy makes it attainable emigrate mission-critical SAP programs to Azure, gaining most price financial savings, scalability, and agility, with out disrupting enterprise operations. Our horizontal technique means transferring low-risk environments resembling our sandboxes first, giving us expertise with Azure migration with out risking important enterprise features within the course of. Utilizing a vertical technique to maneuver complete low-impact programs provides us expertise with Azure manufacturing processes.

 

Prerequisite

 

To configure Azure AD integration with SAP Cloud Platform, you want the next objects:

1. Azure Subscription
2. Fundamental Azure information
3. An Azure AD tenant
4. SAP Cloud Platform Id Authentication tenant
5. A person account in SAP Cloud Platform Id Authentication with Admin permissions.
6. An Azure AD subscription. If you do not have an Azure AD setting, you will get a one-month trial right here
7. SAP Cloud Platform single sign-on-enabled subscription

Definition

All through the doc, these phrases are used:

Creating one of the best SAP setting with Azure

 

Azure is the popular platform for SAP. As the highest SAP-certified cloud supplier, Azure is ready to reliably run a mission-critical SAP setting on a trusted cloud platform constructed for enterprises. Azure meets scalability, flexibility, and compliance wants.

 

Azure can run probably the most full set of SAP purposes throughout dev-test and manufacturing eventualities in Azure, and be totally supported. Azure is licensed for extra SAP options than another cloud supplier, together with options like SAP HANA and S/four HANA, SAP Enterprise Suite, SAP NetWeaver, and SAP Enterprise One to call just a few.

 

Azure additionally carries numerous advantages when internet hosting the SAP platform, together with:

• The strongest and most various portfolio of cloud companies: software program as a service (SaaS), platform as a service (PaaS), and infrastructure as a service (IaaS).
• Full assist for a various set of on-premises to cloud migration methods.
• World-wide area protection with 54 Azure areas throughout the globe.
• Deep integration with Azure Lively Listing and single-sign-on capabilities with SAP Cloud.as PCI DSS.

Making a telemetry resolution for SAP on Azure

 

The distributed nature of our enterprise course of setting led us to look at a broader resolution, one which would offer complete telemetry and monitoring for our SAP panorama, but additionally for another enterprise processes that comprised the end-to-end enterprise panorama at Microsoft. Our implementation was pushed by the next necessary objectives:

• Combine complete telemetry into our monitoring.
• Transfer in direction of holistic well being monitoring of each purposes and infrastructure.
• Create an entire view of end-to-end enterprise processes.
• Create a contemporary, standards-based construction for our monitoring programs.

Targets and drivers

 

Microsoft developed a telemetry platform in Azure referred to as the Unified Telemetry Platform (UTP). UTP is a contemporary, scalable, dependable, and cost-effective telemetry platform that’s utilized in a number of completely different enterprise course of monitoring eventualities in Microsoft, together with our SAP-related enterprise processes.

 

UTP is constructed to allow service maturity and enterprise course of monitoring throughout CSEO. It gives a standard telemetry taxonomy and integration with core Microsoft information monitoring companies. UTP permits compliance and the upkeep of enterprise requirements for information integrity and privateness. Whereas UTP is the implementation we selected, there are quite a few methods to allow telemetry on Azure.

 

Capturing telemetry with Azure Monitor

 

To allow business-driven monitoring and a user-centric strategy, UTP captures as most of the important occasions throughout the end-to-end course of panorama as attainable. Embracing complete telemetry in our programs means capturing information from all out there endpoints to construct an understanding of how every course of flowed and which of the SAP parts had been concerned. Azure Monitor and its associated Azure companies function the core for our resolution.

 

Azure Utility Insights

 

Utility Insights gives an Azure-based resolution with which we will dig deep into our Azure-hosted SAP panorama and pull out all obligatory telemetry information. Utilizing Utility insights, we will routinely generate alerts and assist tickets when our telemetry signifies a possible error scenario.

 

Azure Log Analytics

 

Infrastructure telemetry resembling CPU utilization, disk throughput, and different performance-related information is collected from Azure infrastructure parts within the SAP setting utilizing Log Analytics.

 

Azure Information Explorer

 

UTP makes use of Azure Information Explorer because the central repository for all telemetry information despatched by means of Utility Insights and Azure Monitor Logs from our utility and infrastructure setting. Azure Information Explorer gives enterprise large information interactive analytics; we use the Kusto question language to sew collectively the end-to-end transaction circulate for our enterprise processes, for each SAP course of and non-SAP processes.

 

Azure Information Lake

 

UTP makes use of Azure Information Lake for long-term chilly information storage. This information is taken out of the recent and heat streams and stored for reporting and archival functions in Azure Information Lake to cut back the fee related to storing giant quantities of knowledge in Azure Monitor.

 

 

Implementing UTP in SAP on Azure

 

Step one in enabling our telemetry platform was to create a reusable customized technique and configuration desk to drive the constant creation of the telemetry payloads. The configuration desk defines the fastened construction of the payload in line with the UTP requirements.

 

The tactic then permits the calling utility to go an application-specific payload to populate the dynamic properties part of the telemetry occasions payload, after which provides SAP normal parts such because the occasion date and time, and system identifier. This technique can then be referred to as instantly from any ABAP code, in both synchronous or asynchronous modes.

 

For instance, in most enterprise processes in our ERP, we use SAP enterprise course of occasions to set off our telemetry occasions. The enterprise course of occasions share a customized examine routine framework constructed utilizing SAP Enterprise Rule Framework plus; then customized receiver lessons construct the dynamic properties of the payload and name the shared telemetry class.

 

When every occasion within the workflow is processed in SAP, the JSON payload is handed to Utility Insights utilizing an exterior REST service name, which connects to the UTP framework. The next determine accommodates an instance from our non-delivery order-to-cash course of.

 

 

Azure Monitor

 

Azure Monitor maximizes the supply and efficiency of your purposes and companies by delivering a complete resolution for gathering, analyzing, and appearing on telemetry out of your cloud and on-premises environments.

 

Azure Monitor can:

• Detect and diagnose points throughout purposes and dependencies with Utility Insights.
• Correlate infrastructure points with Azure Monitor for VMs and Azure Monitor for Containers.
• Drill into your monitoring information with Log Analytics for troubleshooting and deep diagnostics.
• Help operations at scale with good alerts and automatic actions.
• Create visualizations with Azure dashboards and workbooks.

The beneath diagram provides a high-level view of Azure Monitor. On the heart of the diagram are the information shops for metrics and logs, that are the 2 elementary forms of information utilized by Azure Monitor.

 

On the left are the sources of monitoring information that populate these information shops. On the precise are the completely different features that Azure Monitor performs with this collected information resembling evaluation, alerting, and streaming to exterior programs.

 

 

Monitoring information platform

 

All information collected by Azure Monitor matches into one in every of two elementary sorts, metrics and logs. Metrics are numerical values that describe some side of a system at a specific time limit. They’re light-weight and able to supporting close to real-time eventualities. Logs include completely different sorts of knowledge organized into information with completely different units of properties for every sort. Telemetry resembling occasions and traces are saved as logs along with efficiency information in order that it might probably all be mixed for evaluation.

 

 

Log information collected by Azure Monitor could be analyzed with queries to shortly retrieve, consolidate, and analyze collected information. You’ll be able to create and check queries utilizing Log Analytics within the Azure portal after which both instantly analyze the information utilizing these instruments or save queries to be used with visualizations or alert guidelines.

 

Azure Monitor makes use of a model of the Kusto question language utilized by Azure Information Explorer that’s appropriate for easy log queries but additionally consists of superior performance resembling aggregations, joins, and good analytics. You’ll be able to shortly be taught the question language utilizing a number of classes.

 

Information collected by Azure Monitor?

 

Azure Monitor can gather information from quite a lot of sources. You’ll be able to consider monitoring information in your purposes in tiers ranging out of your utility, any working system and companies it depends on, right down to the platform itself. Azure Monitor collects information from every of the next tiers,

• Utility monitoring information: Information in regards to the efficiency and performance of the code you have got written, no matter its platform.
• Visitor OS monitoring information: Information in regards to the working system on which your utility is working. This could possibly be working in Azure, one other cloud, or on-premises.
• Azure useful resource monitoring information: Information in regards to the operation of an Azure useful resource.
• Azure subscription monitoring information: Information in regards to the operation and administration of an Azure subscription, in addition to information in regards to the well being and operation of Azure itself.
• Azure tenant monitoring information: Information in regards to the operation of tenant-level Azure companies, resembling Azure Lively Listing.

Azure Insights

 

Azure Monitoring information is simply helpful if it might probably improve your visibility into the operation of your computing setting. Azure Monitor consists of a number of options and instruments that present beneficial insights into your purposes and different assets that they rely upon. Monitoring options and options resembling Utility Insights and Azure Monitor for containers present deep insights into completely different features of your utility and particular Azure companies.

 

Utility Insights

 

Utility Insights monitor the supply, efficiency, and utilization of your net purposes whether or not they’re hosted within the cloud or on-premises. It leverages the highly effective information evaluation platform in Azure Monitor to offer you deep insights into your utility’s operations and diagnose errors with out ready for a person to report them. Utility Insights consists of connection factors to quite a lot of improvement instruments and integrates with Visual Studio to assist your DevOps processes.

 

 

Azure Lighthouse

 

Azure Lighthouse provides service suppliers a single management airplane to view and handle Azure throughout all their prospects with increased automation, scale, and enhanced governance. With Azure Lighthouse, service suppliers can ship managed companies utilizing complete and strong administration tooling constructed into the Azure platform. This providing can even profit enterprise IT organizations managing assets throughout a number of tenants.

 

 

Advantages

 

Azure Lighthouse lets you profitably and effectively construct and ship managed companies in your prospects. The advantages embody:

• Administration at scale
  Buyer engagement and life-cycle operations to handle buyer assets are simpler and extra scalable.
• Higher visibility and precision for patrons
  Prospects whose assets you are managing can have better visibility into your actions and exact management over the scope they delegate for administration, whereas your IP is preserved.
• Complete and unified platform tooling
  Our tooling expertise addresses key service supplier eventualities, together with a number of licensing fashions resembling EA, CSP, and pay-as-you-go. The brand new capabilities work with present instruments and APIs, licensing fashions, and associate applications such because the Cloud Resolution Supplier program (CSP). The Azure Lighthouse choices you select could be built-in into your present workflows and purposes, and you may observe your influence on buyer engagements by linking your associate ID.

There are not any extra prices related to utilizing Azure Lighthouse to handle your prospects’ Azure assets.

 

Capabilities

 

Azure Lighthouse consists of a number of methods to assist streamline buyer engagement and administration:

• Azure delegated useful resource administration: Handle your prospects’ Azure assets securely from inside your individual tenant, with out having to modify context and management planes. For more information, see Azure delegated useful resource administration.
• New Azure portal experiences: View cross-tenant data within the new My Prospects web page within the Azure portal. A corresponding Service supplier blade lets your prospects view and handle service supplier entry. For more information, see View and handle prospects and View and handle service suppliers.
• Azure Useful resource Supervisor templates: Carry out administration duties extra simply, together with onboarding prospects for Azure delegated useful resource administration. For more information, see our samples repo and Onboard a buyer to Azure delegated useful resource administration.
• Managed Companies provides in Azure Market: Provide your companies to prospects by means of personal or public provides, and have them routinely onboarded to Azure delegated useful resource administration, as an alternate to onboarding utilizing Azure Useful resource Supervisor templates. For more information, see Managed companies provides in Azure Market.
• Azure managed purposes: Bundle and ship purposes which are simple in your prospects to deploy and use in their very own subscriptions. The applying is deployed right into a useful resource group that you just entry out of your tenant, letting you handle the service as a part of the general Azure Lighthouse expertise. For more information, see Azure managed purposes overview.

Azure Monitor Logs

 

Azure Monitor shops log information in a Log Analytics workspace, which is an Azure useful resource and a container the place information is collected, aggregated, and serves as an administrative boundary. When you can deploy a number of workspaces in your Azure subscription, there are a number of concerns you need to perceive with the intention to guarantee your preliminary deployment is following our pointers to offer you a cheap, manageable, and scalable deployment assembly your group’s wants.

 

Information in a workspace is organized into tables, every of which shops completely different sorts of knowledge and has its personal distinctive set of properties primarily based on the useful resource producing the information. Most information sources will write to their very own tables in a Log Analytics workspace.

 

 

A Log Analytics workspace gives:

• A geographic location for information storage.
• Information isolation by granting completely different customers entry rights following one in every of our advisable design methods.
• Scope for configuration of settings like pricing tier, retention, and information capping.

As mentioned overview of the design and migration concerns, entry management overview, and an understanding of the design implementations advisable in your IT enterprise.

 

Greatest Practices

 

We realized a number of necessary classes with our UTP implementation for SAP on Azure. These classes helped inform our progress of UTP improvement, and so they’ve given us one of the best practices to leverage in future tasks, together with:

• Carry out a correct stock of inside processes. You could pay attention to occasions inside a course of earlier than you’ll be able to seize them. Performing an entire and knowledgeable stock of your online business processes is important to capturing the information required for end-to-end business-process monitoring.
• Construct for true end-to-end telemetry. Seize all occasions from all processes and collect telemetry appropriately. Information factors from all components of the enterprise course of—together with exterior parts—are important to reaching true end-to-end telemetry.
• Construct for Azure-native SAP. SAP on Azure is less complicated, and instrumenting SAP processes change into extra environment friendly and efficient when SAP parts are constructed for Azure.
• Encourage data-usage fashions and requirements throughout the group. Information requirements are important for an correct end-to-end view. If information is saved in several codecs or instrumentation in numerous components of the enterprise course of, the top reporting outcomes gained’t precisely symbolize the state of the enterprise course of.

Conclusion

 

Microsoft/ Azure is regularly refining and enhancing the business-process monitoring of SAP on Azure with UTP. It has enabled the enterprise to maintain key enterprise customers knowledgeable of enterprise course of circulate, offered an entire view of enterprise course of well being to management, and helped our engineering groups create a extra strong and environment friendly SAP setting. Telemetry and business-driven monitoring with UTP have remodeled the visibility we now have into our SAP on Azure setting, and persevering with journey towards deeper enterprise perception and intelligence is making your complete enterprise higher.