DSAG Technologietage 2019 Review

The DSAG Technologietage 2019 conference was very interesting this year and with the theme "Do IT yourself - Wege in die Cloud: gemeinsam denken, individuell handeln" (translated: "Do IT yourself - Paths to the Cloud: Think together, act individually") was strongly characterized by SAP Cloud Platform solutions.

The location of the Technologie Tage at the World Conference Center Bonn with the historic Bundestag Plenary Hall was certainly an experience for many. The contrast between hypermodern cloud topics and the old Bonn Bundestag had its charm.

The new DSAG Technologietage Board Member Steffen Pietsch called for an API-First strategy from SAP in his keynote. You can watch the complete keynote again on YouTube.

Mr. Pietsch's demands regarding the API-First strategy were even more far-reaching. A very important aspect was the homogenization of the semantic content of the various information objects of SAP systems and modules.

In the working group (AK) Application Integration, the Cloud Integration Suite from SAP was presented by Dr. Udo Paltzer.

The Cloud Integration Suite includes the following SAP Cloud Platform products

• Cloud Platform Integration (CPI)
• API Management
• Workflow
• Business
• Enterprise Messaging & Functions
• Integration Content Advisor
• Internet of Things
• API Business Hub
• Open Connectors

The Cloud Integration Suite thus offers very comprehensive functionality that should cover all conceivable integration scenarios.

In the presentations by buco and Globus regarding the API-First Omni-Channel architecture, some important aspects were addressed that were not otherwise highlighted at the DSAG TT.

Firstly, one does not need to and should not wait for SAP to develop an API-First strategy. Rather, everyone should design an API-First strategy for themselves. You will quickly realize that integration is not the most important thing here, but only a technical aspect.

In the context of integration, API-First also does not mean that all interfaces must now be converted from RFC or SOAP to JSON API as quickly as possible. That in itself does not currently add any value. Rather, one should "embark on the journey" and it is recommended to start with innovation projects.

This can be, for example, the provision of basic customer services for websites, mobile apps, and other channels via API Management. The data objects and process flows that emerge with the API-First strategy should also not be directly based on backend objects or processes. Here, one should rather define their own semantics and processes within the framework of the API-First strategy. Only in this way can innovation ultimately take place.

If services do not yet exist in the backend as part of innovation projects, they can simply be implemented on the SAP Cloud Platform, for example as microservices. This is one of the great advantages of the SAP Cloud Platform, which offers many possibilities at this point.

An impression from the many conversations and presentations was that the need for information regarding SAP Cloud Platform and strategic topics such as API-First is still very high for many.

The distribution of various SAP Cloud Platform topics across different working groups does not make it any easier.

Perhaps DSAG should consider establishing a working group for SCP?

If you are interested in having the presentations presented to you again in detail or if you have questions about individual aspects of the presentations, you can contact me by email at d.belser@buco-consulting.de.

Additionally, you can find more detailed information in our blog posts.

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