SAP R/3: A Database Application System
Alfons Kemper
(University of Passau)
Donald Kossmann
(University of Passau)
Florian Matthes
(Technical University of Hamburg-Harburg)
Many database applications in the real world are no longer built on
top of a stand-alone database system. Rather, generic (standard)
application systems are employed in which the database system is one
integrated component. SAP is the market leader for integrated
business administration systems, and its SAP R/3 product is a
comprehensive software system which integrates modules for finance,
material management, sales and distribution, etc. From an
architectural point of view, SAP R/3 is a client/server application
system with a relational database system as back-end. SAP supports a
choice between a variety of commercial relational database products.
The goal of this tutorial is to present the distributed system
architecture, the data model, the database programming language, the
database interfaces, the transaction and process model and the system
evolution concepts of SAP R/3 and to relate them to established
database and distributed system concepts.