Updating SAP ABAP Systems on UNIX and Linux: SAP MaxDB

Upgrade Schedule Planning

You need to create an exact schedule for your SAP system upgrade.

Prerequisites

You have decided on the scenario strategy.

Context

Procedure

  1. Decide when to begin preparing for the upgrade.

    When you start, the upgrade preparations depend not only on the length of the preparations but also on the length of the upgrade itself.

    To determine the expected total length of the upgrade of your production system, perform a test upgrade of an SAP system with a similar set of data (a system copy of your production system is ideal

  2. Decide when to start the upgrade.

    If you have special requirements regarding the availability of your SAP system, adjust the procedure and the length of the upgrade to fit the expected amount of downtime.

    During the upgrade, various actions are performed by and in the shadow system. The runtime of these actions depends on various factors and is therefore specific to each SAP system:

    • Creating the shadow repository

    • Importing the additional software packages such as languages, support packages, and add-ons.

      The minimum runtime of the import phase increases with every support package, add-on, and language that is included.

    • Adjusting modifications to the ABAP Dictionary objects (transaction SPDD)

    • Mass activation and distribution

    If you have chosen Standard or Downtime-optimized, you can continue to use your SAP system in production operation during these actions, as they run in the Preprocessing roadmap step.

    If you finish the preparation before the scheduled start of downtime, the upgrade procedure will wait with the start of the downtime until you trigger it. You can trigger the start of the downtime by choosing Next when the Preprocessing roadmap step is completed.



    Upgrade Up- and Downtime
  3. Take the necessary measures to extend the time in which the upgrade can run unmonitored.

    • Specify all mount directories at the start of the upgrade.

      The Software Update Manager asks you to specify mount directories when you start upgrading. This significantly increases the amount of time the upgrade can run without user input.

    • Early locking of the ABAP Workbench

      If you are sure that you can do without the ABAP Workbench, confirm the lock when you are asked for the first time.

  4. Decide when a full backup is performed after the upgrade.

    The full database backup is a prerequisite for resuming production operation of your system when archiving is deactivated.

    It has to be carried out after you have performed all necessary follow-up activities. This has the advantage that all database changes resulting from follow-up activities are included in the full backup.

  5. Decide when production operation resumes.

    If possible, resume production operation only after you have performed all required follow-up activities.