Customer Reviews

SAP® BW: A Step-by-Step Guide

5 star:		(0)
4 star:		(4)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(6)
1 star:		(5)

 

 

I am a SAP Consultant for FICO for the last few years and I have experience in Data Warehousing projects. Now I have entered into the world of SAP-BIW, with my past experience in DW. I am involved currently in a SAP-BIW project.

SAP- BIW has a Back End called 'Administrator Work Bench', which is all about Data Modelling, Data Targets which leads Info cubes, Info source and Data source. The back end process is all about gathering data from the data sources and put them in BIW thru R/3. The Front End is called 'Business Explorer' and this helps in viewing the data gathered for decision processing.

Critical points about the Book: The Book deals only in Back End processes and it does not teach about Front End, except querying (chapter 5). To know about Front End extensivley, one has to read "SAP BW Reporting Made Easy, 2.0B/2.1C" by SAP Labs Inc. Simplification Group.

Further even in Back End, it is not giving any info abt data modelling or data designing. It merely teaches how to transfer the data from Data source to BIW thru R/3. Regret that, it is not covering complicated transfers. This book is in-complete in many aspects. In other words, the book teaches the core functions required from BIW Consultant for handling the Back end processes.

Positive points: Authors deserve appreciation for having written a book needed in the crucial time, since SAP- BIW is getting implemented in many places. The book is concise and clear in whatever topics they deal with.

I should also say that this book can be useful from beginners to intermediate level. Beginners mean, those who have prior experince in SAP or in Data Warehousing but new to SAP- BIW.

Thanks for reading.

Nowhere in the book, nor on Amazon detailed info nor in the "view pages inside" is mentioned that the book treats BW 2.0 and IS NOT GOOD for BW 3.1 or later.

I had to read all the buyers reviews and to find out about the BW version, only after I had the book ordered and sent to me. So Because I use 3.2 I have sent back this book. It's not up-to-date, there seems not to be a reprint for BW 3.0

So it was not useful to me. I am very disappointed.

The book can show you some tasks to do in BW 2.0 but it learns you nothing if you have other cubes to make in different SAP applications.

Also, it does not mention the transaction names behind the screens printed. Pitty, since this could have helped us when working in BW 3.0 (screens and menus can change but often the TX's remain the same)...

With this book, you can seat down in front of the terminal and begin using BW right away.

On the other hand, you better have some experience building Data Warehouses prior to using BW. There might be 2 or 3 ways to build a business solution and this book is not necessarily a good source for "best practices" or architecture concepts. A good book that could complement this one is "Mastering the SAP Business Information Warehouse".

As title suggests this book is step by step guide. I think author has assumed you already have knowledge of SAP BW concepts. It walks you through steps on how to create infocubes, load data and create queries and workbooks. Its EXTREMELY useful for people who are thinking to self-train themseleves in BW area . NOT meant for expereince BW people ...

I am an ABAPer, working on a BW project, and have access to BW system to carryout some self-study. I needed some reference to guide me through various aspects of BW technical tasks.

Having read some reviews and browsing many of the BW books in the market, I felt that this book is the one I need. I didn't want the theory behind data warehousing. I needed to know what each of those BW objects are, how they are related, and how to create them.

I am somewhat satisfied with the book as far as what I wanted to learn right now. However, I think much more could have been done. Surprisingly, I don't see any other book on BW that shows 'how to.'

The CD that comes with the book is a joke. Completely worthless to me.

If you have gone through BW training, this book may not be of much use to you. If you can find some other book that deals with fundamental technical aspects of BW, you might want to consider that. If you have nothing to refer to, you will be OK in purchasing this book.

Currently BW 3.0B is used. But the book deal with BW 2.0B. Too late version. Also The book deal in step-by-step way, so It couldn't treat details.

If you are really a novice, it will be good.
But If you have any experience and want to know more advanced topics, It will be not a good book.

The subtitle of this book should be A Step-by ... Guide. The chapters methodically detail the steps in creating the BW objects, with ample use of screenshots. However, some steps are neglected, and then data that you haven't entered is refered to in later steps. The data is easily entered by backing up and repeating the steps you've done in the previous sections and making up sample data, but there's no way that anyone followed the steps as written successfully. Poor QA here. That said, for someone looking for a book that will help them get a sample cube and queries running quickly, this is the book.

This book is published in 2002 sometime. So the concepts are for the version3.5 or less. The Current version is 7.0 and above. The book is good enough till version3.5 but not for 7.0 and above.SAP(R) BW: A Step-by-Step Guide

I paid lots of money for this book when I bought from Barnes & Noble... I paid 70$

and I dont see anything close to what I am studying since the book is written for version 3.5 and latest version is 7.0 !!!!

Dont get fooled...

Ask to buy for 5$

Anybody buying this book to learn some BW will be very much disappointed. Like the way the book is organised but older stuff. I can't beleive the greedy publiser is still selling this book. Not only they should stop selling, also should recall the book.