SAP connectivity is a big topic on this blog—especially when it comes to production and production planning. In this article, we’ll take a look at long texts. The term “long text” refers to a pattern that is used in many SAP contexts and business objects. A long text lets you...
Peakboard applications are often used in paperless environments. But what if a piece of paper is necessary to identify a pallet, a package, or a warehouse bin? One answer is to use a paperless e-ink display. In this article, you will learn how to transfer data from a Peakboard app...
A safety cross is one of the most common methods for visualizing safety in lean manufacturing. The cross typically consists of 31 rectangles, which represent the 31 days in a month. Each day, the corresponding rectangle is colored in, according to what happened: Green - No accident Orange - Light...
Besides the SQL Server, SAP is the most used data source in Peakboard applications. We already have many SAP articles on this blog. In this article, we’ll list the 10 most common use cases for the SAP data source, and give a quick rundown on how to build them. Of...
In this blog, we’ve talked a lot about how to connect Peakboard and SAP. We’ve always used Peakboard’s built-in SAP integration, which is based on SAP’s RFC protocol. In more than 95% of all cases, this is the best choice for a perfect, smooth, and fast SAP connection. However, there...
Back in the 90s, calling SAP RFC function modules was pretty straightforward. There were import, export, and table parameters. The imports and exports could either be scalar or structured—and that was the end of the story. Over the years, more complex parameters where pressed into this structure, and “Changings” became...
As readers of this blog know, we have a lot of articles about SAP. The last one was SAP on fire - how to perfectly integrate LUA scripting with SAP. But there was something missing in that article, which we will discuss now. In this article, we will learn how...
Because SAP is one of the top 3 systems used with Peakboard, there are already a lot of SAP articles available on this blog. But those articles cover how to access SAP for reading and writing from a data source. In this article, we will learn how to make sophisticated...
In an earlier article, we discussed how to build an ideal SAP RFC function modules to be connected to Peakboard. The basic idea is that the RFC has multiple scalar input parameters, and it returns a single table with the payload. This architecture serves the Peakboard side perfectly, because every...
Peakboard works well with a lot of things relating to SAP production. In this, article, we will learn how to access the components of a production order in SAP. The term components refers to products that are needed to fulfill a production order, such as: The parts that are needed...
Peakboard is often used with SAP in production environments. One of the most common use cases is building interactive terminals for confirming operations of production orders. An operation of a production order might require multiple confirmations. For example, a confirmation might be needed for starting the operation, submitting an update,...
In another article, we discussed how to get the capacity of a workplace. This article covers a common way to list or process the work orders of a workplace. We will use the data from a transaction COOIS to get the work orders. Technically, we are executing the report behind...
One of the top 5 use cases for Peakboard in production environments is showing the current orders, operations, and load of one or more workplaces. To determine the load of a workplace, we need the capacity that is currently available for that workplace. The best way to get this is...
Within the available Peakboard connectors, there are multiple options for accessing different SAP objects: reports, MDX, BAPI/function modules, tables, queries, etc. The right one to use often depends on what is already there and what the customer is able to build on their own. For example: When you already have...
SAP Queries can be seen as a very early version of what we call self-service business intelligence. In this article, we cover some basic information about SAP Queries and how to use them in Peakboard. One important thing before we start: There’s no installation necessary in SAP. You only need...
SAP Business Warehouse (BW) can be seen as a module within the SAP product portfolio that is used for analysis. Usually, the modules of the production environment (e.g. FI for financials or MM for material management) send their data to BW. Then, in BW, the data is processed into special...
Peakboard supports a lot of different object types that you can access in SAP. Besides RFC function modules, queries, tables, and MDX commands, it is also possible to execute and process ABAP reports. In order to do so, it’s necessary to install a small, generic function module in the SAP...