Virtualization for SAP Solutions

SAP and VMware working more closely together

communities-emailer@vmware.com — Fri, 11 Nov 2011 10:37:37 GMT

SAP announced today that they will work closely with VMware to Accelerate the Journey to Cloud Computing

Details can be found here:

http://www.sap.com/corporate-en/press/newsroom/press.epx?pressid=17747

So what does that mean for our customers ?

1.) Better support offerings:

As a part of this broader engagement, SAP and VMware expect to deliver an extended support program by integrating a configuration and health check for SAP systems running on VMware cloud infrastructure into SAP® GoingLive™ Check services and SAP EarlyWatch® Alert service. Customers should gain a better ability to monitor and manage their SAP systems running on the VMware platform.

2.) Better managebility:

SAP also intends to drive a radical improvement in the manageability of enterprise applications in private clouds by evaluating the delivery of VMware vSphere®-based virtual appliances, orchestrated by declarative models in the TOSCA language recently submitted to OASIS for standardization. SAP, VMware and EMC plan to collaborate to develop new automation and management tools that can interpret and execute the TOSCA models provided by SAP.

Together with all the vsphere5 proof points and Benchmarks, now is the time to virtualize and prepare for the cloud computing journey.

VMware vSphere5 fully virtualized SAP 3-tier SD benchmark published with HP

communities-emailer@vmware.com — Tue, 08 Nov 2011 10:15:43 GMT

Results: 32,125 SD Users and 175,320 SAPS*

This 3-tier benchmark pushes the database to the limit, showcasing that virtualized databases can support even the largest amount of users.

This is the largest fully virtualized SAP benchmark in history, and an excellent proof-point for:

VMware vSphere 5 scalability

Large virtualized databases

Supportability of large SAP systems

Details on the SAP SD benchmark certificate :

http://www.sap.com/solutions/benchmark/sd3tier.epx

Nearly 4 years ago, when we started with SAP Benchmarks we were able to get to 350 SD Users in a 2tier setup.

This result increases the envelope nearly 100 fold , showcasing the advancements in our Technology.

Performance report can be found here:

http://h71028.www7.hp.com/enterprise/downloads/HP_SAP_VMware_Performance_Brief.pdf

Link to HP:

http://h71028.www7.hp.com/enterprise/us/en/partners/vmware-hpvirtualsystem-SAPbenchmark.html

We would like to thank our Partner HP to make this possible.

*SAP ECC 6.0 with EHP 4 on HP ProLiant 460c G7, on Windows 2008 R2, database was SQL Server 2008, 0.99 sec avg. resp time

SAP certificate 2011044

VMware will be at SAP Sapphire NOW Madrid, Booth #745

communities-emailer@vmware.com — Wed, 02 Nov 2011 10:37:12 GMT

VMware will be at SAP SAPPHIRE NOW Madrid at Booth #745. If you’ll be there too, swing by our booth to discuss our latest best practices, solutions ,benchmark results and ways in to YOUR cloud.

Remember to also visit our sessions:

Spotlight Theatre Panel – Journey to the Cloud Game-Changing Co-innovation with the SAP Ecosystem with SAP, EMC and VMware
- VMware panelist Ray Blanchard
- Thursday, November 10, 2pm
- Spotlight Theatre in Hall 7

VMware Lecture Session “Virtualization and Cloud at SAP” by Dr. Markus Winter, Chief Product Owner, Virtualization & Cloud Management, SAP AG
VMware Expert Session “Benefits of SAP on a VMware Cloud” by Andre Kemp
VMware Expert Session "The route to your SAP business Cloud" by Christoph Reisbeck
- session ID: EXP567
- Wed, Nov 9th, 1pm,
- Lounge 2, Clubhouse

We look forward to seeing you there !

vSphere 5 for SAP proof points

communities-emailer@vmware.com — Tue, 30 Aug 2011 09:28:21 GMT

Hello everybody,

i thought i share all the current proof points for running SAP on vSphere 5 for your reference.

vSphere 5 SAP proof points:

Fujitsu Benchmark 24 vcpu's , 25120 SAPS, only 6% overhead compared to native.

http://download.sap.com/download.epd?context=40E2D9D5E00EEF7C28E4E62D4CB15EA689A3B74B610938E909A53777CAF358AA

Link to Fujitus Benchmark report:

https://sp.ts.fujitsu.com/dmsp/docs/performance-report-vmware-em-en.pdf

IBM vSphere 5 validation with X-series:

http://www-03.ibm.com/support/techdocs/atsmastr.nsf/WebIndex/WP101960

HP/Intel/VMware/ESG group vSphere 5 performance validation report:

http://h20195.www2.hp.com/v2/GetPDF.aspx/4AA3-4785ENW.pdf

vSphere 5 is fully supported by SAP since GA.

http://www.sdn.sap.com/irj/sdn/windows-virtualization

http://www.sdn.sap.com/irj/sdn/linux

SAP notes: 1056052 Windows

1122388 Linux

So overall we have done a lot of testing and worked with our Partners to ensure vSphere 5 will be a good solution for SAP , and i think we have proven it.

Michael

First SAP SD Benchmark on vSphere 5

communities-emailer@vmware.com — Wed, 03 Aug 2011 08:49:51 GMT

Results: 4600 SD Users and 25150 SAPS* in a 2tier setup with 24 vCPU's

This is the largest 2 tier virtualized benchmark in history, and an excellent proof-point for:

VMware vSphere scalability
Large virtualized databases
Supportability of large SAP systems
Extremely low overhead of just 6% compared to the same native System

Details on the SAP SD benchmark certificate :

Virtualized:

http://download.sap.com/download.epd?context=40E2D9D5E00EEF7C28E4E62D4CB15EA689A3B74B610938E909A53777CAF358AA

Native:

http://download.sap.com/download.epd?context=40E2D9D5E00EEF7CEBCA4322831E3B23C8D4D48DEFCCF18AA0175E55AFB03057

We have created two Benchmarks on the exact same Hardware.

Virtualized: 1 VM with 24 vCPU's on 24 threads and 25120 SAPS*

Native: 1 Server with 24 threads and 26630 SAPS*

This is the "worst case scenario" since the VM takes all the native resources without additional resources for the Hypervisor and enables a one to one comparison, resulting in an overhead of only 6%.

With vSphere 5 even the most demanding SAP workloads are ready for virtualization.

We worked with Fujitsu to create a Benchmark report:

https://sp.ts.fujitsu.com/dmsp/docs/performance-report-vmware-em-en.pdf

*SAP ECC 6.0 with EHP 4 on Fujitsu Primergy on SuSE Enterprise Linux 11 SP1, database was MaxDB 7.8.

SAP certificate 2011027 and 2011028

Flexpod for SAP released

communities-emailer@vmware.com — Fri, 20 May 2011 08:55:56 GMT

Hello everyone,

VMware,Netapp,Cisco and SAP worked together to create a solution that adapts and extends the existing

Flexpod for VMware architecture to SAP customers.

This solution allows

• Secure isolation of tenants and systems
• Seamless provisioning and deprovisioning
• Granular data protection • Unlimited data mobility • Monitoring and automation
management • Accounting and chargeback

Some of the highlights include the ability to both copy and clone SAP systems.

A copy in this context means , that the SAP system is copied via a Storage Snapshot

and the SID is changed in an automated post-processing. So you get a copy of the

source system with a different SID, that you can integrate in your existing SAP

Landscape.

A use case would be to create a QA system from the productive system.

A clone in this context means , that the SAP system is copied via a Storage Snapshot,

the SID stays the same and the system is isolated/fenced via the tenant isolation features.

A use case would be to create a training system with exact contents of the production system

This solution provides you with a pre-tested set of components that are fully integrated , as

well as a solutions guide on how to setup such a Landscape.

More details can be found here:

Flexpod for VMware:

http://www.netapp.com/us/technology/flexpod/

Flexpod for SAP:

http://www.netapp.com/us/media/ds-3166-flexpod-for-sap-applications.html

Michael Hesse

Virtualizing the SAPGUI with Thinapp is now supported

communities-emailer@vmware.com — Thu, 24 Mar 2011 10:22:08 GMT

With VMware ThinApp, applications are packaged into single executables that run completely isolated

from each other and the operating system for conflict-free execution on end-point devices.

Application packages can be deployed to different Windows platforms, eliminating costly

recoding and regression testing so you can easily migrate existing applications to Windows 7.

http://www.vmware.com/products/thinapp/overview.html

After several month of intense QA testing, SAP has released support for packaging the SAPGUI

with Thinapp. The support is documented in SAP support Note 66971.

Some excerpt from the Note: (please always download the latest version of the note from the SAP Notes system)

As of SAP GUI for Windows 7.20 patchlevel 5 the usage of SAP GUI on VMWare

ThinApp 4.6 (and higher) is supported:

o For the SAP GUI to work with Thinapp and Office 2003 you need to

change:

Search for "VirtualizeExternalOutOfProcessCOM=0 " and uncomment it

by removing the ";" at the beginning of the entry.

o For the SAP GUI to work with Thinapp and Office 2007 (2010) you

need to change three parameters in the "package.ini" file found in

the project folder

a) Search for the saplogon.exe entry and add an additional line with

"ForcedVirtualLoadPaths=%ProgramFilesDir%\Microsoft

Office\Office12\PPCORE.DLL"

For Office 2010 the entry looks like this:

"ForcedVirtualLoadPaths=%ProgramFilesDir%\Microsoft

Office\Office14\PPCORE.DLL"

b) Search for the saplgpad.exe entry and add an additional line with

"ForcedVirtualLoadPaths=%ProgramFilesDir%\Microsoft

Office\Office12\PPCORE.DLL"

For Office 2010 the entry looks like this:

"ForcedVirtualLoadPaths=%ProgramFilesDir%\Microsoft

Office\Office14\PPCORE.DLL"

c) Search for "VirtualizeExternalOutOfProcessCOM=0 " and uncomment it

by removing the ";" at the beginning of the entry.

Rebuild the package with "build.bat"

The usage of SAP GUI for Windows in conjunction with other virtualization

products like Microsoft App-V (Softgrid) is currently not supported.

This latest support statement is a result of the long term relationship between VMware and SAP

in supporting their joint customer needs.

Here you can find a whitepaper describing the details and installation process:

http://www.vmware.com/files/pdf/solutions/VMware-ThinApp-Virtualizing-SAP-GUI.pdf

Michael

VMware at SAP Virtualization week April 12th-14th in Palo Alto

communities-emailer@vmware.com — Mon, 21 Mar 2011 09:42:42 GMT

VMware will be at SAP Virtualization and cloud week in Palo Alto

If you will be there too, we will be happy to discuss

our latest best practices, solutions and benchmark results with you.

We will be at the Partner exhibit Tuesday afternoon in Building 1, Cafeteria

Also visit our sessions listed below.

http://www.sapteched.com/sapvweek/

VMware sessions:

http://www.sapteched.com/sapvweek/agenda/tuesday/

12:00-1:00 pm TRND09 - From Virtualization to Hybrid Clouds: Customer Scenarios & Lessons Learned
Joachim Rahmfeld

http://www.sapteched.com/sapvweek/agenda/thursday/
10:45-11:45 TRND21 - Securing and Protecting a Multi - Tier SAP Architecture on VMware vSphere
Vas Mitra, Andre Kemp

Partner session with VMware content:

http://www.sapteched.com/sapvweek/agenda/tuesday/

10:45-11:45 TRND22 - Solutions and Services to Operate SAP Systems in Virtualized and Cloud Infrastructures: Next Steps

Gunther Schmalzhaf, Bernhard Schulzki SAP

http://www.sapteched.com/sapvweek/agenda/thursday/
3:45-4:45 pm TRND08 - FlexPod for SAP: Elevating the SAP Landscape to the Cloud
Nils Bauer Netapp

http://www.sapteched.com/sapvweek/agenda/thursday/
3:45-4:45 pm OPS06 - Insourcing SAP - Systems Using VMware Virtualization

http://www.sapteched.com/sapvweek/agenda/thursday/
3:45-4:45 pm OPS15 - Virtualization and Cloud at SAP: How SAP Walks the Talk

Markus Winter SAP

VMware at SAP TechEd 2010 Las Vegas

communities-emailer@vmware.com — Sat, 16 Oct 2010 03:50:34 GMT

VMware will be at SAP TechEd 2010 Las Vegas. If you’ll be there too, swing by our booth 418 to discuss our latest best practices, solutions and benchmark results.

Remember to also visit our sessions:

"Miami Dade School District Virtualizes SAP With VMware: Architecture, Results, and Recommendations"
Tuesday 10:15am –11:15am ALM126, room L16 (ASUG)
"SAP On Vblock - Further Extending the SAP Landscape Into a Private Cloud"
Tuesday, Oct 19, 430-530pm ALM241, Room: Titian 2201A
"On-demand Intelligent Provisioning of SAP and Non-SAP Systems with VMware and UC4"
Tuesday 4:30-5:30pm BI218, Titian 2203
"SAP on VMware vSphere Performance Best Practices"
Thursday 10:30am, ALM245 Room Titian 2201A
"Virtualization of SAP" at Lounge 7 discussions in the Expert Networking Lounge hosted by Andre Kemp and Vas Mitra with Craig Reinhart/Miami Dade as a customer quest speaker

We look forward to seeing you there!

VMware @ Teched Berlin 2010 October 12-14 th

communities-emailer@vmware.com — Mon, 04 Oct 2010 09:43:15 GMT

VMware will be at SAP TechEd 2010 Berlin.

If you will be there too, swing by our booth 4.06 to discuss

our latest best practices, solutions and benchmark results.

Remember to also visit our sessions:

On-demand Intelligent Provisioning of SAP and Non-SAP Systems with VMware and UC4”

ID:ALM232 Tue 12:15-13:15

ALM216 - Near Zero Downtime Maintenance for SAP NetWeaver Portal

Room L7 Thursday 11:00-12:00

Management of a complex SAP landscape on vSphere

Expert Session Lounge 6 Tue: 14:30 - 15:00

"Virtualization of SAP"

Expert Session Lounge 7 Wednesday 15:00-15:30

I look forward to seeing you there!

New IBM/VMware whitepaper available

communities-emailer@vmware.com — Mon, 13 Sep 2010 09:12:01 GMT

Hello everyone,

We are happy to announce the availability of a new joint IBM/VMware whitepaper .

The IBM SAP International Competence Center (ISICC), the SAP Center of

Excellence / Value Prototyping and VMware carried out a Proof of Concept. to

show our experiences and recommendations running a so called “Blue Stack” of IBM

hardware and software components which deliver that dynamic infrastructure for a

typical SAP Business Suite landscape. This Proof of Concept shows that the IBM

Blue Stack offers a uniquely integrated, easy to manage and cost-effective way

to deliver mission-critical SAP applications, matched closely to business

needs.

The whitepaper targets "mainstream, average" SAP customer situations,

neither particularly small nor particularly large.

It is available here:

http://www.ibm.com/support/techdocs/atsmastr.nsf/WebIndex/WP101749

SAP

Application components in a real-world scenario:

SAP ERP, SAP NetWeaver BW,

SAP NetWeaver Portal, SAP NetWeaver Process Integration and SAP Solution

Manager.

Infrastructure components:

IBM DB2

SUSE Linux Enterprise

Server

VMware vSphere components

IBM System x platform

IBM XIV Storage

technologies

The PoC demonstrates that an integrated solution from IBM

enables:

• Greater CPU and memory utilization offers better SAP performance

for the same hardware investment

• Integrated XIV storage delivers faster

data transfer, improved performance and higher productivity

• Automated

failover, non-disruptive testing and faster disaster recovery reduces total

business risk

The specific use cases covered in this whitepaper show

various aspects IT departments use in their day to day business activities.

We show the benefits of using virtualization to run several SAP

applications in separate virtual machines (VMs) across one or two physical

servers. We simulate realistic business process workloads with the IBM Rational

Performance Tester. The ability to monitor the system behavior of Linux and DB2,

CPU- and memory utilization as well as storage I/O rates was accomplished using

standard tools from VMware and SAP.

To demonstrate business resiliency, we used VMware Site Recovery Manager

and the IBM XIV storage system to address high availability and disaster

recovery scenarios. We used IBM FlashCopy Manager in

order to create FlashCopy-based backups of the SAP production database.

We test cloning functionality using the IBM XIV storage system and describe the

proper set up and use of cloning scenarios.

Michael

SAP LinuxLab Performance tests on VMware

communities-emailer@vmware.com — Wed, 21 Jul 2010 09:28:09 GMT

Hi,

This year again the SAP LinuxLab workshop happened in St. Leon Rot at the SAP LinuxLab.

VMware was one of the participants and did a lot of Performance and functional testing.

Especially the results around Memory throughput and the "best" Linux I/O scheduler are interesting.

The Test-setup contained the latest VMware vSphere 4.1 Software and the latest Intel "Nehalem EX"

Servers. Test results showed excellent scaling and Performance of VMware vSphere 4.1.

Details can be found here:

http://www.sdn.sap.com/irj/sdn/linux (SAP Linuxlab Page)

http://www.sdn.sap.com/irj/sdn/go/portal/prtroot/docs/webcontent/uuid/90bf7257-166b-2d10-2fbb-ec137a5c9b86?QuickLink=linux (Actuall results Presentation)

Michael

SAP discovery System on VMware ESXi released by Partners

communities-emailer@vmware.com — Wed, 21 Jul 2010 08:56:50 GMT

SAP has released it's new Discovery System in Version 4.

http://www.sdn.sap.com/irj/sdn/discoverysystem

What is SAP Discovery System ?

SAP Discovery system is a preconfigured and

preinstalled SAP landscape that can help you explore SAP products before

deploying new software in your infrastructure. A full array of preinstalled

applications and development tools help you begin to evaluate SAP software,

demonstrate its benefits and train staff right away. Explore SAP ERP, the SAP

NetWeaver® technology platform, SAP NetWeaver Business Process Management (BPM),

the SAP NetWeaver Composition Environment (CE) and SAP BusinessObjects™ tools.

This time around the Hardware partners use ESXi 4 to enable delivery on a single Server.This allows customers not only to test SAP Software but also experience the benefits of VMware virtualization.

Links to the Partner offerings:

IBM: http://www-03.ibm.com/systems/x/solutions/infrastructure/erpcrm/sap/discoverysystem.html

HP: http://h20338.www2.hp.com/enterprise/cache/405647-0-0-225-121.html

Fujitsu: http://ts.fujitsu.com/it_trends/dynamic_infrastructures/solutions/sap_infrastructure/discoverysystem.html

Benchmark Report released on 3-tier Benchmark with Fujitsu

communities-emailer@vmware.com — Wed, 05 May 2010 23:14:57 GMT

Hello everyone ,

as promised in my previous blogpost, we have published a detailed Benchmark Report on the recently published 3-tier Benchmark with Fujitsu.

The Report can be found at our Techpaper section of the vmware Homepage.

http://www.vmware.com/files/pdf/Fujitsu_SAP_Three-Tier_Benchmark_on_vSphere_23-APR-2010.pdf

There should be no doubt anymore, if it is possible to virtualize large SAP systems . This Benchmark proves it.

Michael

First ever fully virtualized SAP 3-tier SD benchmark on VMware vSphere published with Fujitsu

communities-emailer@vmware.com — Mon, 19 Apr 2010 22:28:09 GMT

Results: 16,000 SD Users and 87,800 SAPS*

Unlike the previously published 2-tier benchmarks, this 3-tier benchmark pushes the database to the limit, showcasing that virtualized databases can support a large number of users.

This is the largest fully virtualized benchmark in history, and an excellent proof-point for:

VMware vSphere scalability
Large virtualized databases
Supportability of large SAP systems

Details on the SAP SD benchmark certificate :

http://download.sap.com/download.epd?context=40E2D9D5E00EEF7C1AB8A5873709BD5032A48D77A8A3FFD8F71D1611A257A8A3

We will follow up on the details of this benchmark and the results in a more detailed Technical paper very soon. Availability of the paper will be announced here. We would like to thank our Partner Fujitsu to make this possible.

*SAP ECC 6.0 with EHP 4 on Fujitsu Primergy on SuSE Enterprise Linux 10 SP2, database was MaxDB 7.8.

SAP certificate 2010016