Guided Procedure Authoring

Guided Procedure Browser

How to Access 

Select the Guided Procedure Catalog tile from SAP Solution Manager launchpad.


How to Create a New Guided Procedure

Before you create a new guided procedure, select the required application area. For more details, see the Create Guided Procedures for different Application Areas page. In the Guided Procedure Browser, the Create button opens the Create Guided Procedure wizard, to define basic settings for the guided procedure, before you edit the content. You can either create a new guided procedure, or copy the content of an existing one and adapt it to your needs, with Copy From. The original guided procedure is not changed.


Guided Procedure Creation Wizard

  1. Specify a meaningful name and description for the GP.
  2. You can define an initial number of guided procedure steps, or keep the proposed value. The number of steps can be changed later.
  3. Specify an ABAP package for the step and activity help texts. If you don't want to transport the guided procedure, you can choose "Temporary Package", otherwise specify a customer-specific ABAP package with the right transport layer.
  4. Set "Guided Procedure for Production System" flag, if the guided procedure is to be transported to a production system. If the GP is for testing purposes on the local system, or will be imported into a test system manually, do not set the flag.
  5. Set the flag "Enforce Step Sequence", to ensure that the steps are performed in sequence at runtime.


The second step of the roadmap sets search attributes for the guided procedure (optional). You can leave the search attributes initially empty, and define them later if required. For more details about setting search attributes, see the Create Guided Procedures for different Application Areas page.

Guided Procedure Maintenance

The Guided Procedure Maintenance looks as follows:

 

How To Add a New Step

To add a step, click on New, and select the step type in the menu, as shown below. You can also reuse an existing step. A new step will be inserted below the selected step, in the Steps tree. Step types can be standard, parent, plug-in or complete.


How to Define a Help Text

The step help text provides detailed information about each step, such as what needs to be done, and what will happen in the background. The "New" button in the help text section opens the Create New Document pop-up, which allows you to define documentation for a step or an activity.


You can create a new HTML document or upload a PDF. Here is a documentation with an uploaded PDF:


In case you would like to reuse an existing document by selecting button "Reuse". If you reuse an SE61 document for the help text, you can either use it directly, or you can either maintain it directly in the guided procedure maintenance (in this case a copy of this SE61 documentation will be performed into a new HTML document).

  1. To create a new document, enter the help text name and select OK.
  2. Edit the help text.


Ui5 Document Editor

The UI5 Document Editor has been enhanced to support accessibility, for instance, text-to-speech and navigation by keyboard.

Standard Steps

Standard steps can be Automatic, Manual, Custom or Mixed, depending on the contained activity types.

Automatic Steps

Automatic steps are standard steps which contain only automatic activities.

How to Create an Automatic Activity

Automatic activities are activities that can be carried out in a guided procedure without user interaction or manual steps. They are usually in a guided procedure step of type automatic or mixed. You can carry out several automatic activities in one step.

To create a backend class for the automatic activity, follow the steps described in the PDF

1. To add an automatic activity, select New --> Step --> Standard Step.

2. Select the "Automatic Activities" tab and click "New".

 

3. The Create New Activity pop-up opens:


4. Specify the Activity and Class Name.

5. Mark the activity as optional if you don't want its status to be taken into consideration in the step status calculation.

Manual Steps

Manual steps are standard steps which only contain manual activities.

Two types of manual activities are supported:

Simple manual activities consist of a description and either no navigation link, or a navigation link to a UI in the SAP Solution Manager, in the managed system, or an external link. The navigation link can be configured. For almost all simple navigation links like calling a transaction or URL in the SAP Solution Manager or the managed system, you can use the simple manual activities provided. You can insert the required jump-ins without any programming, as described here.

Expert manual activities consist of a description and a navigation link to a UI in the SAP Solution Manager or in the managed system. The navigation link is calculated by an ABAP class that you develop. Simple activities are usually sufficient, but if you need to put some more logic in the URL generation (e.g. authorization checks or additional parameters), you need to create an ABAP class and an expert manual activity, as described here. 


How to Add a Manual Activity

To add a manual activity, select the "Manual Activities" tab and click "New".

The Create New Activity pop-up opens:

  • Specify the Activity Name and choose the type "Simple" or "Expert". 
  • You can mark the activity as optional if you don't want its status to be taken into consideration in the step status calculation.

 

If the activity type is "Expert", specify the corresponding Activity class. To create a backend class for the expert manual activity, follow the steps described here.


Click "OK" to create the activity. You can edit the activity properties after it has been created. You can also reuse an existing activity from the list displayed if you click on "Browse" when the Use Existing option is selected.

 

You can create the documentation either by clicking on Document does not yet exist, or via the New button in the help text section, as explained previously.

 

Add Custom Step

Some tasks to be carried out in the step of a guided procedure require input values and a more complex logic in the back-end. Such steps usually need their own user interface for the user to input values. These tasks can be performed by custom steps. A custom step in a guided procedure is a step that contains its own user interface and own logic which is implemented in a back-end WebDynpro component. Deriving out of 7.20 SP5, To create a custom manual activity, for example to redirect the user to another link, you can implement custom classes. To create a custom step, follow the steps described here.


Add a Parent Step

You can group a number of steps as sub-steps of a parent step. The parent step contains a list of sub-steps with the following information: status, description, managed objects, responsible, last changed on/by.


Add 'Complete' Step

The Complete step is the last step in the guided procedure, which provides an overview of the execution status of the previous steps, so that the processor of the guided procedure can check whether he has performed all required activities. He can also generate an HTML report containing the documentation, status and logs of all activities in the guided procedure, and add a comment summarizing the overall execution status of the guided procedure. The comment in the Complete step will be displayed in the Guided Procedure Log.

A Complete step is optional, but strongly recommended.

  1. Press button "Add Complete Step".
  2. Provide a new step title and description, if required.
  3. Add a step help text summarizing all actions that the person executing the guided procedure has to do, to finalize it. For example: "Verify that all activities are rated green, generate the HTML report, and send it to  ..."

 In runtime view, the complete step looks like the screen shot below.

Activity and Step Plugins


Plug-in Creation

As a user with an Admin role, you can create a plug-in, register and customize it according to your preferences. In order to start the plug-in registration application, enter the transaction GPA_PLUGIN_MNGT.

The functionalities that can be performed in the plug-in registration application are:

  • Create new plug-in
  • Edit, delete, check and transport existing plug-in

Plug-in Step Creation

Before creating the Plug-in step, a few prerequisites are needed:

  • Create a class for the plug-in, the class must inherit from CL_GPA_PLUGIN_STEP.
  • Create a WebDynpro implementing the interface GPA_PLUGIN_CONTROL and containing the view to be displayed in design time.
  • Create a WebDynpro implementing the interface WD_IF_SISE_STEP and containing the view to be displayed in run time.
  • Create the help texts for design time and run time. This is not mandatory however it is recommended to explain what the plug-in does and how to use it


Plugin Activity Creation

In order to create a plug-in activity, there are some prerequisites that needs to be fulfilled:

  • Create a class for the plug-in, the class must inherit from CL_GPA_PLUGIN and redefine the method GET_PLUGIN_ATTRIBUTES which is used to return Name/Value attributes to all the plug-ins as well as meta data used to create controls in WebDynpro.
  • Create a class inheriting from the class CL_SISE_ACTIVITY_AUTO and redefining the method GET_NAV_LINK_NEW and EXECUTE_CONFIGURATION.
  • Put the treatment to be done when executing the activity in a private method and call it in EXECUTE_CONFIGURATION.
  • Create the help texts for design time and run time - not mandatory however it is recommended to explain what the plug-in does and how to use it.


Plug-in Check

  • Check the plug-in class exists and is valid
  • Check the application component exists
  • Check the package exists


Add an Activity Plug-in

Activity plug-ins can be used in automatic activities.

They offer a custom UI in the Maintenance view used to configure the plug-in.

They are delivered by SAP and can be reused by customers.

To integrate an activity plug-in:

  1. Select the "Automatic Activities" tab and click "New".
  2. In the "Create New Activity" pop-up, select the “Select a Plug-in” Radio button.
  3. Choose the Plug-in Activity from the list and specify the parameters according to the selected plug-in.
  4. Press OK.


Add a Step Plug-in

Step plug-ins offer:

  • A custom UI in the Maintenance view used to configure the plug-in.
  • A custom UI at runtime to execute the plug-in.
  • Documentation which is integrated in the plug-in.

Step Plug-ins are delivered by SAP and can be reused by customers.

The following step plug-ins are delivered by SAP:

  • Java Rolling Restart
  • OS Command: to run OS commands on all hosts defined in monitored objects. More details here.
  • PI Communication Channel Management
  • Prerequisite Checks: to perform pre-requisite checks on monitored objects.
  • Schedule Report on Managed System
  • Send Notification: to send a notification to a recipient list (via e-mail or SMS).
  • Send System Message: to send an ABAP system message to a technical system of type ABAP.
  • System/Instance Control
  • Lock Users: More details here.
  • Log Users Off: More details here.
  • Unlock Users: More details here.
  • Schedule Single Work Mode
  • Work Processes Overview
  • Nested Guided Procedure: You integrate an existing guided procedure. This allows you to compose guided procedures of reusable modules.
  • Note Implementation: To allow the user to download, for example, a correction note and start the SAP Note assistant to implement it. At runtime, the system automatically informs the user whether an updated SAP Note is available for download.

Perform the following steps to integrate a plug-in:

  1. Select Step type Plug-in.
  2. Select a plug-in.
  3. Read the plug-in help documentation, to understand what the plug-in does, what the prerequisites are, and how to customize it.
  4. Customize the plug-in.
  5. Create a new step help text.
  6. Save the step.

 

Reuse Existing Step

1. Select "Existing Step" from the "New" menu in the "Steps" section.

2. Select either Existing step "by copy" or "by reference".

2. Select a step from the list

3. Click OK.

 

Reuse Existing Activity

You can reuse existing automatic and manual activities.

  1. To reuse an automatic activity, select New --> Step --> Standard Step.
  2. Select the "Automatic Activities" tab and click "New".
  3. Select "Use Existing".
  4. Click "Browse" and select an activity from the list
  5. Click OK.

 

  1. To reuse an expert manual activity, select New --> Step --> Standard Step.
  2. Select the "Manual Activities" tab and click "New".
  3. Select "Use Existing".
  4. Click "Browse" and select an activity from the list
  5. Click OK.

Activate and Transport

You cannot bundle several guided procedures (GP) into one transport.

  1. If you want to transport the guided procedure to the production system, set that the "GP is for production system" flag when creating the GP.
  2. When you have defined all steps and activities in the guided procedure, check its consistency with Check, and see the runtime view, with Preview.
  3. If the test was satisfactory and no further changes are required you can activate the guided procedure using the activate button.
  4. Confirm the activation of the GP.
  5. A success message is displayed when the GP has been activated.

  • If you want to edit the guided procedure after it has been activated, a new version will be created. Subsequent changes will only apply to the new version.
  • If you need to transport the guided procedure, click on Transport. You can use an existing transport or create a new one.

Create a New Version

A new version can only be generated if the current version is active.

1. In the maintenance UI, Click Edit.

2. A confirmation pop-up is displayed, to generate a new version or cancel.

3. Click Generate to create a new version of the guided procedure.

4. An inactive version 2 of the guided procedure is created.

Newly generated GP version:


The new GP in Guided Procedure Browser:


Search Attributes

1. In the maintenance UI, click Edit --> Properties

2. Change the search attributes of the guided procedure

3. Go back to the browser, change the search attributes to match the new search attributes of the guided procedure.

4. Click Apply. Your guided procedure is listed.

The Guided Procedure Search Attributes in Guided Procedure Maintenance:


The Guided Procedure Search Attributes in Guided Procedure Browser:

Guided Procedure Execution

To enter the runtime view, click on "Preview" in Guided Procedure Maintenance, or select the GP in the Guided Procedure Browser and click "Execute". The runtime view looks like the following.

Mixed Step:


Manual Step:


Parent Step and Sub-Steps:


Plugin Note Sub-Step:


Complete Step:


Soft and Hard Linear Dependency Enhancement

Soft Linear Dependency is a new behavior allowing to navigate to the next step even if previous step is not successful. Consequence: previous step could be Successful or Warnings, meaning all mandatory activities have been executed successfully or with warnings. In the opposite of Hard dependency which forbid navigation until the previous step was successfully executed. This feature is available starting from SP6.


 Case of hard linear dependency:


Case of soft linear dependency:

Log Information

Click on Display Execution Logs button to launch the log application.


This application provides all information required about the guided procedure instances execution, such as logs, step statuses, processor.


You can also display all GP instances executed on one or multiple systems, with Guided Procedure Log, in the Technical administration work center --> Guided Procedure Management. From the Log application, you can either continue to execute the existing instances of the GP, or create new instances.


You can also start new instances of one guided procedure, with Start New Instance in the Log, or from the Guided Procedure Browser, with Execute --> New Instance. A new instance is a new execution of the guided procedure, in which all status are grey (Not executed). Managed objects and processor can between instances of a guided procedure.

  1. Create a class for the plug-in, the class must inherit from CL_GPA_PLUGIN_ACTIVITY and redefine the method GET_PLUGIN_ATTRIBUTES.
  2. Create a class inheriting from the class CL_SISE_ACTIVITY_AUTO and redefining the method GET_NAV_LINK_NEW and EXECUTE_CONFIGURATION.
    Put the treatment to be done when executing the activity in a private method and call it in EXECUTE_CONFIGURATION.
  3. Create the help texts for design time and run time - not mandatory however it is recommended to explain what the plug-in does and how to use it.