SAP ABAP Fresher: what to look at?

ABAP is a programming language developed by SAP AG. Core SAP systems, such as ECC, BW etc are written on ABAP. It means that SAP ABAP programming is one of the most desired skills on the SAP job market.

Are you a SAP ABAP fresher programmer looking to develop your career? In this case, it is very likely that you have a question to ask:

What are the main topics to concentrate as a SAP ABAP fresher? What are the key points and suggestions to consider?

SAP Expert would recommend you look into the following areas in the research for your own answer:
1. Functional. Even if you’re not a functional or technical consultant yourself, it would definitely help if you know at least very basic processes in different modules of SAP. In this case, it will be easier for you to understand the requirements of the technical or functional specification you get from your functional teams.

2. SAP ABAP techniques. It clearly means programming techniques. ABAP is a very specific programming language. Some of its techniques are different from every other programming language. At the same time, the same task can be solved in different ways in ABAP. You should understand the difference between them and apply the correct method.

Let me give you a very small example. Processing of table records can be realised in two different ways in ABAP.
a. SELECT FROM TABLE WHERE...
PROCESS RECORD.
ENDSELECT.

b. SELECT FROM TABLE INTO INTERNALTABLE WHERE...
ENDSELECT.
LOOP AT INTERNALTABLE
PROCESS RECORD.
ENDLOOP.

Which one is beneficial at each situation? You should know the answer.

In this section I’d like to mention also the Object-oriented programming methods and other “advanced” programming techniques. SAP Expert recommended books will help you there.

And last but not least, there’s an article on SAP Expert on a similar topic.

3. Non-ERP programming. SAP ECC is not the only system from SAP AG. There are also CRM, BW, SRM, MDM, PI, Portal and other systems. They may have their own specifics in program development. Sometimes they use non-ABAP programming languages. You should know at least the basics of these specifics to be ready for your future tasks.

Do you have further questions to ask? Contact SAP Expert!

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