Transport Management System

You can organize, perform, and monitor transports between your SAP Systems using the Transport Management System (TMS).

User actions at the operating system level are no longer necessary, since all the necessary information and functions are mapped in the SAP System.

The Transport Management System offers the following functions:

● Configuring the transport routes using a graphical editor

● Displaying the import queues for all SAP Systems in the transport domain

● Importing all the requests in an import queue

● Importing all the requests in a project

● Importing specific requests

● TMS Quality Assurance

● Transport Workflow

● Transports between SAP Systems without a common transport directory

Alert Viewer in Transport Organizer

The TMS Alert Viewer records and displays all the actions which you perform with the Transport Management System. You can display this information using the Alert Viewer.

To do this, call Transaction STMS and choose Monitor ® TMS Alerts ® TMS Alert Viewer.

The following information is displayed:

• Date and time

• User name
• TMS function
• TMS message

• SAP System in which the TMS function was triggered
• System name
• Client

The following functions are provided in the Alert Viewer:

	Success messages are also displayed beside TMS error messages and warnings
	Limits the display to errors and warnings or just errors
	Includes any non-displayed actions in the list
	Displays detailed information about a user if the user is known in the SAP System where the Alert Viewer was started
	Displays the TMS Alerts of another SAP System in the transport domain

If you click a message, the TMS Alert Viewer: Error Message dialog box appears with additional information on the message. You can navigate through the messages in this dialog box using . Choose to display the relevant online documentation.

The following functions are available in the dialog box TMS Alert Viewer: :

	Displays the original message
	Displays the long text, if it is available
	For tp errors, the information written by tp to StdOut is displayed

Alerts in the Transport Management System

Alerts

Various situations can lead to errors when you are working with the Change and Transport System (CTS). The system administrator must react to these errors to ensure the stability and consistency of the SAP System.

To support the administrator, the Transport Management System (TMS) records CTS errors and provides tools that can be used to display and process these situations, known as alerts.

Among others, the Transport Management System records the following alerts:

• Errors that occurred when transport requests were exported
• Errors that occurred when transport requests were imported
• Errors in communication between SAP Systems
• Errors in the CTS configuration

You can display the alerts in both the CCMS Alert Monitor and the TMS Alert Viewer. On the initial TMS screen you can specify the default alert display by choosing Extras ® Settings ® Standard Alert Display.

Tools

CCMS Alert Monitor

The CCMS Alert Monitor is activated automatically when the TMS is configured. It replaces the TMS Alert Viewer, which is now only needed in special cases (for example, for special analyses). The CCMS monitor organizes alerts by system and topic. You can use this tool to display and process alerts.

Alerts are recorded in the system where they occur and then sent to the transport domain controller. This lets the system administrator monitor all systems in the transport domain centrally from the domain controller.

You do not need to make any additional changes to the configuration of the Computing Center Management System (CCMS) (such as maintaining central system groups) to be able to monitor TMS alerts in multiple systems. The TMS communication interface is used to send alerts to the CCMS in the domain controller system.

TMS Alert Viewer

Unlike the CCMS Alert Monitor, the TMS Alert Viewer is organized chronologically, and displays all actions for the selected system, not just errors. However, the Alert Viewer does not let you process these actions.

The TMS Alert Viewer only retains a certain number of actions in the display. If you want to display older actions, choose Edit ® History +/- to include more entries.

It can take some time to include older actions in the TMS Alert Viewer.

Displaying Schedules and Logs for TMS Jobs

You have displayed a job list and want to see:

• The scheduling data for TMS jobs
• The logs for TMS jobs

Procedure

Displaying Scheduling Data

Position the cursor on a job in the list with the scheduling data you want to see and choose . The dialog box Job Information from System appears with the relevant data under the tab Schedule.

Displaying the Logs

Position the cursor on a job in the list with the log you want to see, and choose . The dialog box Job Log from TMS from System appears. You can navigate through the entire job list using the icons.

If you want to display the logs of jobs in other systems, you need the administration authorization for background processing. For more information, see Background Processing.

To display job logs in other systems, you must first log on to the relevant system. The logon screen of the system is displayed automatically.

Administrating TMS Jobs

Use

You have displayed a job list and want to:

• Reset the scheduling of TMS jobs

• Release TMS jobs
• Cancel TMS jobs
• Delete TMS jobs
• Check the status of TMS jobs

Procedure

To perform the relevant action, proceed as follows:

Resetting the Scheduling of TMS jobs

In the job list, mark the job(s) whose scheduling you want to reset, and choose .

Releasing TMS Jobs

In the job list, mark the job(s) that you want to release, and choose .

Canceling TMS Jobs

In the job list, mark the job(s) that you want to cancel, and choose .

Deleting TMS Jobs

In the job list, mark the job(s) that you want to delete, and choose .

Checking the Status of TMS Jobs

In the job list, mark the job whose status you want to check, and choose . In the status bar, you can see the result of the check.

Resetting User TMSADM

Use

If you want to reset user TMSADM to the default, or if the configuration of this user was damaged, then:

Procedure

1. Log on to the SAP System in which you want to reset user TMSADM.
2. Enter Transaction STMS.
3. Choose Overview
® Systems. The system overview appears.
4. Choose Extras ® Reset user TMSADM.

Result

The CPIC user TMSADM is regenerated with the default authorizations.

Determining Approval Steps in the Domain Configuration

Use

You want to determine approval steps for QA systems.

Note the following rules:

• At least one approval step must be active for each defined QA system.
• You cannot delete or change the 3 default approval steps. You can only set the approval steps to be active or inactive. The default approval steps are valid for all configured QA systems.
• If you define additional approval steps and have configured more than one QA system, you can determine if the additional steps are to be system-/client-specific (only one QA system) or cross-system/client (global).

Prerequisites

You have configured at least one QA system.

To determine approval steps for the QA systems in the domain, you have to log on to the domain controller.

Procedure

1. In the TMS initial screen, choose . The screen System Overview: Domain appears.
2. Choose . The screen Display TMS Configuration: appears.

Under the tab Management you see how many QA systems are configured and who made the last change and when.

Under QA Approval Procedure you see the names of the configured QA systems and which steps exist. (If the transport routes are client-specific, the column Client is also displayed. If several QA systems are configured, the column System is also displayed.)

3. Switch to the change mode. To do this, choose Configuration ® Display « Change.

If you want to add approval steps:

1. Choose Insert row. By default, the new step has the type Approved by user department.
2. You can choose another type using the input help. If you choose another type, you receive the default text for it at the same time. You can edit this text.
3. If you have more than one QA system configured, additional columns are displayed (System and Client). You must use the input help to determine if the additional step is system-/client-specific or global.

4. Mark the approval step in the column Active that you want to process for the requests of the relevant QA system.
5. Save your entries.
6. Distribute the configuration.

Result

You have defined the approval step that is valid for your QA systems.

Configuring the QA System

Use

To perform quality assurance measures in the TMS, you must first configure the QA system.

Prerequisites

The system you want to configure as the QA system must have the following attributes:

• It must be the target of at least one consolidation or delivery.
• It must deliver to at least one additional real system.

To configure the QA approval procedure, you have to be logged on to the domain controller.

Procedure

1. In the TMS initial screen, choose . The screen Display Transport Routes appears displaying the existing transport routes in the transport domain.
2. Switch to the change mode by choosing Configuration ® Display <-> Change.
3. Position the cursor on the system that you want as the QA system.
4. Choose Edit ® System ® Change. The dialog box Change System Attributes appears.
5. Choose the tab System attributes and under Quality assurance select Delivery after confirmation.

You can only set Delivery after confirmation for the whole system. If you use Extended Transport Control, then all clients with the following attributes become QA clients in the system:

1. Clients that are the target of a delivery or consolidation
2. Clients that deliver to other clients

Under Procedure you can determine the approval steps. You can also set and change the approval steps in the domain configuration. The step Approved by system administrator is the active default setting.

1. Choose Copy.
2. Choose Configuration ® Distribute and activate.

Result

You have configured the QA system. After the configuration, the QA worklist is built. All the requests that are then imported into the QA system are included in the QA worklist. You can only import completely approved requests into the delivery systems.

Configuring the QA Approval Procedure

Use

Before you can process request with respect to the TMS Quality Assurance, you must configure the QA approval procedure.

Prerequisites

Ensure that your system landscape and/or transport domain is set up so that there is at least one development, one quality assurance, and one production system.

The system you want to configure as the QA system must have the following attributes:

• It must be the target of at least one consolidation or delivery.
• It must deliver at least one additional system.

To configure the QA approval procedure, you have to be logged on to the domain controller.

Procedure

1. 
   
Configure your QA system.
2. 
   
Determine the approval steps for your QA system.

TMS Quality Assurance

Use

TMS Quality Assurance increases the quality and the availability of the production systems by letting you check requests in the QA system before they are delivered to subsequent systems.

The system for which the QA approval procedure is activated is called the QA system. When the QA approval procedure is activated, transport requests are only forwarded to the delivery systems if all the QA approval steps are processed for each request in the QA system and each request has been approved. (When you configure the QA system, you determine how many QA approval steps have to be processed for each request.) If a check for an approval step is not successful, the entire request cannot be approved.

Rejected requests are not imported into the delivery systems of the QA system.

If you reject requests, there is the risk that errors may occur when they are imported into the delivery systems. This is a result of the requests containing objects that are referenced from other requests. It is safer to correct an error using a subsequent transport (see Transport Strategy in the CTS).

Integration

In the TMS transport route configuration, you determine which system is the QA system, and which approval steps should apply to this system. You configure the QA approval procedure by performing these two steps. All the requests that are then imported into the QA system are included in the QA worklist.

You can go from the TMS Import Overview to the QA Worklist where you have to check the requests for each approval step.

You can only import all requests into the delivery systems if all the requests ready for import have been checked (which means approved or rejected).

If all the requests for a project and target clients are checked, you can import them even if requests for other projects and target clients have not been checked yet.

Prerequisites

Your system landscape contains at least one QA system from which there are configured delivery routes into other systems.

In a 3-system landscape, the requests from the development system are imported into the QA system. There, the requests are checked and the approved requests are forwarded to the production system.

Functions

• Configuring the QA approval procedure (determining the QA system and the approval steps)

You determine which system is the QA system, switch on the option Forward after confirmation for this system, and define which approval steps are valid for this system.

• Processing the QA worklist

After a system has been configured as the QA system, the QA worklist is built. You then have to check the requests in these views for the individual approval steps.

• Displaying the QA history

Using this history you can display the QA activities for a specific period.

Activities

1. When you configure the
QA approval procedure, you determine the QA system, switch on the option Forward after confirmation, and define the approval steps for that system.
2. You
approve or reject requests.
3. You display the
QA history for a selected period.

external SAP System

Change & Transport System

A special type of virtual system that uses a real SAP System to perform actions for the system in a transport directory.

External systems differ from virtual systems in that they have their own separate transport directory.

Import Overview: Information

The TMS import overview shows the current status of the import queue for each SAP System in the transport domain. To access the import overview, call Transaction STMS and choose .

The following system types exist:

	Virtual system
	External system
	Quality assurance system

An import queue can have one of the following statuses:

	Data is obsolete or does not exist
	Import queue is open All requests released for this SAP System, or forwarded to this SAP System are flagged for the next import.
	Import queue is closed The import queue has an end mark. All requests in the queue before the end mark are imported during the next import. All requests marked after the end mark are marked for the import following the next import. After the import queue has been closed, all the released or forwarded requests for this SAP System after the end mark are sorted.
	Import is scheduled
	Import is running All requests in the queue before the end mark are currently being imported into the SAP System. To display detailed information about the import running, use the Import Monitor. Preliminary imports are not displayed in the import overview.
	Errors occurred during import All requests in the queue before the end mark are currently being imported into the SAP System. However, errors occurred during the import. To find the source of the errors, use the tools described under Monitoring Transports.
	Import terminated An error occurred during the import. You can display detailed information about the source of the error by using the Import Monitor.
	Could not read import queue Error occurred when reading the import queue of an SAP System. Click the status field of the import queue to display a detailed error message.

Creating a System List in Transport Organizer

Use

The import overview can quickly become very complicated if a domain contains a large number of systems, or if the overview involves multiple domains. A particular user may only be interested in a certain group of systems (for example, an administrator may only make imports for certain systems). To help these users, you have the option of reducing the import overview to a predefined group of systems.

Procedure

To create a system list:

1. Log on to the domain controller.
2. Call Transaction STMS.
3. Choose Overview
® Systems. The system overview appears.
4. Choose Goto
® System lists. The screen Display View "TMS System Lists": Overview appears.
5. Choose Display ® Change.
6. Choose New entries.
7. Enter the name and a description for the new system list.
8. Select the new entry.
9. On the left of the screen, choose the node Systems/Clients. The screen Change View "Systems/Clients": Overview appears.
10. Choose New entries.
11. Enter the systems you are interested in and save.

Note that the Client column is not currently used.

12. To exit this screen, choose Table view ® Exit.

13. Distribute the configuration immediately, so that you can use the system list in all your systems. To do this, go to the system overview and choose Extras ® Distribute and activate configuration.

You do not need to distribute the configuration if you only want to use the system list in the controller system. System lists are distributed automatically when you distribute changes to the TMS configuration.

Result

You have created a system list that you can select in the personal settings in the import overview.

Configuring Transport Routes

Prerequisites

Before you can configure the transport routes, the following prerequisites must be met:

The transport domain has been configured.

• All SAP Systems involved were included in the transport domain.

Functions

The configuration of the transport routes is managed in the SAP System that serves as the transport domain controller, and can be distributed to and activated in all other connected SAP Systems in the transport domain.

The transport route configuration consists of:

• System attributes
• Consolidation routes
• Delivery routes
• Target groups

SAP provides two editors for configuring transport routes:

Graphical editor

The SAP Systems and their transport routes are displayed graphically.

You can position and link the SAP Systems together by clicking and holding the mouse.

• 
  
Hierarchical list editor

The SAP Systems and their transport routes are displayed in a tree structure.

Configuring TMS

Before you can work with the Transport Management System (TMS), you must configure it in all SAP Systems in your system landscape.

The TMS configuration includes:

• 
  
Configuring the transport domain: You define which SAP Systems in your system landscape form a transport domain, and which SAP System is to be the transport domain controller.

• 
  
Configuring the transport routes: The transport routes are used to define in which target system you want to consolidate change requests, and which SAP Systems are forwarded this information automatically.

If your system landscape is already set up, you only have to configure the TMS transport domain. TMS takes over the transport routes.

• 
  
Choosing the transport strategy: You can choose how you want to make transports between SAP Systems.
• 
  
Configuring the QA approval procedure: You can use TMS Quality Assurance functions to check changes in the QA system before you transport them to other systems.
• 
  
Configuring the transport workflow: The transport workflow allows you to make speedy corrections to the production system or make transports that do not follow the defined transport routes.

Transport Management System - Concept

You use the Transport Management System (TMS) to model and manage your system landscape. It provides tools for configuring your system landscape, as well as for organizing, carrying out and monitoring transports.

Configuration of a System Landscape

All SAP Systems that are subject to the administration of the TMS form a transport domain. This is usually all SAP Systems in the system landscape. Certain system settings are the same for all systems within a transport domain, such as the transport routes. To achieve this, one SAP System in the transport domain has the reference configuration, with all other SAP Systems in the transport domain taking copies of this reference configuration. The system with the reference configuration is known as the Transport Domain Controller; only in this system can you make changes to the reference configuration. Each time you change the reference configuration, you must distribute the new configuration to all systems. The TMS automatically generates RFC connections between the systems in a domain so that they can communicate.

When you install an SAP System, a transport directory is set up for it. The CTS uses this directory to store transport data. In most cases, all SAP Systems in a transport domain have a common transport directory. However, there are situations where this is not possible, for example:

• A system has a 'slow' connection to the network

• The high security level of some systems does not allow file system access by other systems (NFS or shares)

• Different hardware platforms are used

TMS supports multiple transport directories within a transport domain. The systems that share a common transport directory form a transport group. Data is exchanged between the systems using the RFC connections of the TMS.

Transport domain A: This transport domain has one transport group. This means that all the systems access a common transport directory.

Transport domain B: This transport domain has several transport groups, each of which shares a transport directory.

All systems in Europe share a transport directory; this is transport group 2. All systems in Asia share a transport directory; this is transport group 3. Together, transport groups 2 and 3 form a transport domain (transport domain B).

When you configure an SAP system landscape, it is usually the case that not all SAP Systems are available right from the beginning. The TMS allows you to define placeholders, or virtual systems. These take the place of systems that you want to include in the landscape at a later date. In this way, you can model the complete system landscape and make the settings for the CTS as soon as you have configured the TMS in one system. The virtual system is replaced when you install the real system.

If you administrate your SAP Systems locally in different locations, for example at head office and in different branches, it may be a good idea to configure several different domains. If you want to make transports between systems in different domains, you can use domain links to link the two domains. The data is transported between the domains using the RFC connections of the TMS, in the same way as transports are made between different transport groups.

If there is no permanent network connection between systems in different domains, you can use external systems in the TMS to make the transports instead. The transport data is exchanged using a transport directory that can be accessed by both domains, or by using a data volume. External systems offer fewer functions than domain links; for example, transport logs in a different domain can only be displayed using domain links.

When you configure your system landscape, you first have to configure the transport domain. Only then can you configure the transport routes. For more information, see Configuration of the TMS.

Making Transports

You can use the Transport Management System to organize, carry out and monitor your transports. You no longer need to execute tp commands at the operating system level. You can start and monitor all imports from every system in the transport domain. The TMS uses the RFC connections that were created automatically when the transport domain was configured to display all information on the requests that are waiting for import.

When you make an import, the TMS starts the transport control program tp in the target system. This program imports the data that was earlier exported from the database of the source system. If the two systems do not have a common transport directory, the TMS copies the necessary files into the transport directory of the target system before the import.

If you want to schedule an import for a particular point in time, the TMS schedules a background job in the target system. This is then executed at the time you chose.

If the import accesses another system in the domain, you need to authorize yourself in this system. Even if there is a test system in your domain with free authorization for all users, imports into the production system can only be made by users with special authorizations.

After you start or schedule an import, you can monitor the process from each system in the domain. All imports are logged, so that you can see which transport requests were imported into a system at which time.