Blogs by Ashwin

  SAP NetWeaver with AnyDB on Azure VMs This reference architecture consists of a set of proven practices for running SAP NetWeaver in a Windows environment on Azure with high availability and is always deployed with specific VM sizes that can changed to accommodate your organization's needs accordingly. High level architecture Architectural components The architecture exhibits the following infrastructure and key software components: Virtual network- The Azure Virtual network can securely connect all the Azure resources to each other as well as an on-premises environment via virtual gateway provisioned as a part of ExpressRoute or Site-to-Site connection. An ideal VDC design allows the virtual gateway to reside in the virtual network that also serves as the hub of a hub-spoke hierarchy containing multiple, peered virtual networks. The spokes represents the individual virtual networks hosting the SAP applications and database tiers. Subnets- Every virtual network is divided into se...

  Overview According to the Microsoft Azure Support Prerequisites, you must enable built-in SAP monitors about configuration as well as resource utilization from the underlying Azure infrastructure for full support. Hence, all the Azure instances that hosts software and related DBMS systems must be set up as follows: The Azure Monitoring Extension for SAP is deployed and correctly configured. Data from the Azure Monitoring Extension for SAP is visible in the SAP NetWeaver system.  The following technical requirement should be available for use of the Azure Monitoring Extension for SAP: An active route to the internet is required by the Azure Virtual Machine instance to easily access the Azure Extension Pool which also need the setting up of Internet proxies for the Virtual Machine Instance before deploying the Azure Virtual Machine Extension for SAP. The SAP Enhanced Monitoring is deployed which consists of the enhanced SAP Host Agent and monitors transaction of ST06 to precis...

  The following high availability provisions are applicable to Azure VM-based deployments: Window Server- Microsoft supports Windows Server Failover Cluster in Azure VMs with replication for non-shared storage. While SAP does not tests its applications with replication for non-shared storage, Microsoft can easily guarantee full transparency of this technology for SAP applications. Hence, the SAP applications can be operated by following the guidelines on how to set up HA configurations for SAP NetWeaver applications on Azure.  SUSE Linux Enterprise Server for SAP Applications- SUSE and Microsoft supports the SUSE Linux Enterprise Server for SAP Applications based cluster for HANA System Replication and SAP NetWeaver ASCS.  Red Hat Enterprise Linux HA Add-on- Red Hat and Microsoft supports the Red Hat Enterprise Linux HA Add-on for HANA System Replication and SAP NetWeaver ASCS.     Regarding SAP HANA on Azure (Large Instances), Microsoft supports some ...

  Network Security It is required for any SAP production system installed on Azure to operate in Virtual Private Network(s) which is/are connected to your datacenters with Azure site-to-site or ExpressRoute connectivity. End-user access to the application should be routed through your company's intranet and the Azure's site-to-site or ExpressRoute connections to the applications hosted in Azure VM Services. This way, the network and other security policies defined for on-premises applications are extended to the application in the Azure VMs. A design that is NOT supported is the segregation of the SAP application and DBMS layers into different Azure VMs that are not peered with each other. It is recommended to segregate the SAP application and DBMS layers by using subnets within an Azure virtual network instead of using the different Azure virtual networks. But, if you segregate the two layers into the different virtual networks, the two virtual networks need to be peered. The ...

  Azure VM NFS Storage Azure VM NFS storage is widely available for SAP workloads can be easily implemented by using Distributed Replicated Block Device (DRBD) with the help of Pacemaker clustering on Azure VMs running SUSE and also by using GlusterFS clustering on RHEL. Managed NFS storage is available in the form of Azure NetApp Files which is an enterprise-class, high-performance, metered file storage service. Azure NetApp Files supports a wide range of workloads and is highly available by default. Snapshots set up and service as well as performance level can be selected through the service. Microsoft has already tested the SAP file shares with Azure NetApp Files for application-level high availability and plans to provide support for SAP HANA in the near future, after the Azure NetApp Files are certified by SAP. Azure VM SMB Storage SMB shares are highly available for SAP workloads in Azure VMs and can be readily implemented by using Storage Space Direct (S2D)-based clusters wi...

  Azure VMs SAP certified operating systems supported for SAP products on Azure VMs includes: Microsoft Windows Server 2008 R2, 2012 (R2), 2016 and 2019 SUSE Linux Enterprise Server 12 (SLES 12) and higher SUSE SLES for SAP Applications (based on SLES 12) and higher Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7 (RHEL 7) and higher Red Hat RHEL for SAP (based on RHEL 7) and higher Red Hat RHEL for SAP HANA (based on RHEL 7) and higher Oracle Linux 7 (OL7) While running SAP products on Linux, you should also review the following SAP notes: 2243692- Linux on Microsoft Azure (Iaas) VM SAP license issues 2513384- SUSE Linux Enterprise Server for SAP Applications for Azure 2694118- Red Hat Enterprise Linux HA Add-On on Azure Note- Multi-SID cluster configurations for SAP Central Services is supported with Windows Server as guest operating system on Azure VMs, but it is not supported with any of the Linux distributions. SAP HANA on Azure (Large Instances) SAP-certified operating systems supported for SAP pr...

  General Prerequisites (SAP support in public cloud environments) As we all know, SAP provides scalable, compliant, and enterprise-proven platform for a range of SAP workloads which is based on the criteria stipulated by SAP. The general prerequisites for SAP supports in public cloud environments includes the following: Licensing for SAP software to be deployed. SAP system sizing and knowledge of resource requirements of SAP workloads to be deployed. Certified VM instance sizes and total capacity required by SAP software on the cloud provider platform. Sufficient network connectivity (in regard to bandwidth, latency, and package loss) to the cloud environment that will host SAP workloads. Certified operating systems on which the SAP workloads will be deployed. Support agreement available from the cloud provider. Experience with technical operation of SAP systems and the infrastructure of the cloud provider pertinent to the shared responsibilities model.   Deployment opti...

  SAP HANA on Azure (Large Instances) networking, storage, & compute SAP HANA on Azure (Large Instances) includes deploying and running SAP HANA with the help of the physical servers dedicated to an individual customer instead of using a hypervisor. IT represents and example of HANA Tailored Data-integration Center (TDI) certified methodology where customers can easily choose from several server SKUs, widely ranging from 36 Intel CPU crores as well as 768 GB of memory to 480 Intel CPU crores as well as 24 TB of memory. Customer isolation within each infrastructure involves: Networking- The network isolation of tenants prohibits network communication between tenants in the infrastructure stamp level, even if the tenants belong to the same customer.  Storage- Storage volumes can be assigned to one storage virtual machine only which in turn is only assigned to one single tenant in the SAP HANA TDI certified infrastructure stack. As a result, storage volumes assigned to a stor...

  Azure for SAP Workloads Whenever you use Microsoft Azure, you can easily run SAP applications across the development, test as well as teh production scenarios in Azure, while readily taking advantage of its scalability, flexibility, and cost savings. With the expanded partnership between Microsoft and SAP, you can be fully supported on every platform. Azure can be considered unique for SAP HANA as it enables hosting more memory and CPU resource in the scenarios involving SAP HANA, while offering the use of customer-dedicated bare-metal hardware.  SAP and Microsoft have a strong partnership along with a long history of working together that has mutual benefits for the customers. Microsoft is providing constantly updated platform and new certification details to SAP ensuring that Microsoft Azure is the best platform to run your SAP workloads. Azure Virtual Machines (VMs) Azure VMs consists of the primary Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS) compute service offerings available in...