What's next for SAP HANA 1.0 users

The end of SAP HANA 1.0 support

As of June 30, 2021, SAP Hana 1.0 is out of mainstream maintenance.

In other words, SAP is no longer delivering fixes and patches for those systems, whether on premises or cloud-based. However, some businesses have decided not to upgrade their SAP HANA 1.0 environment to the current version, SAP HANA 2.0. So what does that mean for them?

With the end of mainstream maintenance, SAP HANA 1.0 now receives more limited support under what is called customer-specific maintenance. This is defined in the SAP Release Strategy -- specifically in section 2.3.4 -- and refers to the set of terms by which SAP will investigate problems in SAP HANA 1.0. Users should be sure to review SAP Note 52505, in which SAP discusses the SAP applications maintenance strategy and spotlights what users should be aware of if they haven't upgraded to SAP HANA 2.0.

Consider what would happen if a business needed to create any new Online SAP Support messages or incidents due to SAP HANA 1.0 issues. SAP will review your message and offer potential workarounds or existing solutions, but it will not release any new code updates for SAP HANA 1.0 to fix issues in that version. Fixes will only be provided with SAP HANA 2.0 revisions or support packs that are in maintenance.

For companies on SAP HANA 1.0 that are considering an upgrade, this means it's time to consider every aspect of their business situation, including factors such as the following:

• lacking the time or budget to pursue a wholesale system upgrade;
• operating a stable environment that does not need further development in the near future; and
• already having plans in motion to upgrade to SAP HANA 2.0 on a structured timeline.

Upgrade musts

So how are things playing out in the real world?

Any successful upgrade should start with planning and follow the guidelines below.

1. Identify all relevant team members. These should include the following roles:

• data center and associated basis teams, specifically in on-premises situations;
• SAP HANA and application developers for regression testing;
• internal basis team members -- an extension from data center organization, if applicable;
• project management team;
• change management team, to communicate with end-user community;
• SAP HANA security team, to recognize and update based on changes; and
• end-user team for thorough regression testing.

2. Create a timeline for each environment, with associated project plan.

3. Allot time in the development environment to operate as expected to identify any defects that may not have been recognized during regression testing. This is not a requirement, but it is highly recommended if your timeline allows for it. This should be a maximum of one week.

There are some other changes you should be aware of before executing this upgrade. These include the following differences:

• The single-tenant database functionality of HANA 1.0 is removed in HANA 2.0, and it will instead become a multi-tenant database. This is critical to understand, especially if you're still using client tools -- such as HANA Studio -- as you may want to adjust your connections due to the multi-tenant functionality.
• Since HANA 2.0 is a multi-tenant database, there will be some additional overhead for memory due to the existence of a main system tenant as well as corresponding tenants, where development will occur. It's not a significant amount, but if you have a 64 GB HANA database and have -- or plan to create -- multiple tenants, you may want to consider increasing your space to accommodate this additional overhead. Within their pre-checks, SAP has included the ability to validate that your database will not have any memory issues.
• There are new objects within the delivered SAP INA role that need to be included in your custom INA role as well as some objects that are no longer supported.
• Although XS Classic is still supported within SAP HANA 2.0, you should start to consider new development objects that will be supported in downstream SAP HANA releases so you can mitigate additional remediation in the future.

Here are some other actions you can consider including:

• leveraging SQL analytical privileges rather than classical ones -- this is a must when upgrading and should be included in your project plan to ensure best practices and future upgrade support moving forward;
• ditching analytical and attribute views;
• discontinuing SQL script view development and planning to migrate your current SQL script views to graphical calculation views or transition them to table functions; and
• installing the following EPM-MDS if utilizing INA protocol -- applications like SAP Analytics Cloud, Lumira, etc. -- to consume SAP HANA data.

What's next?

If you want to make the upgrade, begin by upgrading to the minimum required version of SAP HANA 1.0, which is a minimum of 1.00.122.33. However, the latest version is best. Then, if you aren't already running your SAP HANA system in multi-tenant database containers (MDC) mode, you must convert your SAP HANA single-tenant system -- or XS system type for HANA Service in Neo -- to an MDC system.

Once on SAP HANA 2.0, your company may be better positioned for the future of SAP, with the latest features, bug fixes and security updates fully supported by the software vendor. Upgrading also prepares you for the long-term roadmap being laid out at SAP. The company is definitively moving toward cloud-based software with SAP HANA Cloud, and cloud-based users should prepare for this reality as well. HANA Cloud is a cloud-native -- or hyperscaler-agnostic -- integrated database service with a built-in data lake. HANA service for Neo and Cloud Foundry environments are no longer available to new users, and SAP is helping existing users migrate to SAP HANA Cloud by developing self-service migration tools.

However, users may want to risk staying on SAP HANA 1.0. Perhaps they've been running on it for years and nothing has gone wrong, or risking issues is simply fine with them.

Tim Korba is a director of delivery for business intelligence services at Dickinson + Associates, a Navisite company, which is an SAP systems integrator. He is an experienced consultant with over 18 years of SAP experience with multiple full-cycle go-lives.