When a component fails in a complex SAP landscape, the Root Cause Analysis process to identify the offending component can often be very time consuming. In fact, the time taken to perform the following reiterative three-step process normally takes far longer than the actual problem fix (Figure 1):

• Gather problem information and document it
• Recreate the problem scenario and environment
• Analyze the recreated problem to determine its root cause

Figure 1

The Root Cause Analysis iterative process

When performing the Root Cause Analysis process in a complex SAP landscape, you would use one of the following End-to-End Trace Analysis tools integrated into SAP Solution Manager:

• CA Wily Introscope to analyze problems in the J2EE layer
• DBACOCKPIT to analyze problems on the database layer
• Trace analysis using the SAP Client plug-in to analyze functional and component performance issues
• BMC AppSight for SAP Client Diagnostics to analyze problems in the client side

I’ll walk you through some of the features of BMC AppSight before showing you a step-by-step procedure for downloading and installing the application. BMC AppSight is SAP release independent — it works for SAP ERP, SAP Customer Relationship Management, SAP NetWeaver Business Warehouse, or any other SAP product offering. The only release-dependent requirement you face is that you need SAP Solution Manager 7.01 to activate the BMC AppSight licensing check.

BMC AppSight for SAP Client Diagnostics

Most SAP NetWeaver technicians are aware of SAP Solution Manager tools that help to resolve problems on the database, server, or SAP application side. However, what happens when the problem is caused on the client side? SAP GUI, desktops, and Internet browsers can often be difficult to rule out, and almost impossible to analyze. With the onset of more diverse handheld mobile client-side devices, it is now necessary to have a toolset to identify and analyze the root cause of poor client performance.

BMC AppSight for SAP Client Diagnostics provides client-side tracing, advanced diagnostics, and root cause determination for SAP front-end and client applications. For operating system support, see the sidebar “Operating Systems Supported by BMC AppSight 6.0.”

BMC AppSight for SAP Client Diagnostics is a special version of BMC AppSight that you can use to analyze client software issues in SAP solutions. It differs from the full (non-SAP) BMC AppSight product in two key ways:

• SAP recording profile templates

• SAP Solution Manager license check

SAP Recording Profile Templates

BMC AppSight for SAP Client Diagnostics only works with the special SAP recording profile templates. These profiles have digital signatures to restrict the use of BMC AppSight analysis to SAP client applications only. You can freely restrict which metrics are recorded, but creating your own new BMC AppSight recording profiles to include additional metrics requires the purchase of a full BMC AppSight license.

You can find the following BMC AppSight recording profiles (*.RPR files) in SAP Note 1038811:

• Internet Explorer JavaScript: Contains code instrumentation for jscript.dll to get calls of JavaScript functions
• SAP GUI: For troubleshooting SAP GUI problems
• SAP Application Hang: Ensures you close all applications except the offending application
• SAP CRM Mobile Client Installation: A comprehensive profile that includes most metrics. This profile has a high performance overhead and should be used sparingly.
• SAP Duet Client Loop or Hang: Basic profile that includes basic process crashes and event log notifications
• Duet Enterprise: Troubleshooting profile including visual logging and stack-dump alerts used for escalation to code-level analysis

The SAP recording profiles determine if the user’s desktop should be visually recorded and if keystrokes and mouse activity should also be captured. Black Box recordings may provide access to information that can be subject to privacy laws, so be aware of any such privacy laws and regulations in every jurisdiction where Black Box recording is performed.

You can download the Recording Profile (RPR) Viewer from SAP Note 1034760 to display which information is recorded when using a given recording profile (Figure 2). The RPR Viewer does not allow any modification of recording profiles.

Figure 2

The SAP Recording Profile Viewer

SAP Solution Manager License Check

The other modification made to standard BMC AppSight is the license check process requiring the following SAP Solution Manager configuration. Use transaction SPRO and follow IMG menu path BMC AppSight for SAP Client Diagnostics > Information and Configuration Prerequisites (Figure 3).

Figure 3

Transaction SPRO configuration

Figure 4 comes up when you click the Information and Configuration Prerequisites node and shows the creation of a new service user called SEP_WEBSRV with the role SAP_SEP_INTERFACE. Ensure the Role is active (by using transaction PFCG) before creating and saving the new service user.

Figure 4

Transaction SPRO configuration

Use transaction WSCONFIG to create a Web service definition and the associated variant, called AGS_CHECK_LICENCE_SEP (Figure 5). Ignore the warning message about WSCONFIG being an obsolete transaction. Click the ICF Details button and enter the service user name you created in Figure 4.

Figure 5

Create and release a Web Service using transaction WSCONFIG

Use transaction SICF and navigate to the new ICF Service by following the path /default_host/sap/bc/srt/rfc/sap/AGS_CHECK_LICENCE_SEP (Figure 6). Change the Procedure to Required with Logon Data and enter in the User field the service user you created in Figure 4. Save and the system automatically activates the new Service and Dependent Services.

Figure 6

Activate the service using transaction SICF

Install BMC AppSight

BMC AppSight is comprised of two main components:

1. BMC AppSight Console: Used to record and analyze Black Box traces

2. BMC AppSight Black Box: Used to record traces of user actions

BMC AppSight Console 

Using the BMC AppSight Console, you can invoke Black Box recordings, replay client actions, and perform detailed analysis of AppSight Logs (*.ASL files).

First you download the BMC AppSight Console. You can download the BMC AppSight Console from SAP Service Marketplace by going to https://service.sap.com/swdc and following menu path Installations and Upgrades > A-Z Index > SAP SOLUTION MANAGER > SAP SOLUTION MANAGER 7.0 EHP1 > BMC APPSIGHT 4 SAP CLIENT DIAG. > Win32 > APS4SAPCDIAG1100_0-10004478.ZIP (Figure 7).

Figure 7

Download BMC AppSight for SAP Client Diagnostics

Then install the AppSight Console. Once you download and unzip the files into a temporary directory on the client machine, execute setup.exe and enter your User and Company names (Figure 8). 

Figure 8

Execute setup.exe from a temporary directory

Ensure the destination folder is correct, and then select the Custom installation radio button (Figure 9).

Figure 9

Select a Custom installation

In the Select Features window, deselect the Sample Applications and Web Service check boxes (Figure 10). The SAP license does not cover these features.

Figure 10

Deselect features not required

Change the Destination Folder from C:Black Box Server to a more appropriate destination such as C:Program FilesIdentifyAppSight Server (Figure 11).

Figure 11

Select a new Destination Folder

After a short installation time of a minute or so, you will be ready to start up BMC AppSight Client Diagnostics for SAP (Figure 12).

Figure 12

BMC AppSight start-up screen

If the installation was successful, you see a screen with a BMC Software program group with the following programs (Figure 13):

• AppSight Black Box
• Launch AppSight Code
• Launch AppSight System

Figure 13

The BMC AppSight program group

Click Launch AppSight System from the workstation desktop and you are prompted for a license file or the URL to a SAP Solution Manager system in the form of:

https://<host>:<port>/sap/bc/srt/rfc/sap/AGS_CHECK_LICENCE_SEP?sap-client=<Solution Manager client number> (Figure 14).

You can later find this information by following Help > About > Register in the BMC AppSight Console.

Figure 14

License screen for the first BMC AppSight start

BMC AppSight Black Box

BMC AppSight Black Box is a software agent that records application runtime behavior

The Black Box records the following information:

• User experience: User interaction including keystrokes and mouse movements as well as a movie of the desktop during the recording phase
• System-level information: Including starting and stopping processes and threads, network communication, file system activity, registry access, database requests, and system performance
• Code-level information: Runtime metrics including variables within each iteration of a loop

You can install Black Box as a completely standalone product, writing output to a BMC AppSight Log (*.ASL files) that encapsulates all the necessary information for problem resolution. It is, however, more conveniently installed as part of a standard BMC AppSight installation since the standard Black Box is already contained in the console package.

You can download the BMC AppSight Black Box from the SAP Service Marketplace by going to https://service.sap.com/swdc and following menu path Installations and Upgrades > A-Z Index > SAP SOLUTION MANAGER > SAP SOLUTION MANAGER 7.0 EHP1 > BMC APPSIGHT BLACKBOX > BMC APPSIGHT BLACKBOX 6.0.2 > Win32 > APPSIGBLKBOX6000_0-10004461.ZIP (Figure 15).

Figure 15

Download the BMC AppSight Black Box

You can use the BMC AppSight Black Box recorder in standalone mode to record client-side user activity for sending to SAP Support for analysis. The BMC AppSight Black Box can use either signed or unsigned BMC AppSight recording profiles.

Once you download and unzip the BMC AppSight Black Box files into a temporary directory on the client machine, navigate to the directory C:<your directory>APPSIGBLKBOX6000_0-10004461Black BoxesSelf Extracting Black BoxesSelf Extracting Black Boxes and execute RemoteInstallUI.exe (Figure 16). Accept the license agreement and enter your user and company names.

Figure 16

Execute RemoteInstallUI.exe and accept the license agreement

When presented with the dialog box as in Figure 17, do not enter a server name — just click the Next button to continue the installation.

Figure 17

Do not enter a server name

As there are no licensing requirements for the BMC AppSight Black Box, do not enter any details into the dialog box shown in Figure 18. Just click Finish to complete the installation.

Figure 18

Do not enter any license details

If the installation was successful, you end up with an Identify AppSight program group as shown in Figure 19 with only the AppSight Black Box application.

Figure 19

The BMC AppSight Black Box program group

BMC AppSight and SAP Support 

SAP Support may ask you to make a recording of your SAP client problem using the BMC AppSight Black Box. BMC AppSight logs and recording files are normally too large to attach to a customer message, so the SAP Support technician normally provides an upload link for an SAPmats container.

For any problems you may have with BMC AppSight or BMC AppSight Black Box, raise a customer message using component XX-PART-AP.

Checking Versions 

To check the version of the BMC AppSight for SAP Client Diagnostics, select Help and then About… (Figure 20).

Figure 20

Check the BMC AppSight version

To check the version of the BMC Black Box, right-click the BlackBox icon in the system tray and select About… (Figure 21).

Figure 21

Check the BMC AppSight BlackBox version

BMC AppSight Future

SAP Solution Manager 7.1 continues to support a comprehensive range of integrated third-party diagnostic tools you can use across the entire suite of SAP offerings. A quick search for AppSight in the SAP Service Marketplace provides evidence of the continued BMC AppSight client diagnostics integration with several SAP products, including:

• SAP NetWeaver MDM Console (Data, Image and Import Managers, Indexer, Language Selector, Publisher, Syndicator and Workflow)
• SAP Easy Document Management
• SAP NetWeaver Web Intelligence
• SAP Visual Business
• SAP POS and ePOS
• SAP NetWeaver Portal, including TREX and KMC
• Duet 1.0
• xMII 11.5
• SAP BusinessByDesign
• SAP BusinessObjects solutions, including SAP BusinessObjects Planning and Consolidation, SAP BusinessObjects Process Integration, SAP BusinessObjects Financial Consolidation, SAP BusinessObjects Profitability and Cost Management, and SAP BusinessObjects Enterprise
• Various partner products, including Microsoft Office

At the time of writing, the current version of BMC AppSight version is 7.5 compared to the version 6.0 offering from SAP. It is likely that SAP will soon update the current BMC AppSight for SAP Client Diagnostics offering to take advantage of new features (especially x64 support) in the near future.

Tony de Thomasis

Tony de Thomasis has been working with SAP software since 1986. He installed the first SAP R/2 system in Australia for Mobil Oil in 1989. Tony has several years of Basis experience with large companies including National Australia Bank, Telstra, Coles Myer, BHP Billiton, and Australia Post. Tony enjoys SAP NetWeaver system and landscape design, extracting the best out of the database, operating system, disk subsystem, and server platform. He is very keen to virtualize, consolidate, and reduce downtime. Most recently, as an SAP Mentor Tony has taken on an application life cycle management thought leadership role in the SAP community. In his role as NetWeaver Practice Lead for Acclimation, Tony is passionate about deploying SAP Solution Manager as an initiative to reduce support costs, introduce proactive and innovative capability, and manage change. Follow him on Twitter at https://twitter.com/c821311.

You may contact the author at tony.dethomasis@acclimation.com.au.

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